Chocolaterie de Rive

After an afternoon of shopping on Rue de Rive/​Rhone, we were feeling quite a bit Swiss and wanted to take a break with a cup of hot chocolate. We had passed by many fancy bustling chocolateries on our way, but we decided to step into Chocolaterie de Rive, a less pretentious-​looking establishment.
The front of the store is a bakery/​chocolaterie, with a slightly cramped seating area to the side/​back. You order your drinks at your seats, and any pastries/​chocolates at the front counter. Aside from the fact that we were drinking chocolate, and therefore did not feel the need to go overboard with sweets, the bakery section of the store didn’t have a lot to offer. The pastries that they did have seemed fresh enough, but the sparse variety made them look somewhat lonely and sad, and I felt like taking one would just make the other pastries look lonelier and sadder.
Our hot chocolates came out in individual trays, the hot chocolate flanked by a small cup of water and a few sugar packets. I was impressed by the water presentation (how thoughtful!!), and appalled at the sugar (how sweet do these people want their hot chocolate, that they’d want to add MORE sugar???). Now, if you haven’t had hot chocolate in Switzerland don’t expect the sickly sweet drink you often get in American establishments. The hot chocolate was basically bitter chocolate melted into milk. I found it to be quite a bit lighter and much more enjoyable without any sugar. In fact, being a fan of salted sweets, I found myself wondering how this would taste with a pinch of salt.
Service wasn’t great, the space was cramped, and the bathroom was located under a perilous flight of stairs, but all this seemed to add to the charm of Chocolaterie de Rive. Kind of like a no-​nonsense neighborhood diner, except with chocolate.