Southern Indiana On the Road Chocolate Discoveries 1

From May 26 through May 31, 2015, I was off to Southern Indiana with my hubby for our 23rd wedding anniversary trip. Yes, I did find some chocolate along the way. Come with me now and see what I found. If you know of others or you have a chocolate shop or candy shop or restaurant dessert in the towns we visited that I didn't find, leave us a comment and tell us where you are and the name of your business. Please do NOT leave a website or email.

May 26, 2015, was just getting to Tell City, to the Ramada Limited Inn we were staying at so we could spend two full days at nearby Holiday World in Santa Claus, Indiana. No chocolate at the included breakfasts each morning but the offerings were on par with what I expect from such hotel chains.

May 27, 2015, was our first day at Holiday World and we found Mrs. Klaus' Kitchen when we stopped into the Kringle Kafe for lunch. This photo is the back of my hubby going into the shop. Would you like to see more?




Here are some photos from around Mrs. Klaus' Kitchen in Holiday World.

The individual chocolates and fudge are in front of you when you enter from the Kringle Kafe. I'll show you the fudge in a moment.

I got five types of fudge with their Buy 4 get 1 Free deal. Rocky Road (upper left), Mint Chocolate (lower left), Cookies & Cream (middle), Chocolate (upper right), and Chocolate Peanut Butter (lower right). Nothing we got was going to last our trip with all of the hiking we did so we had to eat things in the hotel room thus the less than ideal photos. Yes, I did share four of these with my husband 50/50 split -- but not the Rocky Road which had nuts. All of them were good but the mint was oddly only mint on the top layer and the peanut butter chocolate was split layered as well.

Back to Mrs. Klaus' Kitchen with this photo of the section where they have the baked goods and huge candied apples as well as one of three check-out register stations. Because of the glass and lighting I didn't try to get a close-up of the huge candied apples but none had chocolate.

My hubby did get this XXL Chocolate Chunk Cookie from this section of the shop. He shared a bit with me, like I shared the fudge, and it was good. No, I didn't get the larger broken off part, I only took a third of the smaller side since I had to eat the Rocky Road Fudge myself.

There was also a smaller section with some items that seemed to be primarily breakfast goods, maybe left over, it wasn't clearly labeled. We didn't buy anything else at this station but check out the mural above it.

The next day, May 28, 2015, after finishing day two at Holiday world, we found Santa's Candy Castle which is along the road we took into Santa Claus, Indiana. Yup, Santa Claus Indiana. Here is me at what looks like the entrance to the castle with their statue of Santa.

This place is fairly large as you can see in this shot of it from the parking lot.

Inside are multiple rooms of different candy, toys, and books but my favorite was the front section where they sale the chocolates made for them but not by them by local candy makers. I got the Reindeer Shoe and the Chocolate Peanut Meltaway which the lady working that late afternoon said were their two biggest sellers.

Here are those treats close-up, again in the hotel room so the photo isn't great. I shared the meltaways with my hubby but the Reindeer Shoe had pecans, almonds, and cashews under the milk chocolate coating and inside a chewy caramel center. I would have loved the option of both of these in a dark or semi-sweet chocolate.



May 29, 2015, we moved to Tell City and stayed at the Kintner House B&B right in the downtown area. No chocolate for the breakfast or in the guest cookies -- the peanut butter and snickerdoodles were good but not chocolate -- from the B&B itself. We asked a BBQ we had dinner at that night where we could find chocolate or ice cream, preferably both since a bakery we found around the square was closed (it was closed our entire stay!). But that place wasn't opened and didn't have posted hours.

After a morning walking around Corydon on May 30, 2015, we had "lunch" at Emery's, the place that had been recommended to us the previous night. Now Corydon was Indiana's first state capital and there are a ton of historical sites which we love to visit.

While Emery's has candies of all types, their chocolates are primarily made by a place called Alvin's, their main focus seems to be ice cream and cold drinks. Here is just one of their wall menus with their famous shampoo bottle collection.

The owner was there and he was great to chat with. I asked him for the most chocolate ice cream he had and he gave me this: Moose Tracks with dark chocolate ice cream, ribbons of peanut butter, and dark chocolate covered peanuts. It was great!

That evening on May 30, 2015, the date of our wedding anniversary, the hubby drove us to Louisville, KY, to The Melting Pot. This is a chain and I forget to take a photo of the Chocolate Peanut Butter fondue we had but since it was our anniversary and I'm a club member, we also got this box of 6 chocolate covered strawberries which we split later that evening. We loved the dark chocolate with milk chocolate drizzle, liked the white chocolate with dark chocolate drizzle, but were underwhelmed by the milk chocolate with white chocolate drizzle that oddly tasted less chocolatey than the white dipped berries!

May 31, 2015 we traveled home slowly, stopping in Salem and Mitchell, Indiana, but sadly didn't find candy or chocolate shops open. The one restaurant we visited this day, Christie's in Salem, Indiana, had a buffet only but the desserts were not included and to be blunt, didn't look good enough to buy separately. There is a candy shop on that town's Public Square but it wasn't open on a Sunday afternoon... so sad.

Candy shops, ice cream shops, and bakeries not opened on this little trip was a frustratingly common experience. Given that there were so many rundown or vacant shops in all of the small Indiana towns we visited we have a piece of general advice -- Keep regular hours so that folks can shop and get their chocolates!