Sweets Handmade Candies - Truckee, CA

Sweets Handmade Candies - visited July 18, 2015

After the visit to Cake Tahoe, we took a walking tour down the main street of Truckee and came upon Sweets Handmade Candies, a cute little confectionery shop. It reminded me of the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory with the space at the front to showcase the fudge making then the rest of the shop was devoted to confections and chocolate.

I love poking around confectionery shops. My eyes get their fill of - haha - eye candy and my nose thanks me for all the mouthwatering smells found in your typical chocolate shop. And, I'm not going to lie, my taste buds sit up and start begging as I try to decide what to get. Never mind the two cupcakes I'd just bought from Cake Tahoe minutes before.

When we walked into Sweets, we were offered free samples of their homemade fudge. Fudge. We all know I like fudge, despite the sweetness. It's fudge. Sweets had a whole tray of small bits of fudge out for sampling for the customers (I think we were pretty much all tourists) milling around in the shop. I nipped up a sample to try. And I'm sorry but I wish I hadn't. I normally try to say positive things in a review and I have a pretty low bar for fudge to clear in order for me to like it. Unfortunately this didn't pass that bar. I don't know why but the flavor just wasn't there. The chocolate wasn't very chocolaty and the texture wasn't the rich smooth creaminess I expect from fudge. And I wasn't the only one who felt this way. We all tried it - my nieces and their boyfriends - and we all had the same reaction which my niece succinctly summed up as "it tastes like brownie mix fudge". Yup. Sorry.

By that token, I felt I had to buy something now so I could find something good about the shop that I liked better because I hate not being able to say something nice about it. It was a cute shop! And the Sweets counter people were very nice and friendly. But I wouldn't go for the fudge, I'm sorry.

Instead, I picked out a Sea Salt Caramel from the display case and I had one of my nieces pick out the truffle she wanted; she chose a cappuccino truffle enrobed in white chocolate.

Fudge making at the front of the shop

Fortunately, the chocolates we selected were way, way better than the fudge. I only caught a shot of the truffle as my nieces started eating it before I could take a picture ("wait!"). But they liked it.

I'm also happy to say the sea salt caramel covered in milk chocolate that I got was superb. The caramel was soft and chewy the way I like it but not too sticky or hard and the sea salt sprinkled on the chocolate was the perfect complement to the sweetness of the caramel. So you may not want to go for the fudge but if you do go to Sweets, try one of the confectionery chocolates instead.