Candy is dandy, but chocolate wine really seems to get taste buds in an uproar. Never heard of chocolate wine? Chances are you will. Due to the products’ peaking popularity, more area store owners are stocking shelves with the chocolate-infused beverage.

“In the last year it’s really taken off,” says Scott Schmidtberger, manager of Alvin’s Wine and Spirits, 4000 W. Sixth St. “I wouldn’t drink a lot of it. This is a dessert wine, and I would treat it like a dessert. A little bit goes a long way as it definitely has more calories in it than a regular wine.”

Steve Wilson of City Wine Market, 4821 W. Sixth St., has a small selection of chocolate-infused wines in stock, including Trentadue Chocolate Amore, a chocolate-infused port wine.

Some varieties of chocolate wine look like Yoo-Hoo or malty chocolate milk. Many brands barely even resemble wine, the chocolate-infused version having a thicker consistency than regular wine- — and a much sweeter taste. The overly sweet flavor occurs because chocolate-wine vinters typically don’t allow the yeast consume all of the sugar in the wine in order to counteract the bitterness, which is characteristic of both chocolate and wine.

Combining chocolate with wine is tricky because both ingredients contain tannin, a plant and astringent. Tannin is the bitter component that creates a dry, puckery feeling in the mouth, dissolving saliva instantly.

“They are two chemically complex things that have the great ability to clash,” says Steve Wilson, co-manager of the City Wine Market, 4821 W. Sixth St.

So to get past the tannin issue, some wine makers leave lots of sugar in the wine before mixing in the chocolate, he says. And this approach creates a calorie-packed liquid that has more viscosity than normal wine.

“These really aren’t wines,” Wilson says. “It has wine in it, but I definitely wouldn’t call it wine. It’s more like a liqeur.”

City Wine currently sells Trentadue Chocolate Amore, a chocolate-infused port wine. In order to mix the chocolate with the wine, Trenadue vinters used Merlot because it’s less tannic. Other vinters use white wine for the same reason.

Chocolate wines generally fall into two camps. Some are port-style wines, which are dark red and have, if done right, a rich, dark chocolate taste. An example would be Rosenblum Cellars’ Desiree dessert wine. The other style mixes cream into the wine, creating a sort of adult milk shake.

Cocoa di Vine falls into the latter category, though it’s a little different in that it is based on a blend of white wines, including torrontes, moscato and Pedro Ximenez, a sherry grape.

Cocoa di Vine can be found at Cork & Barrel, 901 Miss., though a year ago chocolate wine wasn’t selling at all locally, says Brendan Dowdle, store manager. Recently, though, people have begun to show more interest in the beverage. The store added two new chocolate flavors to its wine inventory at the launch of the year: Cocoa di Vine and Chocovine. Because of successful sales for February and March, Cork and Barrel is ordering new shipments of chocolate wine now. And holidays are not responsible for the pickup in sales, Dowdle says.

“It’s almost random,” he says. “We didn’t sell a single bottle on Valentine’s Day.”

Alvin’s Wine has several varieties of chocolate wine for sale: Coco DiVine, Chocolate Shop, Chocovine and Sweet Sunset Red Chocolate.

City Wine offers only one chocolate wine for sale because Wilson says he likes to keep products as organic as possible, avoiding wines loaded with chemicals and flavoring agents.

“There is a lot of bad stuff out there,” Wilson says. “Some (of the chocolate wines) are sickly sweet and fairly artificial in flavor.”

Some chocolate wines can taste more like Hershey’s chocolate milk than wine, says Wilson.

And anyway, many good wines have notes of chocolate flavor in them naturally. An example is Washington Merlot, which has undertones of chocolate and almond flavors.

“The chocolate (in wine naturally) is not as dominate as the (artificially flavored versions) are,” Wilson says. “Some of the natural versions are bit more subtle.”

Artificially-flavored chocolate wines tend to be so sweet and rich that most people only drink a small amount.

“Most people would probably not slug down a 5 ounce glass of this stuff. More like a 2 ounce pour,” Wilson says. “It’s like eating a full pint of ice cream: it’s definitely done, but it’s certainly not for everyone.”