Krause’s Chocolates

In the town of New Paltz, there sits a local chocolate shop called Krause’s Chocolate. The history of Krause’s Chocolate is about family tradition. Since 1929, the Krause family has created outstanding candies. Third generation candy maker Karl Krause uses his grandfather’s recipes and hand-dipping methods in his business. Every chocolate that is manufactured in their candy shop is a one-of-a-kind masterpiece. There are three different stores in Saugerties, New Paltz and Rhinebeck. They have been voted Hudson Valley’s Best Chocolates/Candy Store for over 18 years. Over fifty distinct hand-dipped chocolate types, a variety of flavors of homemade fudge, and melt-in-your-mouth peanut brittle are available. The majority of variations come in milk or semi-sweet chocolate.

Taste is the most important factor when using quality chocolate, which Karl uses because it was created using a Swiss formula. In contrast to the robust, strongly flavored semi-sweet chocolate, the milk chocolate is lighter and sweeter and, as its name suggests, contains more milk. What makes Krause’s Chocolates better than the cheaper quality chocolates is the lack of waxes or oils. Karl’s chocolate of choice has a robust flavor and no off-putting aftertaste. Only the finest imported dried fruits from around the world and freshly roasted nuts are used by him. Only the freshest ninety-three score butter is used in salty favorites like caramel, butter crunch, and peanut brittle. Pure cane sugar, egg-white whipped cream, fresh fruit, and fruit oils are used to make cream centers. Karl makes every effort to use natural flavors and colors. If you favor moist, exotic coconut, old-fashioned peanut butter, or soft, light marshmallows, Krause’s Chocolates are the greatest you’ll ever taste. What makes Krause’s Chocolates so unique is the method of hand-dipping their chocolate creations. Each candy’s center is hand-made in a copper cooking kettle. They are moved to a cream beater and manually squeezed in an old candy press. The best chocolate is then ready to be poured over the sweets. Each center is manually placed into a dipping pot, and the “dipper” scoops out the centers with specially made scoops, loops, or forks, depending on the shape of the center. To guarantee that every item has a rich, lustrous coating, the temperature of the chocolate is constantly maintained. The candy is scooped into separate paper cups from the dipping pot. For simple identification, these are color-coded. Warm candy trays are filled to capacity and lowered into temperature-controlled chilling tunnels. Unique, individual chocolates that are ready for hand packing emerge from the tunnel. Candy made in large quantities is inferior. Krause’s Chocolates are of such superior quality that they practically sell themselves. Never worry about freshness!

The interior of Krause’s Chocolate feels like walking into a wooden cabin. The shelves and stands all share similar colors, a light shade of brown. The whole store itself shares a similar color palette, from the brick walls to the light gray flooring. The store has an enormous selection of molded chocolates to choose from. Chocolates shaped like animals, cartoon characters, numbers and words and many more. There’s an endless amount of chocolate fun to pick from.  You have the ability to freely choose and pick up any molded chocolate of your choice. Then on its opposite side there’s glass cased shelves filled with their many tasty crafted chocolates. Chocolates such as almond bark, assorted caramels and assorted truffles in many flavors and toppings. Based off of the Krause’s Chocolates’ website those are their best sellers and favored by many of their customers. Their 1lb box of assorted chocolates are totally customizable with endless flavors to choose from. It’s overwhelming to want to try them all. Krause’s Chocolates when they have chocolate ready for any occasion and holiday!

Based on my lack of interest in chocolate, I choose this establishment because of my genuine curiosity of its craft and history. I wanted to know how great this store was because it has two other stores in New York. Coming across its reviews and articles about its chocolate made me more interested to do my research. Specific article reviews about Krause’s Chocolate that stood out to me was  the Chocolate Cult article. A blog written in 2009 titled “Special Sacramental Review”. Whereas this reviewer was sent in a box of chocolate by the Krause business itself to review. After lengthy paragraphs detailing every piece of chocolate eaten they end their review with “All of these, minus my own bias against coconut, were great tasting pieces of handmade candy. Some provided a good cocoa buzz while others were overpowered by the other flavors. At least none were so lightly flavored that I couldn’t determine what they were. This means that Krause’s Chocolates did a good job with this Special Sacrament.” (The Chocolate Priestess). Now basing my research on the customers reviews, said by Kelly & Anne F, “Keep up the good work, because you’ve got the best chocolate out there.  Wow!  This is SERIOUSLY good chocolate.” Another review said, “Krause’s Chocolates have been our family tradition for over 40 years! Absolutely delicious and the best I have had. It’s that good. Dark Chocolate Coconut Toasties are OMG good as well as everything. Thank you to all at Krause’s Chocolates for making our life sweet all these years!” (Lin L and Family). Finally, in the last review written by Jaclyn B, she wrote “Krause’s has the most amazing chocolates.  The custom boxed chocolates have a huge variety to choose from and they are absolutely delicious. Their customer service is also first rate!”. The amount of amazing feedback and compliments written by lovers of this business,

I had decided to go to Krause’s Chocolate myself with friends in the town of New Paltz. My first impression was the smell of chocolate that hits you in the face. My friend, Keisha, said it reminded her of “Charlie’s Chocolate Factory” from the amount of different kinds of chocolates and candies they had displayed. Krause was not a store where you can sit and dine in. It’s mainly a store to window shop, choose and taste the goodness of chocolate. The store has a very welcoming and calming atmosphere. Though calming can be used if you know what you want to order, the choices were endless, from chocolate covered cookie dough, to chocolate covered animal crackers to almond bark and so on. Though I hadn’t bought anything my friends had. I remember that I tried the chocolate covered cookie dough, as I said before I wasn’t a huge fan of chocolate so my opinion stays the same even after testing chocolate. Though I think someone who is huge on chocolate and cookie dough would love that treat. The chocolate was very thick and rich in flavor. It was almost creamy in texture. While at Krause’s Chocolate, I had an opportunity to interview one of the workers at the establishment named Hannah. “What is the store’s best seller?”, I ask. “The Sea salt caramels or the hazelnut truffles, I always have to restock them.”, (Hannah, Krause’s Chocolates). Hannah states that she mostly does not make the chocolates herself but she would have to say that the almond toffee is something that seems the most difficult to make. Lastly, I had asked her what her favorite chocolates in the whole store was and she stated, “That Marzipan and Coconut Toast are my favorites.”. After interviewing Hannah, I had a bit more time to walk around the store and take in my surroundings. It was a very friendly atmosphere and the customers were also friendly. The kind of customers they seem to attract are mainly people on the older scale. They might be people who just simply like eating chocolate especially from Krause’s or they are possibly people who just want to give gifts to people they know. The store also had small plush animals and foods that you could buy as well as some horse printed china. Overall the place is very soothing from the chocolate smell to the nice homely cabin-like appearance and interior. I definitely recommend this place to someone who really enjoys chocolate either for themselves or wants to give a delicious gift to family, friends or even coworkers. Krause’s chocolates is definitely the place or a home to chocolate lovers!