Two years ago, Millésime chocolate, a craft chocolate workshop opened its doors in the province of Liège. It is one of the few in Belgium that works directly from the bean and which is totally transparent in its process of “Bean-to-bar”.

“We do not mix neither harvests, nor regions, nor vintages.”

Process of production:

• The harvest: Millésime ensures to work only with terrains that are particularly conductive to exquisite cocoa. They also make sure that planters get fair wages and stand firmly against child labor.
• The Fermentation: beans stay in a box and are covered with a banana leaf in order to reach approximately 50-60 degrees celsius. The beans are stirred every 4-5 hours.
• Drying in the sun in order to reach low moisture content. This means 7%. That procedure allows avoiding the development of possible germs.
• The Millésime’s secret is to grinding not too high in order to avoid the bean to burn which give a bitter taste that we find in many chocolates.
• The grinding
• The Conching; with few centimetres of cacao butter.

• The Molding
• The Bars

Today, Millésime proposes a range of 16 different bars with 10 dark chocolate bars, and 4 milk for the greediest.

To give you an example, a 75% dark chocolate is made with 25% of organic cane sugar and 75% of beans. A 55% milk chocolate is made with 20% of organic milk powder, 25% of organic cane sugar, and 55% of beans.

The packaging’s drawings are imagined by a designer who will often be inspired by the country’s culture: For the 74% dark chocolate from Tanzania, the packaging is inspired by the ceramic of the country. For the 55% milk chocolate from Peru, the packaging is inspired by Peruvian bracelets.

Besides the 16 different bars, Millésime is starting a creation of “carres” of chocolates, “mendiants”, spreads, candied oranges coated with chocolate and truffles. There are also two news tablets of 76% dark chocolate made with beans form Tanzania. One is Whisky flavored and the other is Rum flavored.

At Hop, we cannot wait to propose you those new products.

Did you know that…

• A cacao pod is composed of 40 to 80 beans.
• A bean is composed of cacao butter and cacao powder.
• The idea of a bar appears in the 19^th century, before we consumed chocolate only in a liquid form.
• You must have noticed that some bars are bright and others are mat. It’s the mold that gives this look. If the mold is shining, the chocolate will be too.