Okay, I will take one for the team this year and sample and research chocolates to determine the best boxed chocolates for Valentine’s Day 2023. What can I say? I’m selfless.
Perfect for any chocolate lover in your life, this box set includes 14 milk, dark, and white chocolate truffles. It’s packed with your favorite classic chocolates from Godiva as well as three entirely new flavors: Mexican Cacoa, Cacao Honey Delight, and Modern Love.
Godiva’s Belgian chocolates are incredibly flavorful, with a depth of chocolate taste even in their simplest pieces. It’s a brand many already know they enjoy indulging in.
If you want something that they’ve never tasted before, try Flair Chocolatier. Their Ruby Cacao Bar Set wouldn’t be out of place at the dessert course of a five-star restaurant. The flavors are delicate, clever, and unique.
I was able to get my hands on media samples of a couple of Flair’s bars, with no promise of any review at all, and I have to say I’m blown away by the flavors. This set includes their Tokyo, New York, and Paris ruby chocolate bars.
The Tokyo bar is accented with Shizuoka matcha, genmai puffed rice, and white chocolate crisps. I think this is my favorite of the set. I’m not always the biggest matcha fan, but it works so well with the fruity ruby chocolate and the warm toastiness of the genmai rice. If they love green tea at all, they’ll love this.
Paris is studded with fig, praline, and dark chocolate crisps and New York is filled with Fuji apples, dark chocolate pearls, dark chocolate crisps, and cocoa nibs.
I know it’s a step away from the normal Valentine’s day truffle boxes but my set of bars came in a beautiful, gift-ready ruby-pink box that I’d be delighted to receive.
Ruby chocolate is made from a special variety of cocoa beans that has a natural pink color. That feminine, Valentine’s baby pink isn’t from dyes, it’s the color of the chocolate itself. Ruby chocolate has a white chocolate feel but with a floral, fruity taste that’s refreshing and light.
If ruby chocolate doesn’t appeal to you, Flair Chocolatier also has a set of dark chocolate bars with equally unique flavors.
Step outside the heart-shaped boxes for a moment, and consider these luxury champagne truffles from Charbonnel et Walker, a British chocolatier dating back to 1875. What’s more romantic than champagne and strawberries?
Charbonnel et Walker skipped the mass production approach others, like Cadbury, took and focused on hand-making truly gourmet chocolates fit for royalty. This is why Charbonnel et Walker was awarded a Royal Warrant which means they are one of the select chocolatiers to the Queen of England.
This Tri of Marc de Champagne Gift Set contains a sampling of three of their famous Marc de Champagne Truffles in strawberry, dark chocolate, and milk chocolate. Each mini hatbox contains three truffles with a creamy texture to die.
Their Pink Milk Marc de Champagne Truffles are one of their most famous and best-selling selections worldwide. The decedent milk chocolate truffles are blended with marc de champagne, a French brandy made from the pomace of champagne grapes, giving the truffles their unique and renowned flavor. Their trademark pink coating lends a light strawberry taste.
Not sure what kind of chocolates you should get for the more masculine people in your life? Skip the frilly hearts and go for the Woodford Reserve Bourbon Ball Gift Box.
These 16 bourbon balls, each with a pecan on top, are made with real Woodford Reserve Whiskey, the bourbon of choice in our home. This set is perfect for the bourbon man in your life or Kentucky native.
A little more mainstream, Chuao is an American chocolatier with Venezuelan roots. Their chocolate bars are known for their unexpected and unusual flavor pairings like Baconluxious Chocolate (maple, smoked sea salt, and bacon in milk chocolate), Honeycomb (caramelized honey bits in dark chocolate) which is one of my favorites (bought with my own money), Salted Chocolate Crunch (sea salt and toasted breadcrumbs in dark chocolate) which sounds odd but is surprisingly good.
If the chocolate lover in your life is into trying new and interesting combinations, this might be the perfect box for them. The sturdy gift box comes with a large red bow and 36 mini chocolate bars, three of each flavor.
The flavors included are Firecracker, Honeycomb, Baconluxious Chocolate, Potato Chip, Caramel Apple Crush, Salted Chocolate Crunch, Totally Tangy Mango, Cheeky Cheeky Churro, Spicy Maya, Pop Corn Pop, Orange-a-go-go, Sweet and Salty, Cinnamon Cereal Smooch, and Strawberry Waffle Wild. If you’re looking for something smaller, they also have an eight piece gift box.
La Maison du Chocolat brings French sophistication and Parisian flair to the traditional Valentine’s Day heart. Known for their perfectionism, La Maison du Chocolat focuses on the precision balancing of flavors to complement and bring out the most pleasurable qualities of their luxury chocolate.
They’re quoted as saying they want people to experience the “otherworldliness” of perfect chocolate. I am up for that if you are.
This Heart Gift Box offers 14 pieces of La Maison du Chocolat’s most famous pralines and ganaches with ingredients like lemon zest, rum-flambeed raisins, Grand Marnier, coffee, crepe, and hazelnut gianduja–which I’m not too proud to say I had to Google. Gianduja is an Italian chocolate and hazelnut paste that would make a Nutella-lover weep.
