Alegio Chocolaté

This chocolate tasting was so much fun. I planned this as a date afternoon with my hubby.
We were a bit early so we spent some time puttering around the shop, looking at pictures and reading articles. The guy at the shop was friendly and welcoming.
We got started a few minutes late. The host (I wish I could remember his name) was funny and intriguing. He shared the history of chocolate and their farm. He mixes a good amount of questions for the audience and does an amazing job preparing you to taste real chocolate.
We tried around 10?, different chocolates. He walks you through how to appropriately experience chocolate. Do not chew it. Let it melt. Respect the hard work that went into the high quality product. I loved so much about this tasting that I immediately bought my parents a tasting pass so they could try it out.
I love that their chocolate is so pure. Even the chocolate that have add ins like orange peel, coffee, ginger, or salt and pepper use the same high quality chocolate. The chocolate melts and toward the end you get to enjoy these lovely pops of flavor. So amazing.
We bought two kinds of chocolate. We did not blink an eye at the prices. We knew what we were paying for and it was well worth it. I know I will crave this chocolate. It looks like all other chocolate is officially ruined for me

They have absolutely amazing chocolate here. The 80% with sugar crystals is probably one of my favorites. The people who work here are very knowledgable about chocolate and they even let you taste samples before buying! I’ll have to come back here sometime on a weekend when Claudio is around!

Yay. Did the chocolate tasting. Panos was über-​awesome; delivered many facts about cocoa in a joyful way. Chocolate here is out of the world. We ended up getting 100% and 85% crystal; both were deeelicious. You may find here pricey ($ 26 per box = 160g), but it’s well worth. Strongly recommended for cocoa lovers.

Came here with friends for a tasting not knowing what to expect and I actually never even heard of this chocolate shop before. I was pleasantly surprised. The tour by Panos was 2 hours (even though it was only booked for 1 hour). He is a super eclectic and interesting person who has a deep love of his work. You could tell chocolate is his passion! He also has a funny sense of humor which made the tasting fun. I think we got to try all the chocolates in the store. He just kept on bringing out more and more chocolate!
You may have sticker shock when looking at the prices, but once I got home I compared the prices with my other chocolate favorites and prices are nearly identical. The big difference is this chocolate has the huge brick size while other brands stock primarily small bars. (Comparison with Dandelion Chocolate for example). It’s definitely worth supporting a sustainable company that has good values. There are few left.

We got a groupon for an hour-​long chocolate sampling which ended up being closer to two hours because there was nobody signed up after us. The owner gave instructions on how to optimally enjoy the chocolate and showed us how to get the most out of every piece. He also explained the chocolate creation process and how his chocolate was different than most mainstream chocolate because of their creation process.
What really stuck out to me was that the 85% cocoa wasn’t bitter at all, unlike any other 85% I’ve tasted.
The owner was affable and willing to answer any of our questions. He seemed to be enjoying giving the sampling as much as we were enjoying receiving it.
It opened my eyes to what chocolate can really be.

I do not have a very discerning palette; so I would not pay a fortune for a small incremental benefit.
As with many buying decisions…
Is going from 70% chocolate to 100% — worth forking out some serious $$$?
Of course, some who have money burn will do so.
But to me. this is a lot of hype; story telling!
It is a well-​disguised retail outlet! That is just what this place is!
A buyer should think about «sufficiency» vs. «optimality».
By all means. drop by, if you have nothing to do… and have a lot of spare time on your hands.

This chocolate shop is very charming and unique. One of the owners that I met was an absolute delight to talk to and learn about chocolate from. It was a great experience and to learn that most chocolate is made with vanilla, but theirs is not! They take great pride in their product and process which was nice to experience.

We did the chocolate tasting for 2 through a Groupon deal. I think it was supposed to last one hour, but it ended up being close to two hours with all the things that the staff have to say. The guy leading the tour is a little eccentric and borderline inappropriate, but he was highly entertaining and fun.
This is chocolate like you have never tasted before. It feels like a gimmick, but you can actually taste the difference between this chocolate and other high-​end chocolates. We know, because we sampled other brands’ chocolates as part of the tour. For example, did you know that 100% chocolate actually isn’t bitter at all? And that most chocolates in the world have added vanilla (even if it’s not in the ingredients list), so once you taste chocolate without vanilla, all you can taste with other brands is the vanilla?
The tour included tastings of:
— Roasted cocoa beans
— 100% chocolate– it’s like butter
— 80% chocolate with sugar crystals– my second favorite, the sugar crystals melt in your mouth at the same time as the chocolate and provides some sweetness
— 73.5% chocolate with cacao beans
— 70% with crystallized ginger– my favorite
— 70% chocolate with alcohol-​infused raisins
— 70% chocolate with salt and pepper
— 70% chocolate with crystallized orange peels
— 70% chocolate with Liberica coffee nibs
— Roasted coffee beans covered with varying % of chocolate, including 100% chocolate, which is not available to the public
I think you can BYO alcohol to enjoy during the tasting. Just double check with the staff.
Bad thing: because the chocolate is delivered straight from Africa, they are sometimes out of stock of the popular offerings. It would probably be a good idea to call ahead of time if you have a favorite you’re looking for.
Second bad thing: the chocolate is expensive. This would definitely be saved for a well-​deserved treat. Good thing: through the tour, you’ll understand why the chocolate is priced so high.

