Grimaldi

On my valedictory tour of Corte, we went to Grimaldi, the best chocolate shop in Corsica. I would happily work there for free for my entire life.

They sell all the normal pâtisseries, brightly coloured macarons, gâteaux with worms of crème de marron drizzled over, slabs and slices of nut-studded nougat, falculella, the flat Corsican cakes baked on leaves, sprigs of plastic lily of the valley in chocolate pots for May day, calissons d’Aix, melon biscuits shaped like a madonna’s mandorla, cubes of frosted pâte de fruit which they arrange in pyramids in the window, and, of course, chocolates. The smell from the chocolates is incredible. You know that warm, peppery smell that rises from a ripe tomato, showing the difference between a fruit that will be white, woolly and tasteless and one dripping with sweet juice? Real chocolate gives off a smell like that, rich, almost spiced and alcoholic.





I would have to take out a mortgage to buy everything I want in this shop, and I restricted myself to a pack of Corsican chocolates to share with Jonny at home. Fourteen little squares, seven flavours, each decorated to show its interior: the clementine one has been imprinted with the skin of the fruit, the thyme has a printed sprig on it, the dark ganache with chestnut honey has little chestnuts on it, the olive oil just says Grimaldi. If you ever go to Corsica, there is no excuse to miss this place: there are branches in Bastia and Ajaccio too, but Corte is the best. Ellen, Emily, Ellen’s aunt and sister, Stella and I sat out on the street and I indulged in a last Italian hot chocolate: thick, lustrous melted chocolate with a glass of chantilly to spoon into it.