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Hotel Chocolat.
The name conjures up romantic images of languorous days spent in tropical splendor. Which is precisely the point, according to Angus Thirlwell, co-founder of the UK-based company . The company has been around for nearly twenty years, originally as a catalog retailer, explains Thirwell, but about seven years ago we realized that our brand really didn't reflect our aspirations for the future so we decided to change our name.
'Chocolat' is more romantic than 'chocolate' and we wanted a name that would transport people, in their minds, to this magical, escapist, place that provides physical pleasure and nourishment of the soul. Once we came up with 'Hotel' we immediately knew it was right choice.
Sometime this Fall, Hotel Chocolat will be more than a collection of over 40 retail boutiques in the UK and the US (in Boston) it will also grow to include an actual luxury eco resort on the Caribbean island of St Lucia , closing the circle and bringing the metaphysical to the real world.
The main plantation house at Hotel Chocolat on Rabot Estate.
Rockers on the Plantation House veranda for guests to relax in.
Located on the Rabot Estate, a World Heritage Site , the Hotel Chocolat features a view down to the ocean soaring to views up to 1000 m (over 3000 feet) twin volcanoes. The hotel boasts eco-conscious barefoot luxury in an intimate boutique - only 14 rooms - setting. True to its cacao heritage, the hotel's 60-seat restaurant, Boucan, is built on the site of an old boucan (throughout the Caribbean today, a boucan is place where cacao is fermented, and boucan and buccaneer share the same linguistic roots, perhaps going all the way back to Arawak word for barbecue).
A view down to the water from Rabot Estate.
The Pitons from Rabot Estate.
But this is only one part of the Hotel Chocolat story. St Lucia has a long history of cocoa production but there has been little or no export from the country in a long time. Rabot Estate is not only the site of a hotel, it is the center of the company's efforts to reinvigorate the local cacao industry which has fallen on hard times; many established cacao farms were turned over to faster-growing bananas. With support from the Board of Directors and the Government of St Lucia, Hotel Chocolat representatives met with independent growers all over the island to see what they could do to help.
From the beginning, we knew we needed and wanted independent cocoa growers in St Lucia to work with us, says Thirwell. We met with them and asked them to join our team. We guaranteed to purchase 100% of the crop and we pay a premium that is as much as 30% over the international commodity price. We also provide technical assistance. There are no middlemen, so all the benefit goes to the farmer.
When we started out a couple of years ago we worked with two farmers. Today we're working with more than 80 independent growers that supplement what we grow on Rabot Estate. We've established a central collection facility where we oversee all the fermentation and drying to control quality, and we've established a number of nurseries on the Estate to provide farmers with subsidized seedlings. It's still a little too early to precisely quantify all the benefits to farmers and the local economy of what we're doing, but growing from two to eighty farmers in two years is an indication that we must be doing something right.
Drying racks on Rabot Estate.
The company intends to begin making chocolate in small batches from defined areas of Rabot Estate and from different areas of the island. The goal is to locate areas that exhibit interesting terroir characteristics and then to commercialize them. The hotel is set to open this coming November (2010) and there is a site for the chocolate factory nearby. This close proximity will enable Hotel Chocolat to experiment freely on a small scale with a focus on small batch and vintaged production. Other beans grown on the island will be sent to a cocoa processor who, working in close collaboration, will create chocolate on a larger scale for use in other products.
One aspect of opening the hotel is especially interesting to me: agro-tourism offers a means of independent verification of the claims made for an operation by people who are visiting. Hotel Chocolat is committed to a total open access policy where anyone staying at the hotel can ask any of the farmers any questions they want about the operation of the business. Visitors can see for themselves the fermentation and drying and walk through the farms to inspect them. This is a very low cost alternative to expensive certification programs and it's straightforward and transparent - anyone with an interest in finding out what is really going can take personal responsibility for doing so.