Outstanding chocolatier. Claudio really knows his way around the cocoa berry.
When entering Alegio be prepared to transport your tastebuds to another world. This isn’t your commercial Godiva chocolate shop. Alegio owns the farms they source their chocolate from. They control the entire supply from sourcing, to processing, to sales.
Once you experience a taste of Alegio melting on your tongue, your tastebuds will shame you for trying anything else.

The chocolate you’ve eaten in the past are lies, after the chocolate tasting here!!! Just like most people on here, my bf and I came here to look for Christmas presents and found something more.
The gentlemen working there was so welcoming and knowledgeable. You could tell he was passionate about what he does, and wanted to share his knowledge with others who are will to try the chocolate and listen.
In the end my bf and I bought 7boxes and 2bars of chocolate for people we wanted to share this with. It was totally worth it! I urge you to at least try it out! It will be worth it!

I love all the hype and ideas about the place. But, the only thing is the bars I bought were far too old, had been in the heat, whiteish powder on top and so were far from great

Outstanding presentation and quality. Very good variety… taste your way through chocolate heaven. If you truly love chocolate, this shop is a must.

After visiting this place, I feel like I’ve been eating Imposter chocolate. Haha… but after the Chocolate tour, I was pretty impressed with the taste of the cocoa beans, which I expected to be bitter. The tour by Panos was informative and entertaining. I took 2 other friends with me and we all ended up buying some chocolate from there. The place itself is easy to miss… the sign says «Claudio Corallo», but the inside is very cute.

I have never had chocolate before. That’s what I learned this weekend at Alegio Chocolate.
At Alegio, you’ll taste chocolate the way it tasted 150 years ago and the way it should taste always. Free of additives like soy lecithin and vanilla that are found in even the most posh of chocolate brands, the chocolate here exists in its purest form. The shop owner, Panos, is absolutely wonderful and facilitated a fantastic tasting event. After a charming video tour of Claudio Corallo’s chocolate plantation in Sao Tome, he encouraged myself and other attendees to try to guess the notes in each piece of chocolate we savored. His passion for his product was infectious, and we would erupt in lively debate as the layers of chocolate melted away and left remnants of pepper, fleur de sel, sugar crystals, and even raisins in rose muscat.
I knew that this chocolate was truly special when one of Panos’ customers stopped by the tasting to drop off some beer he had brewed with cacao nibs he purchased from the shop. I walked out of Alegio in awe of the sheer magic that Panos and his fellow chocolate aficianados have managed to cultivate within the walls of this tiny shop on the quiet block of Bryant & University. I’m proud to say that I am a new customer and will find it difficult to walk by without popping inside Alegio!
If you have not had the pleasure of meeting Panos and trying REAL chocolate, the way it is supposed to taste, hurry over for a true chocolate awakening.

So gf and I were looking for a good gift and thought about giving chocolate. Randomly decided to check out this place since it is so highly rated. At first I was worried that the prices would be ridiculous for just some chocolate, but I realized quickly this was what we were looking for. Perfect gift for real foodies or I’m sure this would be great for wine connoisseurs also.
The owner was super nice and gave us chocolate samples while explaining each one. You will taste the difference from cheaper chocolates immediately. I wouldn’t buy this all the time for myself but I will definitely be back to buy some as gifts.

This was an interesting experience. You’ll definitely try chocolate you’ve never tasted before. The whole history lesson was a bit too extensive for my liking. I think the entire event lasted almost 2 hours, but the chocolate tasting was probably only 45 minutes max.
I enjoyed getting to appreciate the chocolate rather than just munch down on it. Many of them were very good. I wouldn’t say worth the $ 12 per bar though. Maybe I’m not a chocolate snob, I’m pretty happy with my vanilla infused $ 2 chocoalte bars from Trader Joes.

Let me just start off by saying: I LOVE CHOCOLATE. By chocolate, I mean vanilla-​added, soy lecithin-​filled goodness. Thank God for Groupon for introducing me to this place which makes the real thing. I now have a total appreciation for REAL chocolate. Panos was one of the kindest people ever, spending the extra time after the tasting tour to tell me more about the island his chocolate is from. Truly an educational experience. Despite being a sugar addict, I really enjoyed the 100% chocolate but also my favorites were the orange, alcohol-​infused raisins, and the salt and pepper. Chocolate in its purest form. It keeps your taste buds guessing! And hurray for no dairy!

