A Chocolate Factory without Oompa Loompas

The marvellous Riegersburg

Zotterchocolate - This is the name of the only real Austrian chocolate. Some members of the English group felt peckish and they made their way ahead, including myself, towards the chocolate factory which is located not far away from the magnificent Riegersburg. It took us only one hour to reach the destination. The drive was very entertaining and an auspicious start for the trip. We chatted the whole driving time through and that somehow distracted our great driver Julia from keeping track. Anyway, we arrived there before the others :-)

After paying the entrance we got a little spoon which we used for all the very delicious chocolate fountains. Before the tour began a film was shown to us. It was about the owner of the factory, Josef Zotter, and about the whole process of importing the cocao beans from India where the weather conditions are more than perfect for growing cocao beans. The concept of the Zotterchocolate is what makes the chocolate so special. The Zottercompany really tries to treat the farmers in India very fair and provide them with food and good salaries. This is not so common in the rough world of food companies. So, while eating a Zotterchocolate you can be sure that the farmers are treated well in comparison to other companies, where the poor farmers don't earn enough money and therefore live under deprived conditions. After the short film we couldn't wait longer and stormed into the real factory. We stuffed ourselves with every chocolate we came across, some of them were good but a few were a little yucky. Two chocolate fountains were heavenly delicious to me - nougat chocolat and caramel chocolat. I couldn't help returning to refill my spoon. In the end a few of us had to rest because they were too full to move on :-)

Then we continued to the Tiergarten and stroked some lovely animals. The weather was sunny and we enjoyed the mountain air which smelled like the scent of cows :-) We even saw Josef Zotter smilling at us but I couldn't react so quickly and so there's no picture of him :-(
After a while we got back in the cars and visited a typical Autrian Buschenschank at the foot of the Riegersburg. We had a marvellous view to the castle. We had a really great time while eating freshly made bread with different spreads and salads and while drinking fresh juices. But it eventually began to flash and we had to return back home.
The Zotterfabrik-trip was a good idea to stuff our bellies with great chocolate and to get to know each other a little more. We really had a great time :-)

By the way, I'm sure there were Oompa Loompas in the factory but they were too shy to come out :-)