Since 1917, Three Georges Southern Chocolates has been making Mobile smile.

I visited Mobile, Alabama, for Bayfest, their great big music festival. Held inside the city limits on seven stages within walking distance of one another, Bayfest is unique and a whole lot of fun. Since the music’s mostly after dark, I spent an afternoon looking for some indigenous pleasures. With Joan Jett, Kid Rock, The Roots, Alabama and more to look forward to in the evening, I wandered Dauphin Street, the colorful city thoroughfare with a real feel of the old south.

Three Georges Chocolates is housed in a classically Southern building.

It wasn’t long before a pretty New Orleans corner building painted turquoise with a black and white striped awning caught my eye. This is home to Three Georges Southern Chocolates and it couldn’t be any more Alabama authentic.

Billed as “A Mobile Tradition, est. 1917,” Three Georges boasts a soda fountain and simple glass and wooden candy counters. A classic black and white checked floor sets the stage and there’s a clear view of a big open area in the back where the candyland magic happens.

The staff make and package everything by hand

At Three Georges candy shop, you can see all kinds of confections come together, just as they have for almost 100 years. During my visit, the welcoming LaTasha Thompson bagged pralines. She’d just finished garnishing huge chocolate covered candy apples with hand chopped nuts.

Even the logo on the simple white candy boxes and glassine bags holding the perfectly burnished Pecan Pralines is beautifully old school. Big glass jars of Heavenly Hash (a mélange of chocolate, nuts and marshmallow cut into big chunky squares) sit above the Pecan Turtles, their buttery, gooey caramel insides studded with nuts and chocolate. Other house specialties include savory Cheese Straws, Pecan Logs and pretty pink mints in perfect circular shapes.

Who doesn’t love old time candy?

Whether you sidle up to the soda fountain for an old time malted or bite into one of the incredible homemade treats, I can tell you everything I tried was really as good as it gets. Three Georges is a wonderful walk into the past.

— by Leslie Long, RFT Contributor

Three Georges Southern Chocolates
226 Dauphin Street
Mobile, AL 36603
251-433-6725
To order from Three Georges, visit 3georges.com.