Venchi

Having previously opened U.S. locations across major East Coast cities and a handful in California, cententarian Italian “chocogelateria” Venchi debuted its first Orange County shop at South Coast Plaza in late December 2025. Footsteps away from the mall’s former Ghirardelli chocolate and ice cream parlor, the much smaller Venchi shop is within eyeshot of LA-based chocolatier See’s Candies and decidedly more upscale, attracting passers-by with chrome framing, a window display of gelato cones, and light holiday imagery. Inside, your attention is quickly drawn to a wall-mounted chocolate waterfall that endlessly pours across a large Venchi logo, subtle but very memorable branding optimized for the age of social video sharing.

While Venchi’s left side hosts a gelato counter, most of the space is devoted to colorful displays of chocolate bars, individually wrapped imported Italian pieces, and bonbon-like praline chocolates sold by the pound. The prices for the latter are brutal – $68 per pound, explained as $17 per quarter-pound – but in our experience sampling seven different flavors, typically delicious. Fillings made with pistachios and hazelnuts are intense and delicious, caramel and coffee are tastefully strong, and from their subtle molding or topping textures to flavorings, the dark and milk chocolates are hard to criticize. While we didn’t feel great about spending over $20 for a tiny box of pralines, Venchi offsets that sting with an app-based loyalty program that offers a free mini chocolate bar for signing up, a “birthday surprise,” and additional discounts based on spending.

Many visitors will skip the chocolates in favor of Venchi’s gelato, which is made in-house daily, served at the aforementioned counter, and enjoyed at a collection of small tables by the store’s front windows. Despite the Italian-style gelato cones in the window display, it turns out that cones aren’t actually available inside, apparently due to a South Coast Plaza policy. Instead, gelato is sold here in cardboard cups (three sizes from $7.45 to $9.45, growing from one to three flavors max), chocolate/nut-coated cardboard cups (+$2.70), milkshakes (“gelatoshakes”), and with coffee. Eighteen to 20 choices include always-available Italian classics ranging from stracciatella to cappuccino, tiramisu, hazelnut, and green pistachio, as well as fruit sorbets (lemon, raspberry, mango, strawberry), and rotating contemporary options such as matcha, peanut butter, and Dubai-inspired pistachio kunafa.