Notes from the kitchen
Recipe development, cacao sourcing trips, the science of tempering, and stories from the studio. New posts roughly monthly.
Most chocolate shops that say "hand-painted" mean "hand-dipped" or, increasingly, "we had a machine paint these and the box says hand-painted because marketing." Here's what it actually means at Aline Nasseh, why we do it, and why it takes four days instead of one.
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Three days at the farm that grows the cacao for our 72% Ecuadorian bar. Photos, fermentation temps, and what I learned about post-harvest processing that I didn't know.
Last July we held 23 orders in our studio for 6 days because the forecast was over 30°C across Ontario. Here's the math, the customer service, and why we don't have a "ship anyway" button.
It's our best seller. It took 11 attempts to land the recipe. Here's what failed, what worked, and the moment I knew version 11 was the one.
Every year we design the Mother's Day box around a different grandmother. This year, Aline's Mémé got a box delivered to Lyon. The story behind the 2025 collection.
The difference is enormous. We crack and grind each pod the morning of. The cost is real. The flavour is also real. Here's the math.
Every February we close the studio for a week. We empty every mould, polish every marble slab, retemper every machine. Photos of the before and after.
About once a month. Recipe deep-dives, sourcing trips, the occasional discount. No spam.