Saturday, April 4, 2015

Pure Decadence

Once in a while, I run across something that I just have to try.  Nuance Chocolate is one of those places.  When I first read about the small batch, bean-to-bar shop, I was intrigued.  I mean, how cool would it be to have an actual chocolate factory in Northern Colorado?  I filed the information about the shop away in the back of my little mind for a future date.

A few months later, one of the local blogs I follow did a review of Nuance, and I remembered reading about it.  It jumped to the top of my list of places to try.  One day.  You know how that works, you get really excited to try something and then life happens?

It just so happened that two weeks ago, Jay had a Friday off which coincided with the Foodie Walk in Downtown Fort Collins, so we decided to go.  I was absolutely thrilled to see that some new places had been added to the walk and one of them was Nuance Chocolate.

The store is beautiful and we were treated to a mini-lesson on how the chocolates are made.  We got to see the beans and saw samples of each stage of the chocolate-making process before we received a sample.

I'm fairly certain my eyes rolled to the back of my head when that lovely piece of chocolate hit my palate.  I don't consider myself a chocolate snob by any means.  I love me a Hershey's bar and consider the gold-wrapped happiness of a Godiva bar blissful.

But this chocolate?

Nirvana.

Pure Decadence.

Mouthgasm.

It's that good.  The people who work at Nuance are passionate about what they do and talking to them reminds me of speaking with the sommelier at a small vineyard in Tuscany we had the pleasure of meeting.  They speak about their chocolates like a wine-maker speaks of his grapes.

I've been back twice since the Foodie Walk and haven't been disappointed yet.  So far, I think my favorite is the Sea Salt, but I've got a few more flavors to taste (I haven't even started in on the truffles yet).

Nuance Chocolate is definitely worth your time and money when you need to just treat yourself (or, if you're the generous type, treat someone else).