Chocolate aroma crosses salty air and scents of hazelnut: it starts from the sea and gets lost into the highest mountains of Europe:
From Genoa, where Christopher Columbus- the first importer of chocolate in Europe- was born, it is possible to explore the Ligurian west coast, where chocolate rhymes with holidays, seashore and luxury.
From Genoa-the birthplace of engineer Bozelli, whose invention of the first machine to refine cocoa paste and mix it with sugar vanilla eased the way to chocolate bars, it is possible to reach Piedmont where chocolate is everything: industry, culture, wit, literature.
The chocolate history in Italy is closely linked to the Savoy family. In 1563, to celebrate the change of the ducal capital from Chambery to Turin, Emanuele Filiberto of Savoy, nephew of Carlo V of Spain, symbolically offered a cup of hot chocolate to the elites of the city. His son Charles I during the wedding with the Infanta of Spain Catherine Michela Habsburg offered chocolate desserts. Everything occurred at Rivoli Castle which is now seat of an important Museum of Contemporary Art.