The company has been approached by groups interested in its approach, called Engaged Ethics, and there is a move underway to transplant the approach they are pioneering on St Lucia to several other Caribbean islands, including Jamaica and St Vincent.
Not content to innovate on the plantation, Hotel Chocolat announced recently that it was raising money through a private bond issue offered to the approximately 100,000 members of its Tasting Club. The dividends for investment are truly sweet investors receive their dividends in chocolate. (Just as I was getting ready to post this article, I received an e-mail with an update on the progress of the bond issue. Those details (a smashing success so far) can be read here .)
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If you register on LivingECO.com before August 10, 2010, you can enter to win vegan organic chocolate truffles in a paper box infused with wildflower seeds (and some other nice eco-friendly gifts). After you finishing eating the chocolate, you can plant the box, and wildflowers will grow. http://www.livingecho.com/contest/
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I arrived home from a road trip in the wee hours on the 4th of July and was too tired to unload the car. In addition to all the equipment for my new chocolate factory I'll be opening in the fall, I had 400 lbs of cocoa butter and over 150 lbs of beans in the back of the car. I was convinced that I had the best smelling car (especially at the end of a two week road trip).
The next morning I had confirmation of just how good it smelled. When going to open the back of the car, I noticed the windshield wiper was broken. Then I noticed the paw print smudged in the two week build up of grime on the back of the car. It took me a few more minutes before I noticed the puncture marks all along the back bumper.
Yes, even bears appreciate good chocolate.
Fortunately for me, the bear was unsuccessful in reaching the chocolate. The car is a different story.
The next morning I had confirmation of just how good it smelled. When going to open the back of the car, I noticed the windshield wiper was broken. Then I noticed the paw print smudged in the two week build up of grime on the back of the car. It took me a few more minutes before I noticed the puncture marks all along the back bumper.
Yes, even bears appreciate good chocolate.
Fortunately for me, the bear was unsuccessful in reaching the chocolate. The car is a different story.
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Dessert Professional Social Media Coverage of the World Pastry Forum This Week
By Jeffrey J Kingman, 2010-07-02
Cross-posted from Chalkboarder News
Weve got a veritable flurry of social media content messaging happening over the next seven days from our client Dessert ProfessionalMagazine.
Rather than publish a hundred blogposts a day from this client into Chalkboarder News, we invite you to follow them directly:
Dessert Professional on Facebook
Dessert Professional on Twitter
You can also follow the activity via Chalkboarders Facebook and Twitter accounts and through my personal accounts:
Many thanks (!) and I hope you can keep up 
# # ( Jeffrey )
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Please join the new blog about cakes, cookies, candies and chocolate.... Susie Norris Sweets . Bloggin' with recipes, travels, confectionary techniques, interviews, articles and all the sweet stuff.
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Hey everyone,
A friend and I are starting up a small chocolate-making company in the Washington DC area called Potomac Chocolate Co. We're hoping to be the DC area's first bean-to-bar chocolate makers. Currently, we're just starting out and learning the process.
We've set up a Kickstarter project to help us get up and running and on our way towards our first bar. If we hit our goal, the money will be used to acquire lots of beans for testing, experimenting and refining our process.
We've set up a series of rewards for different pledge levels, including final bars and bars still in development.
Our goal is to get $1650 in pledges by July 31st. We'd really appreciate any support you could give, and would love it if you could spread the word!
You can see our project page on Kickstarter here:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2051922175/micro-batch-bean-to-bar-chocolate-makers
To get more info on us, check out our site and/or our facebook page:
http://www.potomacchocolate.com
http://www.facebook.com/PotomacChocolate
Please feel free to reply or contact me with any questions about our project, or our company in general.
Thanks!
Ben
p.s. Thanks to Clay & TCL for letting me post this!
A friend and I are starting up a small chocolate-making company in the Washington DC area called Potomac Chocolate Co. We're hoping to be the DC area's first bean-to-bar chocolate makers. Currently, we're just starting out and learning the process.
