Chocolate

By Boston.com Staff

There are two acceptable options for giving chocolate as a gift: You can go Whitman’s, or you can go local. If you choose to go the latter, good luck picking from the hundreds of quality chocolatiers that New England has to offer, but a few of note are Harbor Sweets in Salem, Boston’s Serenade Chocolatier (who will create a chocolate cornucopia for your holidays), Laughing Moon in Stowe, Vt., and Safe Harbor Confections in Waldoboro, Maine. Safe Harbor is environmentally conscious, donates part of its profits to animal welfare charities, volunteers and gives blood on a regular basis, so its slogan of “Better Chocolate, Better World” holds true. Its chocolate is sold across New England. The Sampler doesn’t stand a chance against that quartet.