The Rue du Port-Neuf and surrounding streets in Grand Bayonne are lined with artisan chocolatiers — some of them operating for more than a century, making Bayonne one of the oldest chocolate cities in France. The shops are genuine ateliers, not tourist boutiques, and the quality is uniformly high.
The most famous names include Daranatz, Cazenave, and Puyodebat. Cazenave in particular is worth visiting not just for the chocolate but for the old-fashioned salon de dégustation in the back, where you can sit down to an extraordinary cup of hot chocolate — thick, unsweetened, whipped to a froth in the Bayonne tradition. The chocolatiers also produce mendiants, truffles, and tablets with local flavours like Espelette pepper. If you are buying to take home, the Bayonne ham and chocolate combined make a formidable set of gifts.