Following on from Eating in Spain – Seville, we flew to Brussels and caught the train to Bruges for three nights. Bruges is chocolate heaven! There are so many chocolate shops to check out and I made sure to stop by as many as possible. During our first full day, after some sightseeing, we were meant to walk back to our hotel (short 20 minute walk), but instead it took about 3 hours as I kept having to go into every chocolate shop.
My friend told me to look out for the Guild of Bruges Chocolatiers sign, proudly posted outside some chocolate shops. This signifies that the chocolates are actually made in Bruges as a lot of other shops import the chocolates from elsewhere. This post concentrates on the Guild-approved Belgian chocolate shops.
Chocolaterie Jan De Clerck
One of our first stops was Chocolaterie Jan De Clerck which I had read sold great quality Belgian chocolate at reasonable prices. Unfortunately, the shop was closed the day we visited and we never made it back. I did take some photos of the display window cluttered with all sorts of chocolate.
1 kilo of chocolate for 16€ is a very reasonable price compared to some of the other chocolate shops we visited.
The chocolate beer bottles looked pretty impressive.
I’m disappointed that we never got to try some of this chocolate, but we purchased so much over the next few days that there wasn’t going to be enough room in our suitcases.
Chocolalino
Chocolalino is a relatively small shop compared to others. The display of chocolates only took up one glass cabinet, three rows deep.
There were so many amazing sounding chocolates so I asked for a small 250 gram box to take my pick. But the server brought out a pre-packaged box of assorted chocolates instead. This turned out to be about 18-20 of Chocolalino’s chocolates but it wasn’t all of them.
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Though a little disappointed that I wasn’t able to make my own selection to fill the box, I can understand the pre-packaged box is necessary especially during peak season so that customers aren’t waiting in a queue for too long while someone slowly picks what they want.
These were my first chocolate purchase in Bruges and I was completely happy with the assortment. The chocolate is so smooth and velvety, and the assortment of pralines and nuts are basically what I would’ve picked anyway.
Pralinique
Pralinique has been open since 1997 and offers more than 100 different types of chocolates.
The Guild of Bruges Chocolatiers symbol is proudly displayed outside.
Pralinique certainly has a huge range of chocolates available filling every wall. I didn’t know what to look at first. I noticed the back wall had pre-packaged assorted boxes available in three different sizes.
Apart from the individual chocolate pieces displayed, there was another wall filled with various chocolates packaged in plastic boxes and tied with ribbon – a great gift idea.
Boxes of assorted chocolates start from 5.80€. We purchased a few boxes as gifts (I believe it was 10.80€ for each 500 gram box). The owner was lovely and talked to us about the history of the shop. Friendly place, good prices, and yummy chocolate.
Dumon
One of the biggest chocolate shops in Bruges is Chocolaterie Dumon, established in 1992. It has three shops in Bruges alone and we headed to the newer and bigger of the two at Simon Stevinplein.
It’s more of an upmarket chocolate shop and looks very sophisticated inside.
The main counter is set up in the middle of the large shop with a display of various chocolates snaking around the counter. There are some small tables and stools to one side for those that want a hot chocolate or snack.
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The range of Dumon chocolate tablets is amazing and I wished I’d been able to buy some to try.
My friend had asked me to bring back the Dumon praline sea shells which were smooth, rich, creamy and oh-so-good.
There was so much chocolate to look at and I couldn’t decide what to buy. So I purchased a 750 gram box of assorted chocolates for 28.50€, quite expensive compared to the prices at other shops. I loved the hazelnut/nut chocolates, but I thought the majority of these chocolates were pretty average. I’m not sure if it’s because I waited too long to eat them all (we did bring it all back to Australia with us) but the chocolates weren’t as good as expected, particularly for the price. I do wish I had bought a small box of those praline sea shells for myself too!
The Chocolate Line
Another of the big chocolate shops in Bruges is The Chocolate Line, headed up by chocolatier Dominique Persoone who is also the head of the Bruges Guild of Chocolatiers.
The Chocolate Line is famous for its weird and wacky flavours like the Miss Piggy of bacon and almond praline, a fried onion chocolate, and a wasabi chocolate.
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The Chocolate Line has individually wrapped chocolate bars, large bricks of nut chocolate, boxes of chocolates, chocolate ‘pill’ bottles, and products like chocolate lipstick.
Although there are boxes of pre-packaged assorted chocolate available for purchase, I also noticed some people picking out their own individual chocolates placed in a cellophane bag. So I lined up and pointed at a few random chocolates to buy. It was a little annoying as I couldn’t see what a lot of the chocolates were due to so many people standing against the glass cabinet. I decided to pick the more unique flavours like the the red lips ‘Satisfaction’ of white chocolate with a ganache of Crystal Head Vodka, and strawberry & kaffir lime jam, and the red apple filled with caramel with apple balsamic vinegar and a praliné with “Granny Smith” green apple. I also picked the bacon, gingerbread, and a few more with interesting ingredients. At 72€ per kg, I spent 8.93€ for 124 grams worth of chocolates. Not cheap.
At the register, I also noticed a small packaged bag of purely nut chocolates which are my favourite! So I purchased a 150 gram bag for 12.50€ (which in hindsight is more expensive than the hand-picked bag). These were delicious and I almost polished off the whole thing in one sitting.
I think the more unique flavours are great to taste test, but I much preferred my chocolate nut mix.
Chocolaterie Sukerbuyc
This artisan chocolate shop has been open since 1977. I didn’t see Sukerbuyc until our last day in Bruges, and by this stage we had already purchased about 3kg of chocolate and couldn’t buy any more as we still had 6 countries to travel to. We didn’t even make it inside!
Verheecke
Verheecke is the oldest chocolate shop we’d seen, opening in 1919. It’s another chocolate shop we passed but didn’t buy anything from since we had no more room.
I think prices are decent at Verheecke with 500 grams going for 12€. The shop also makes an assortment of jelly lollies and marzipan.
I’m sure there are several more Guild-approved chocolate shops in Bruges, but we didn’t have the time, stomach space or luggage space to continue browsing!
In the next chapter, I’ll cover off some non-Guild chocolate shops.
Guild of Bruges Chocolatiers – Chocolate shops visited:
- Chocolaterie Jan De Clerck – Academiestraat 19, 8000 Brugge
- Chocolalino – Walplein 20, 8000 Brugge
- Pralinique – Katelijnestraat 35, 8000 Brugge
- Chocolaterie Dumon – Simon Stevinplein 11, 8000 Brugge
- The Chocolate Line – Simon Stevinplein 19, 8000 Brugge
- Chocolaterie Sukerbuyc – Katelijnestraat 5, 8000 Brugge
- Verheecke – Steenstraat 30, 8000 Brugge
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