The Chocolate Train: Stops at Gruyère and Broc

All aboard the Chocolate Train

The Chocolate Train begins at Montreux, Switzerland and makes its way through the mountains to its first stop Gruyère, home town of the famous Gruyère cheese, and on to Broc, Switzerland, home of Cailler chocolates (a Nestle company).

The train itself is composed of "Belle Époque Pullman” deluxe carriages, all of which are 1915 1st class, and 1^st class panoramic coaches.

The tour was completely full of enthusiastic chocolate lovers. Who wouldn't be excited to board a train that looks like a candy bar? The cars had shiny gold exteriors and lovely script just like candy wrap.

It’s a full day on The Chocolate Train. It leaves early enough for it to include cups of hot chocolate and chocolate filled croissants in case riders needed that morning extra boost of caffeine.

I fear this could be the size of chair I'll need after the chocolate tour.

As the train initially climbed away from Montreux and a panoramic view of the Swiss Riviera, we absorbed the ambience and “went with the flow”. This was easy while sitting on green velvet seats in a car that was decorated like my great grandmother’s living room. And gazing out the train windows I though, “Isn’t it wonderful that Switzerland actually looks like all those travel photos we’ve all seen?”

Along the trip, mountain springs looked like beautiful, clear hard candy glittering in the sun. Ripe purple grapes reminded me of grape gumballs. As we rolled by steep green pastures sprinkled with dairy cows I thought, “Why don’t we make and eat chocolate cows as well as bunnies for Easter?” Well, once the mind has played the game of Candy Land, it’s difficult to get out.

The first stop at Gruyère, a town that invented one of my favorite cheeses, is a visit to a museum of sorts. It’s really a demonstration of cheese making following a guided history shown on illustrated walls… English was one of several languages provided on personal listening devices to hear to the narration. Then you tour the ongoing process of making and aging cheese.

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We come from the states of Minnesota and Wisconsin, land of milk and cheese. My husband and I had no surprises. 

However, about four years ago I took a friend to a local Wisconsin dairy to see the milking operation and cheese factory. The up-to-date milking equipment at that farm was imported from Switzerland. Milking’s now a matter of the cows forming a line up to automatic milking stanchions. This is more cow friendly than the older system of cows waiting separate stanchions waiting for the milking machine to be attached to pump milk.

Back at Gruyère, the impeccably clean cheese making equipment is mostly vats with paddles turning the liquid as it forms curds after rennet is added. I was impressed that the vats were copper instead of stainless steel. We had a good look at all the equipment from above. And while observing the cheese they also give you a sample to munch on as you walk around it. I think samples are always the best exhibit!

The tour leaders then loaded us onto buses for the short trip up to the castle and town around it for lunch.  We had about two hours to do what we wanted. There were lots of restaurants, hotels, shops and the castle was open for museum like tours. We had a meal and then just strolled around. The view from the castle is worth a long pause to enjoy.

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Next we were off by bus to the Maison Cailler (Nestlé) which is a chocolate factory at Broc. This is everything you'd expect and maybe more. The exhibit is very well organized. The visitors are divided into groups of about 10 and then proceed through semi-animated rooms depicting the origins and history of chocolate to present times. 

It seems like chocolate has been with us forever, but it's actually only been available to larger populations since about World War One. The refined product we know now is largely due to European development. Our tour included a walk-by of a research/factory area. The entire tour, we were exposed to the lovely fragrance of warm chocolate--similar to the way movies make sure the popcorn odor wafts into the reception area. Even as we were returned to our train cars for the return trip the intense chocolate odor drifted into the train cars.

Of course, there were samples! Lots of samples at the end of the tour. At the end of both tours, gift shops offered the opportunity to load up on your favorites.

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