We've set up a Kickstarter project to help us get up and running and on our way towards our first bar. If we hit our goal, the money will be used to acquire lots of beans for testing, experimenting and refining our process.
We've set up a series of rewards for different pledge levels, including final bars and bars still in development.
Our goal is to get $1650 in pledges by July 31st. We'd really appreciate any support you could give, and would love it if you could spread the word!
You can see our project page on Kickstarter here:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2051922175/micro-batch-bean-to-bar-chocolate-makers
To get more info on us, check out our site and/or our facebook page:
http://www.potomacchocolate.com
http://www.facebook.com/PotomacChocolate
Please feel free to reply or contact me with any questions about our project, or our company in general.
Thanks!
Ben
p.s. Thanks to Clay & TCL for letting me post this!
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We are very pleased to launch our new bar made from Vietnamese cocoa beans, conched and refined in our atelier in Kent. If you also process Vietnamese beans, i would be interested to swap a few bars to compare.
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Hi All,
I just wanted to let everyone know about this great site ChocoMap . What a greatplace for chocolate enthusiast to find chocolate stores in any city! Ifyou have a store I recommend you put it on there and spread the word.Also a great place to find chocolate news, recipes, and resources.Enjoy!
I just wanted to let everyone know about this great site ChocoMap . What a greatplace for chocolate enthusiast to find chocolate stores in any city! Ifyou have a store I recommend you put it on there and spread the word.Also a great place to find chocolate news, recipes, and resources.Enjoy!
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I am sitting here in Paris, three days after my trip to Lisbons only gourmet chocolatier, enjoying a block of 70% dark chocolate with raisins and a unique and potent liquor extracted from the pulp of the recently harvested cocoa fruit. Its heady and delicious.
It was on my recent trip to Portugals capital that I was fortunate enough to have a friend with a Frommers Guide. Inside, it shared a little-known address on a not-so-well-known street: that for Claudio Corallo on Rua Cecilio da Sousa.
I knew my chocolate block was going to be a winner since the moment we rushed into the small boutique, we were warmly greeted and eagerly treated to a chocolate tasting.
We sampled the 70%, 80% and 100% chocolates, a tasting that ranged from semi-sweet to acidic. Some of the bars had ginger or orange pieces, adding a touch of lovely sweetness.
And some of the pristine chocolates are made into more whimsical bonbons, like these lovelies made with pine nuts.
Claudio Corallo is not for everyone. With a devotion to pure cacao that's cultivated on the tiny African archipelago of So Tom, the beans are meticulously sourced and produced into dark chocolate without any sugar or vanilla. Its hardcore chocolate.
But how wonderful (and, to me, delicious) to discover an Italian man, living in Africa, producing chocolate in Iceland and offering it at a hole-in-the-wall in Lisbon.
Sometimes when youre crazy for chocolate, you really will go to the ends of earth for it.
It was on my recent trip to Portugals capital that I was fortunate enough to have a friend with a Frommers Guide. Inside, it shared a little-known address on a not-so-well-known street: that for Claudio Corallo on Rua Cecilio da Sousa.
I knew my chocolate block was going to be a winner since the moment we rushed into the small boutique, we were warmly greeted and eagerly treated to a chocolate tasting.
We sampled the 70%, 80% and 100% chocolates, a tasting that ranged from semi-sweet to acidic. Some of the bars had ginger or orange pieces, adding a touch of lovely sweetness.
And some of the pristine chocolates are made into more whimsical bonbons, like these lovelies made with pine nuts.
Claudio Corallo is not for everyone. With a devotion to pure cacao that's cultivated on the tiny African archipelago of So Tom, the beans are meticulously sourced and produced into dark chocolate without any sugar or vanilla. Its hardcore chocolate.
But how wonderful (and, to me, delicious) to discover an Italian man, living in Africa, producing chocolate in Iceland and offering it at a hole-in-the-wall in Lisbon.
Sometimes when youre crazy for chocolate, you really will go to the ends of earth for it.
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