I learned about Bonnat chocolate on a trip to Voiron way-back-when, well over a decade ago, when I wanted to visit the Chartreuse distillery, to learn how the mysterious herbal elixir was made. It was an interesting trip, especially because one of the smells coming from the infusing vats filled with herbs reminded me of the smell of some of the herbs you’d smell on the streets of San Francisco, specifically in the Haight-Ashbury, near where I lived.
What stood out most from that trip wasn’t that smell, or learning that the liqueur had a secret recipe that only two monks knew, or that there was a gift shop filled with all-things Chartreusian (not Carthusian, like the monks were). It was the ovals of chocolate, wrapped in golden foil. When I unwrapped the foil and popped the whole thing in my mouth, a few seconds later there was an explosion of flavor like I’d never experienced before. I was hooked.
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