Make no mistake, this is not See’s candy. I love See’s, but that’s just candy. IF you’re looking for REAL chocolate then Alegio is for you.
I stopped in recently to buy several boxes for gifts; perfect for a hostess!
Great flavor choices and they are generous with samples to help with selection. Attractive, stylish packaging.
High quality product! And, gracious, knowledgable owner.

I had eaten their chocolate before when a friend had brought it over to our house, but this was the first time that I got to visit their actual shop — I was very impressed!
They have a very pure take on chocolate, which is a complete 180 degrees from chocolate shops that mold ‘mystery’ chocolate into bunnies. To me, it is super refreshing and I absolutely loved their chocolates. They had some really interesting flavors including a ginger chocolate.
I want to come back for a more formal chocolate tasting in the future, but I am definitely a fan!

If you want to taste the authentic of chocolate, you should come here. The owner, Claudio, will be pleased to tell you about the story of Choco Beans, where the plantation is, how they produce their chocolates, etc.

Wow.
I am never going to look at chocolate the same again.
We came home and I couldn’t stop raving about this place. So I am going to continue raving on Unilocal!I highly recommend the tour and will be recommending to all my friends and family!
The Claudio Corallo chocolates sold here have been written up in National Geographic as well as other media channels and have been dubbed as best chocolate in the world. After first hand tasting the chocolates I can see why.
The chocolates are organic non GMO without vanilla and soy that most chocolates have. It was a highly educational experience and after the taste test I now know what real pure chocolate taste like. The chocolates are produced on an island off West Africa. We tasted chocolate with 100% cocoa, 80%, 75%, and other varieties as well including ones with coffee beans.
Don’t think about. Just book the tour. I am not easily impressed and this blew my f’en mind.
My husband doesn’t like chocolate and this experience was highly enjoyable for him.

Wow… the chocolate tasting at Alegio will change how you look at and taste chocolate for the rest of your life.
I went to the chocolate tasting at this Palo Alto location (they have one in Berkeley too) with my friend who bought the groupon. The little sign outside of the store says Claudio Corallo, but on the door it says Alegio, so it can be a little confusing.
We arrived a few minutes earlier than our 3pm tasting time that my friend had called in to reserve. There were a total of 11 people total (including ourselves) sitting around the table in the shop for the tasting. We met Robin, who would be our teacher of all things chocolate for the next hour. She introduced us to another employee who had been helping to prepare the samples that we would be indulging in. We were given little paper cups and filtered water and a napkin. The water was I think to cleanse our palettes after sampling each chocolate.
Robin talked briefly about the history of chocolate — the cacao beans and how it came from South America and how it was brought over to Europe and that it was the Europeans that made chocolate into the form that we know today. She talked about her partners including Claudio Corallo and his wife, and another guy from Greece and how they have a cacao farm and production facility the tiny islands of Sao Tome and Principe, off of the west coast of Africa. They’re quite the international team — Claudio is originally from Italy, his wife is Portuguese, their other partner is Greek, and Robin is American. Chocolate dream team! We also watched a little bit of a French documentary, in which Alegio is the subject of, where we saw the employees collecting the cacao pods, all the way to the scene where they mixed the fermented and roasted cacao beans into liquid. It was totally in French but the visuals speak for themselves.
Then we got to tasting! First we got cacao beans which we broke apart. We tried the germ separately to taste that and then the cacao nibs. When processing their beans, they manually take out the germ — to do that is super labor intensive, so I can already see why the chocolate here is so expensive. Most other big name chocolatiers leave the germ in. Then we tried the 100% cacao. I don’t think I’ve ever had 100% dark chocolate before — it was pretty good. Robin said that some people eat 100% cacao for medicinal purposes. And since it’s 100%, it has no sugar mixed in with it, so it could satisfy your sweet tooth without having any sugar in it. Pretty cool!
We tried the 80%, 75%, one with cacao nibs in it, 70% with orange peel zest, 70% with ginger, 70% with coffee, 70% with uva, 70% with salt & pepper, and chocolate covered coffee beans. My favorites were the ginger chocolate, the salt + pepper chocolate, and the coffee beans. Somewhere in between tastings, Robin gave us a sample of another company’s chocolate, one that uses soy lecithin as an emulsifier in chocolate. I’m not exactly sure what it means, but after tasting the Alegio chocolate, there was definitely a different aftertaste to «chocolate X.» And this was after letting it melt in my mouth (not biting and chewing it like I usually do). Mindblowing.
The chocolate here is quite expensive — I didn’t buy any. But the chocolate tasting was amazing. It really opened my eyes and now I can’t look at regular chocolate bars at other stores in the same way again.