Noah’s Raw Chocolate
The Raw Chocolate Man (aka Noah Nicolas Loin) hails from Fairfield, Iowa – a small city in southeast Iowa known for innovation. Surrounded by farms growing corn and soybeans along with cattle and hog operations, Fairfield is not a city where most people expect to find an abundance of start-ups, including software and development companies, an international center for TM (Transcendental Meditation), and Noah’s Raw Chocolate – a company committed to making raw chocolate desserts that also happen to be non-GMO, dairy free, gluten-free, organic, and delicious. Read more 
Cacao Prieto
Chocolate makers – meticulous aficionados who choose to start with cacao beans to create their chocolates – are the rock stars of an industry that celebrates the subtle flavor differences of the cacao bean. Bars are now notable for the characteristics of the beans – the variety and where it was cultivated which are influenced by rainfall, sunshine, temperature, and the type of soil in which the bean was grown – and the multi-step process by which the chocolate maker takes large colorful cacao beans and turns them into a mouth-watering sensation. Read more
Lilly Handmade Chocolates
Has your mouth danced today?
Walk through the Tremont area of Cleveland, Ohio and visitors will quickly learn the historic neighborhood is home to 29 churches, 31 bars, and 1 amazing chocolate shop known as Lilly Handmade Chocolates. Situated among historic homes (Tremont is one of the oldest parts of Cleveland and once housed a large German and Ukrainian population that has since expanded to include young families, empty nesters, hipsters, and visitors who come for the shops, galleries, restaurants, and cafes) at 761 Starkweather Avenue, Lilly Handmade Chocolates is a destination point for those who appreciate chocolate, fine wine, and craft beers. Read more
Raw Crunch Bars
Just when I think there couldn’t be a better tasting, nutritionally sound bar on the market, along comes one that blows me away. That would be the Raw Crunch Bar: a handmade, unprocessed, uncooked energy bar made with a core of four types of organic seeds (sesame, sunflower, pumpkin, flax), three types of organic nuts (cashews, pecans, macadamia), raw honey, and Celtic sea salt. Read more
The CORE Meal
Core Foods – based out of Oakland, California – was established by Corey Rennell, a self-confessed adventurer who traveled the world and learned two lessons along the way: Â eat mainly whole fresh fruit and vegetables, and treat others the way you want to be treated. Sounds simple, but as we all know, the day-to-day demands of life often keep us from eating healthy and forgetting about the people we interact with each and every day. Read more
15 Bean-to-Bar Chocolate Makers
Whether you prefer chocolate bars with 56%, 70%, 80%, 82%, or even 90% cacao, there are real bean-to-bar chocolate makers who understand and strive to provide a pure chocolate experience for those of us who still love to rip open a chocolate bar when the craving hits.
A real chocolate maker produces chocolate from raw cacao beans and goes through eight (8) processes (along with many subprocesses) – selecting, roasting, winnowing, refining, milling, conching, tempering, and molding – to make a rich, earthy bar with very subtle flavors of nuts or fruits:Â Remember that. There’s a test at the end of this post. Read more
Dick Taylor Craft Chocolate
We have never shied away from a challenge in order to produce a beautifully finished product. It is just part of who we are. Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â ~Dustin Taylor and Adam Dick
How did two craft masters – Dustin Taylor and Adam Dick – specializing in furniture and wood boats come to be premier bean-to-bar crafters of chocolate? According to Taylor and Dick, the answer lies with time, care, courage and commitment. Fitting a mortice or shaping a plank is not unlike handcrafting chocolate from a cacao bean says the co-founders of Dick Taylor Craft Chocolate. Both processes are challenging and must be done slowly to exacting specifications to produce a beautifully finished product. Read more
U Rawk
Real food has real benefits.
Ten years ago, energy bars were on a small shelf in the health food aisle. Today, most grocery stores and markets allocate prime supermarket shelf space to dozens of energy bars because so many of us want a delicious and nutritious bar that we can take anywhere. Although several great tasting bars are on the market, there is only one raw energy bar that totally rocks it in the flavor and nutrition department: the U RAWK Bar. Made with all organic ingredients, the U RAWK Bar is simply scrumptious…and incredibly nutritious. Read more
Domori Biancomenta
Creamy and spearmint are two words not normally used together but the Italian chocolate maker, Domori combined white chocolate with real spearmint leaves to come up with one of the creamiest minty chocolates on the market. Called Biancomenta, an Italian word meaning “white with mint,” the chocolate bar comes in two sizes: a single serving taster square (4.7 grams) and a regular sized bar (25 grams of .88 ounce). Read more
Potomac Chocolate
The Washington, DC metropolitan area is a powerhouse of intrigue with politicians, lobbyists, judges, lawyers, and government offices but today the spotlight is on a chocolate maker in our nation’s capital. Ben Rasmussen owns and operates Potomac Chocolate: a real bean-to-bar chocolate maker who handcrafts truly incredible dark chocolate bars in a suburb (Woodbridge, Virginia) of Washington, D.C. Read more
Paddock Post 