Buying for someone with food allergies can be a struggle, but No Whey Foods is here to help with this chocolate truffle heart that is free from peanuts, dairy products, gluten, nuts, eggs, soy, wheat, sesame, fish, and shellfish.
These vegan truffles look just like any standard truffle you’d find at the store and have classic flavors like salted caramel, raspberry, and Gran Mariner. They are also kosher and free from artificial dyes and flavors.
In a word, these chocolates are gorgeous. Hotel Chocolat truly nails substance and style with their Everything H Box.
Each of the 14 unique truffles is delicately decorated to look like a piece of art. The box contains some of Hotel Chocolat’s best selling truffles including champagne truffles, supermilk caesar, carrot cake, and billionaire’s shortbread.
As you can probably guess from the flavors, Hotel Chocolat is a British chocolatier. They are deeply concerned with making sure their products are ethical. They grow their own cocao so they can be more involved in the working conditions of the cocao farmers to ensure they are ethical and slave-free.
For something decadent, and a little out of the ordinary, try these Baci Perugina chocolates. They’re each wrapped in shiny foil with a hidden message of love inside.
Now, we’re all about Nutella in our house and my husband loves Ferrero Rocher so when I brought home some samples of these hazelnut chocolates, he was a little skeptical–but they totally won him over. He said if he had to choose, he’d choose Baci.
The chocolate shell is exceptionally smooth and creamy, even in the dark chocolate versions. The hazelnut chocolate cream is this perfect silky truffle texture with just the right amount of crunch and the full hazelnut at the top gives you another texture contrast with true hazelnut flavor. It becomes this slow evolution of flavors that make you need to take a moment and enjoy.
Plus, they’re kosher, gluten-free, contain no artificial preservatives, dyes, or flavors, and have under 10 ingredients. No weird chemicals or palm oil–just real natural, pronounceable ingredients.. They are also available in dark chocolate.
While I’m never going to argue that chocolates are particularly healthy, indulging now and then isn’t something to worry about unless you or your loved one has diabetes. If you’re buying for a diabetic, you need to be looking at sugar-free options.
This sugar-free chocolate box shows them that not only did you think of them this Valentine’s day, you really thought about them and took their individual health needs into consideration. It’s packed with half a pound of cherry cordials.
If you’d rather get than an assortment, they also have a one-pound heart box of 16 chocolates including salted caramels, peanut butter cups, and espresso truffles.
Simple, affordable, and classic, you can’t go wrong with Lindt truffles. They’re magic. Nothing in nature could possibly be as smooth and silky as Lindt Swiss chocolate truffles. This Valentine Truffles Heart Box comes with 21 individually wrapped milk chocolate truffles.
If you’re looking for more variety, they also offer an Assorted Valentine Truffle Heart Gift Box with a mix of milk chocolate, dark chocolate, and white chocolate. For those on a budget, this is good choice.
Who doesn’t love Ferrero Rocher? There’s nothing not to like. That makes this 48-count gift box both impressive in size and also a near sure bet when it comes to them loving the flavors.
The Ferrero Rocher Assortment comes with 16 classic hazelnut truffles, 16 dark chocolate wafer truffles, and 16 coconut and almond truffles. And each one is individually wrapped so they’re easy to share. (Or not.)
This Belgian chocolatier has some of the best texture you’ll find in Belgian chocolate. They have a crisp snap and then immediately begin to melt for the perfect, creamy milk chocolate taste.
If you eat with your eyes first, these beautifully decorated truffles and clusters from Miami Beach Chocolates are absolutely delicious.
This box of 24 chocolates, two of each of the 12 flavors, is made when you order it and shipped lightning fast so the chocolates are fresh–you can’t say that about any of the chocolate hearts you can buy at the drug store.
These artisan truffles have a smooth texture and the clusters have that perfect texture of ground nuts for great contrast as you slowly (or quickly) work your way through the box. Miami Beach Chocolates doesn’t use additives or preservatives and come in sizes of 15, 24, or 48 pieces. You have the choice of either milk chocolate which is kosher but contains dairy (cholav Yisroel) or dark chocolate which is vegan (parve) and gluten-free.
Buying for a kid or kid at heart? How about chocolate covered Oreos with yummy toppings? This gift box from Barnetts offers 20 Oreos dipped in either dark or white chocolate in a sturdy cardboard gift box complete with bow. It’s certainly not a traditional chocolate box, but it is a box choc full of chocolate. That said, if the person you’re buying for tends to be more of a dozen red roses and candlelit dinners type, this might be a little too casual for their taste.
Each Oreo has different toppings including toasted coconut, chocolate chips, crushed candy canes, slivered almonds, sunflower seeds, and dried apricot.
When it comes to sweets for your sweetheart, stand out with the best boxed chocolates. A Valentine's Day chocolate box is classic but here are the best of 2023.
