Philadelphia Chocolate Tour, the tour of your chocolate dreams!

 

Philly loves chocolate. Well who doesn’t I am a big chocolate lover, and I was very fortunate to be able to take a PhiladelphiaChocolate Tour this past weekend. A chocolate tour? What is this? Well one of the tastiest and fun ways to tour center city Philadelphia. Here is a little more information about the tour from the website:

The Founder and CEO of The Philadelphia Chocolate Tour Valerie Beck's, a writer and a lover of chocolate. The team and I provide guided walking and tasting tours of unique Philadelphia chocolate shops and cafes, and we're excited to show you our favorites while you sample the specialties at each one!

On a Philadelphia Chocolate Tour, you'll learn about the history and health benefits of chocolate, and the history of the city of Philadelphia and the neighborhoods we visit, as you savor America's favorite flavor. Let us give you a private tour as a scrumptious outing for your family, office, bridal party, or other group. Or, join a public tour and make new chocolate-loving friends!

My daughter, my friend Rose and I started the tour off early Sunday morning. Chocolate before lunch? Yes please! Our tour guide, was extremely friendly and really wanted to get to know us, and for us to get to know her. Our first stop was the famous Philadelphia Reading Terminal.  This is a large building that used to be a train station that is now a giant food court of sorts. You can get any kind of fruit, or ethnic food all under one roof, and guess what else you can get??

Well chocolate of course! We stared by drooling over the chocolate in the windows outside of the terminal, I knew this was going to be a fun tour. But when will we taste the delicious morsels? Well we went right to the first stop on the tour, Famous 4th Street Cookie Company, were we each had a warm freshly baked chocolate chip cookie. Now I don’t think there are any better ways to enjoy chocolate, mmm melted chips in a warm cookie, that is heaven.  I loved this well-made cookie, what a great start to the tour!

Now we were off to the next stop, the Pennsylvania General Store in the Reading Terminal market,  we were able to try a delicious chocolate drop, and “chocolate scrapple” now I know what you are thinking, ugh that is disgusting…. Well it is not chocolate covered scrapple (ugh) it is a chocolate hodgepodges of mixed items (much like scrapple) various chocolates, marshmallow, pretzels and just about any sweet delicious item they could add. The drop and the chocolate scrapple were very tasty and left me hungry for more chocolate. We were given time to shop and even got a discount on our purchase, that was very nice.

We then walked to a local shop, that you would never know made delicious chocolate, Marcie Blaine Artisanal Chocolates the front of the store is a trendy boutique but in the back there was a place where they made the divine chocolate, you could see the chocolate masters at work, it really made me hungry for my next chocolate taste, and that was a white chocolate bark, that had a great creamy taste, I was a big fan.

Teuscher Chocolates of Switzerland,  have you ever had Swiss chocolate? Well I have had an Americanized version of Swiss Chocolate, and it is nothing like the real thing. We were able to try their best seller a champagne truffle (well everyone but my daughter, who tried a piece of hazelnut chocolate) this was thick and creamy. When I think of truffles, they are mostly thin and almost watery inside but not this truffle it was thick and amazing chocolaty, the flavor was divine. This was my favorite taste of the whole tour! I will have to stop by again and pick up some gifts for my family and friends this holiday season.

And we were off for more! While we walked our tour guide, told us the history of chocolate, chocolate facts and some trivia chocolate questions as well. It was fun and the time passed quickly.  All of the chocolate on the tour was handmade, no processed chocolate here. The chocolate was quality and not the kind you can pick up at a drugstore, this was real slowly made delicious chocolate made with care to be thoroughly enjoyed.

Or last stop was for a tasting of Capogiro Gelato, we were able to try four amazing flavors, mocha, chocolate banana, chocolate chip, and dark chocolate.

My daughter raved over the dark chocolate, I have to say it was pretty good. I am not that big of a fan of dark chocolate but this tasted like brownie batter, and you can’t go wrong with delicious brownie batter.  The Mocha was my favorite, the perfect combination of chocolate and coffee, very refreshing and Rose’s favorite was the vanilla with chocolate chips. There was a flavor for everybody, and did you know that Capogiro Gelato was voted best gelato in the world by National Geographic. Now that is a great achievement, and I can see why it was voted #1, it was the best gelato I have ever had so rich and creamy and flavorful.

This is a walking tour, and what a great way to walk off those calories from the chocolate. Walk learn great facts about the city and chocolate history, then eat more chocolate, then walk and eat more chocolate… repeat…  What a great way to visit the city and discover unique treasures in chocolate, that you may have never seen or tried before. Some of the shops we visited I passed many times before, and never even knew they were there

The tours run daily, here is the schedule:

When:

Our public tours run as follows:

• Tuesdays at 12:45 pm
• Wednesdays at 12:45 pm
• Thursdays at 12:45 pm
• Fridays at 12:45 pm
• Saturdays at 10:45 am 
• Saturdays at 2:45 pm
• Sundays at 11:45 am
• Sundays at 2:45 pm

The weekday tours are 1 1/2 to 2 hours long and weekend tours are 2 to 2 1/2 hours long. Advance registration is recommended because tours often sell out.

Contact  online or at info@philadelphiachocolatetours.com or 215-833-0044 for private tour availability. We tour year-round, because chocolate tastes good in any kind of weather!

We enjoyed the tour, but make sure to wear you sneakers  we really walked, the time passed quickly and we were enjoying ourselves and before we knew it we went from 12th and filbert streets to 20^th and Sandsom street, that is a nice walk, but it was a lot of fun. If you are going to be visiting the Philadelphia area or if you are a local, I would highly recommend The Philadelphia Chocolate tour. You get to try some amazing chocolates and get to tour the lovely city of Philadelphia, with a knowledgeable  guide who know all there is to know about chocolate, and Philadelphia.

For more information make sure to like Philadelphia Chocolate Tours on Facebook.

 





Disclosure: The reviews and or opinions on this blog are my own opinions . I received tickets to enjoy this tour.  No monitory compensation was received. I was not required to write a positive review. Your experience may differ. The opinions I have expressed are my own I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commissions 16 CFR Part 255: Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsement and Testimonials in Advertising .