The Chocolate Museum
A short walk from the Cologne Cathedral the Imhoff-Schokoladenmuseum (or Chocolate Museum) overlooks the beautiful Rhine River.
The entrance fee to the museum is € 7.50 for adults but there is a student discount that I was not able to take not of. They also gave out a free sample! But it was a bit tiny, and I was expecting a bigger one or at least more samples for the price I paid.
They have an exhibit that showed the entire history of chocolate back to the times of the Olmecs, Mayans and Aztects. It was particularly interesting to me because I saw the name of my country frequently, the Philippines.
One other thing that I liked about this exhibit was that there were a lot of information on Fair Trade in the Cacao industry, and the precautions being done by companies to try to create better working conditions for their workers.
I think my favourite part of the museum was actually when I entered this room with all the equipment they used to make the chocolate for the free samples given outside.
That and there was this portion wherein there was a beautiful chocolate tree, around 3 meters in height, that was overlooking the Rhine River which was surrounded by Lindt milk chocolate in fondue form. They even gave me a waffle dipped in it! I went around again and asked for another one, and the lady was kind enough to have given me two.
Another interesting thing that I saw was the tropacarium, a small green-house like structure that kept temperature warm enough to let real samples of the cacao tree survive. They also showed a lot of their old molds, and some of their more prominent products throughout the decades.
There was a portion where they could make you your own bar of chocolate and you could choose different fillings like caramel or nuts. It costs around an extra 5 euros more so I didn’t try it, but if you don’t mind spending a bit to get something unique then you should.
The next portion was also interesting because I was able to see how the many different packaging of chocolates evolved. Being a design student who spends her days learning about things like these, and holding a couple of marketing positions for my organizations back home so it was really something of great interest to me.
Here’s Pamela! I forgot what country she said she came from, I think it’s Argentina. She was nice enough to have taken the photo of me above! It took her like 10 tries because she couldn’t figure out how to use my camera. The shot still turned out great though!
I enjoyed this portion where you could actually buy from one of their old time chocolate vending machines. They came from a lot of different countries, but mostly European. I don’t think tropical climates like the Philippines would be able to have these unless they were air-conditioned inside.
As a person who really, really loves chocolate, I super recommend going here. It’s also a big bonus that their souvenir shop is massive and it sells so many unusual flavours. I think I splurged here the most during my entire stay in Cologne. For me, this is a must-see destination!
