It’s tricky to find snacks imported from San Marino, but I had success going straight to the source! La Serenissima is a family-owned dessert company in San Marino that makes cakes, chocolates, spreads and other treats. The company’s name comes from the full name of San Marino – Serenissima Repubblica di San Marino (the Most Serene Republic of San Marino).

I don’t think La Serenissima exports their goods to any stores in Canada, but when I emailed the company directly about trying to place an order, they were super helpful in figuring out how to process and ship it to me. I ordered a bunch of stuff, so there will be a part 2!

Ruby chocolate lollipop – Ruby chocolate made a bit of a splash a few years ago as a totally new variety of chocolate on par with dark, milk, and white chocolate – not just a flavoured chocolate. It’s naturally pink, and the flavour is creamy, almost like white chocolate, but more floral and fruity, almost with a bit of the underlying tartness of fresh berries. Ruby chocolate is still pretty rare; I’ve only tried it once before, when there was a ruby KitKat available for a short time here in Canada. It wasn’t bad, but La Serenissima’s chocolate is much higher quality.

Torta Titano – There’s a couple cakes that are San Marino local specialties – Torta Tre Monti, which is wafers layered with chocolate and hazelnuts, and Torta Titano, a soft cake with a filling of almonds, honey, and peanuts. La Serenissima makes both, and because of my hazelnut allergy, I went for Titano. It comes in a beautiful box with a Renaissance angel on it. It’s a soft cake edged with dark chocolate, with a filling that very much tastes like marzipan. I can’t really taste the peanuts, but there’s definitely honey, and almost a bit of brandy (I think) in the filling. However, almond is the strongest flavour here!

Aquaviva dark chocolate with raisins – I like the packaging for La Serenissima’s chocolate, it’s very well done. Each chocolate is named after the different districts (also know as castles) of the country – the text on the inside of the lid talks about Aquaviva, the district where Marinus, the founder of San Marino, would baptize converts to Christianity. It’s very nice dark chocolate, almost semi-sweet, with green grape raisins studded throughout for extra texture and flavour.

Città dark chocolate – This chocolate’s packaging is based on the Città district – the capital city at very summit of Mount Titano, which includes the Three Towers featured on the box (and on San Marino’s flag). It’s just plain good dark chocolate. It’s 58% cocoa, so on the sweeter end of dark chocolate, and nice to nibble on.

La Serenissima has a soothing production video up for Torta Titano, though sadly it’s only in 240p: