I’m delighted to bring you this interview with Lan Phan bean-to-bar chocolate maker of 9th & Larkin Chocolate located in San Franciso, CA. From their lovely packaging to their delicious chocolate bars, 9th & Larkin is a delight to have in one’s own chocolate stash! In this interview we get to learn more about 9th & Larkin’s bar wrapper design, Lan Phan’s creative inspiration and so much more. Enjoy! Lan Phan & Brian of 9th & Larkin Victoria Cooksey: What is your first memory involving chocolate (before knowing about craft chocolate)? Lan Phan: My first memory with chocolate ..read more

When I dream of desserts in bar form, or a white chocolate bar with cheese, Foxglove Chocolate pops into my mind first! In fact, if I was asked to make a list of inclusion bar makers to watch and learn from by tasting their bars Foxglove would most definitely be on that list! In this interview Linnea Surla of Foxglove Chocolate, located in Portland, Oregon, shares the inspiration for how she picked the name Foxglove for her craft chocolate and we gain insight into her cheese in chocolate bars thoughts. Linnea Surla of Foxglove Chocolates with Foxgloves Enjoy! Victoria Cooksey: How long have yo ..read more

Karl Hogarth of Hogarth Chocolate When thoughts turn to soothing, yet exciting inclusion bars Hogarth Chocolate comes to mind. While Hogarth Chocolate (craft chocolate made in New Zealand) makes lovely dark single-origin bars, the Gianduia, Buttered Toast & Sea Salt, Maple Walnut and now the new Anzac Biscuit bar satisfy the comfort dessert cravings within. I always find each chocolate maker’s individual path to discovering cacao so fascinating. Karl Hogarth originally worked his way up becoming the skipper in his own trawler with a total of 20 years experience at sea. Next, he earned a bu ..read more

Frequently in interviews with chocolate makers, as well as some that I’ve conducted, the maker is asked what chocolate they most like to pair with a certain wine, beer, coffee, cheese and so forth. Then there are those chocolate connoisseurs who adamantly say wine does not pair with chocolate at all, while still others express enjoying various wine/chocolate combos.  So, everyone has an opinion…what’s yours? Over the years I have found some wine/chocolate pairings to be delightful while others to be terrible. But what if there was a way to make it easier? That thought, along with the insp ..read more

Kim Wilson Good King Cacao (Photo Credit: Carlos Garcia) While you have most likely tried a chocolate bar of some type, have you ever tasted a whole cacao bean? Kim Wilson of Good King Cacao works with farming communities to bring the healthy snack of roasted cacao beans that have been lightly caramelized with organic cane sugar and a variety of flavors for us all to enjoy. While these high fiber snacks are delicious they are also part of Kim’s goal of finding ways to increase the possibility of a living wage for cacao farmers. My favorite flavor happens to be “Love” which is seasoned with van ..read more

Welcome to the 5th annual Dark Matters Chocolate Awards! I tasted so many lovely bars in 2020 that it was such a difficult pleasure to pick the very top bars! Throughout the year I keep a running list of potential nominees in multiple categories. To qualify, the craft chocolate bars must be ones that I tasted in the actual award year and that I paid for myself. (Makers do occasionally send me bars to try, and some are award worthy, but if I received them for free they get left out of the running in order to keep the awards fair). I tend to look for bars that are either complex, or manage to re ..read more

Who doesn’t enjoy a great bonbon? But what makes a bonbon great in the first place? It used to be that the majority of options were boxes of chocolates with an unknown filling (until you perhaps took a bite out of each one to find out), and honestly not the best flavors in some of the cheaper options. Now that craft chocolate is continuing to grow the chocolates may be made from single-origin, high quality cacao beans by craft makers. Sometimes bean-to-bar craft chocolate makers are using their own chocolate to make bonbons (hence the term bean-to-bonbon), but now chocolatiers are also experim ..read more

Corinne Joachim Sanon Symietz is the co-founder and CEO of Les Chocolateries Askanya whos craft chocolate bars feature Haitian cacao along with the bars being made Haiti. Corinne Joachim Sanon Symietz is the co-founder and CEO of Les Chocolateries Askanya All of the chocolate makers at Askanya are women and Askanya happens to be celebrating it’s 5th anniversary this year. (Congrats and wishing you many more years Les Chocolateries Askanya!). Studying industrial engineering and achieving an MBA, Corinne long-term vision was to create both a business and jobs, but she didn’t know at the time tho ..read more

Elliott Curelop and Harshit Gupta founded Madhu Chocolate together and named their chocolate after mother Madhu Gupta whose name means “honey” and “sweet” in Hindi. Harshit Gupta and Elliott Curelop of Madhu Chocolate (Pic from Madhu). Originally a software engineer and a product developer by profession these Austin, TX based bean-to-bar craft chocolate makers found their winning combo by pairing Indian inspired flavors with Columbian cacao. Due to the Texas heat their shipping of chocolate is paused until the end of August, so in the meantime we can enjoy learning some new info about Madhu un ..read more

Olivier Fernandez of Gaston ChocolatCacao fermentation? What is it all about? How does it affect cacao flavor? Why is it so important? Olivier Fernandez of Gaston Chocolat makes bean-to-bar craft chocolate in Vanuatu from cacao beans that are grown there. This interview is specific to cacao fermentation and Olivier’s experience/knowledge with fermentation in regards to Vanuatu cacao and location. Quite informative! Victoria Cooksey: Will you give a brief description of the cacao fermentation process? Olivier Fernandez: The fermentation is the second step in the process right after ha ..read more