Chocolate may be a familiar food and a common ingredient, but the word "chocolate" can mean a variety of different things. One simple word encompasses everything from smooth, sweet white chocolate to the darkest bittersweet chocolate, and everything in between. While chocolates in their original form have an excellent taste, a little extra added flavour hurts nobody and instead does wonders to your palate. If you were to pick out a standard dark chocolate flavour, it would be usually the regulars involving cranberries, fruit and nut. Now, exotic flavours like masala chai, hibiscus in these new chocolates immediately make you intrigued, in fact many Indian chocolatiers follow the bean-to-bar philosophy sourcing homegrown cacao from the southern states of Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.
Chitra'm Craft Chocolates
Image courtesy: @chitramchocolates
Chitra’m craft chocolates is a bean-to-bar chocolate brand from Coimbatore. These chocolates are made with handpicked cacao from Kerala, infused with popular Indian flavours that are not just delicious but extremely healthy owing to the use of alternate sugars like palm sugar, natural unprocessed cane sugar, coconut sugar and jaggery. The chocolates exhibit nuances of the bounties of nature like fruit, tea and some fine wine in their purest forms.
Soklet
Image courtesy: @soklet.in
Soklet is India's only tree-to-bar chocolate maker. All the chocolate beans they use in their chocolates come from their plantations in the foothills of the Anaimalia Hills. They handle the whole chocolate bar making process, from the breeding of the cacao trees to the tempering of the bar. Some of the flavours include bhut jolokia chilli, spiced hibiscus, black garlic and desi rabdi bars. Their chocolate range includes a selection of dark and milk chocolates, flavoured bars, drinking chocolate, and chocolate spreads.
Paul & Mike
Image courtesy: @paulandmike.co
Kochi-based Paul and Mike believe farming and fermenting cocoa is both an art as well as science and that everyone deserves great chocolate. The brand is known for pairing Indian fruits like jamun, sitaphal, and Alphonso mangoes with their mild to dark chocolate. Some of my personal favourite flavours include hokey pokey, Sichuan pepper and orange peel, olive rosemary sourdough, peppermint gelato, and thandai. The label is committed to becoming carbon positive by 2023. You can also visit their chocolate making unit in Kochi for a farm-to-bar tour
Mason & Co.
Image courtesy: @masonandco_chocolate
Founded by Jane Mason and Fabien Bontems and based out of Auroville in Puducherry, Mason & Co. is a vegan brand of chocolate bars made with beans from south India, particularly grown on farms in Tamil Nadu and Kerala. All their products are hand-crafted by an all-female workforce. Some of my favourite flavours are crunchy peanut butter and dark chocolate, chilli and cinnamon dark chocolate, black sesame and raisin, and rosemary and sea salt.
La Folie
Image courtesy: @lafolierealchocolate
In her pursuit to showcase the most authentic expression of real chocolate, Chef Sanjana has embarked on a journey to create chocolate from its origin – the bean. Their finest chocolate bars are made with single-origin cacao and infused with local ingredients to create unique flavour profiles. My personal favourites - sea salt caramel, smoked pink Himalayan salt creamy coconut milk and maple & chunky almond butter chocolate bar.
Kocoatrait
Image courtesy: @kocoatrait
Helmed by co-founder Nitin Chordia, the brand insists on a zero-waste lifestyle. For example, according to the company, the chocolate wrapper is upcycled using reclaimed cotton from garment factories and reclaimed cocoa shells (a by-product of the roasting process) making it biodegradable, compostable and recyclable. A single origin bean to bar chocolate brand, their signature 70 per cent dark air roasted chocolate sprinkled with sustainable desert salt of Rajasthan and sweetened with Khandsari sugar is one that’s not easy to forget.