For over forty years, we’ve been making ice cream on the South Devon coast, rooted in a simple belief: if you start with exceptional ingredients and take the time to do things properly, it shows in the final product.
Seven years ago, we began making chocolate too, not as a sideline, but as a way to keep our skilled team employed year-round and to extend that same philosophy into a new craft. From day one, our chocolate was never about shortcuts or mass production. It was about making something we could stand behind.
Ingredients First, Always
One of the biggest differences between our chocolate and much of what’s on the supermarket shelf comes down to ingredients. Unlike large-scale, big name brands, we don’t rely on cheap fillers like palm oil, vegetable oil or soya.
Instead, our chocolate begins with cocoa nibs, the pure centre of the cocoa bean, rather than being driven by sugar or milk powders. In fact, sugar is, on average, around ten times cheaper per tonne than cocoa nibs when bought wholesale, and cocoa nibs themselves are roughly five times more expensive than milk powder. Choosing nibs as our primary ingredient is a conscious decision, even though it costs significantly more.
Our nibs are organic, fairly traded and sourced from a cooperative in Peru, grown in a biodiverse environment rather than a monoculture, commodity-traded system. That means better quality cocoa, more resilient farming communities and a supply chain we feel good about supporting.
How Our Chocolate Is Made
As an artisan producer, we work on a much smaller scale. Every bar is hand-wrapped in fully compostable packaging that’s designed and made here in Devon. At our current volumes, flow-wrapping in plastic would be cheaper and faster, but it’s not something we would choose to do anyway. Hand-wrapping takes time, care and people. It’s slower, but it reflects our values and the level of attention that goes into each bar.
Craft, Not Compromise
From the outside, it might be easy to compare one chocolate bar with another purely on price. But behind ours is a very different story, one of organic cocoa nibs, fair trading, skilled hands, compostable packaging and a commitment to doing things properly rather than cheaply.
Just as with our ice cream, every decision we make with chocolate is guided by quality, integrity and long-term thinking. It’s not the easiest way to make chocolate, but it’s the way that feels right to us, and we believe you can taste the difference in every bite.
