The Winter Chocolate Show: a Celebration of Canadian Chocolate
The floor of Toronto’s The Winter Chocolate Show
Billed as “the place for chocolate lovers to meet chocolate makers,” Toronto, Canada’s The Winter Chocolate Show does exactly that while unabashedly celebrating award-winning Canadian chocolate makers and chocolatiers. The idea came to life after founders Erik Hansen and Paola Giavedoni attended the Northwest Chocolate Festival in 2016. Hansen and his wife Arianne are bean-to-bar makers themselves, the creative team behind DesBarres Chocolate based in Uxbridge, Ontario. It was while he was enroute to the NW Chocolate Festival that Hansen met some Canadian chocolate makers, sparking the plan to bring makers in this country together “to create a Canadian community and showcase the craft chocolate we make here.” Giavedoni, the owner of Toronto’s The Candy Bar, loved it and joined as the show’s business partner.
Their first show, in 2019, featured twenty vendors with about 800 guests at the historic Enoch Turner School House on the east end of Toronto’s downtown. This year, the show was held in the architecturally modernist Toronto Reference Library’s Bram and Bluma Appel Salon – a much more spacious venue with a side room where guests can partake in lecture series, ranging from live demos and curated chocolate tastings (fun fact: I held one dedicated to Canadian bean-to-bar chocolates ideal for Valentine’s Day gifting) to a panel discussion hosted by Program Coordinator and owner of Tasty Tours Toronto, Audrey Ooi. Here are some show bean-to-bar standouts that you might want to source next time you’re in Canada.
Kasama Chocolate Dragon Bar
Kasama Chocolate
Based in east Vancouver, British Columbia, award-winning Kasama Chocolate has been wowing chocolate lovers since they started in 2016. Kasama, which means friendship in Tagalog, is based on the work of four friends: Vince Garcia, Stefan Klopp, Oliver Koth-Kappus and Dominik Vosser. Count on delicious collaborations with fellow artisans, like their unique 55% Davao de Oro cacao Dragon Bar. Made with local baker Noisette by Olivia’s biscuit, itself inspired by a hot ginger and longan (a tropical fruit known as “Dragon’s Eye) drink made by Olivia’s mom in Taiwan. The bar features kiln roasted, smoked longan soaked in Shaoxing Wine, combined with ginger and black peppercorns. The result is a creamy, complex bar with fabulously crunchy bits of biscuit with a dalandan orange undernote. A must-try in celebration of the Year of the Dragon.
Vaka Spruce Bud
It’s hard not to be impressed with London, Ontario’s Vaka Chocolate’s many carefully crafted flavour combinations. Serge Savchuk is the wizard behind the melangeur, whipping up beautifully conceived bars like his 60% Tabasco, Mexican cacao Gin + Tonic bar. Toasted sorghum and juniper berries get ground together into the white criollo cacao for a dark milk bar that’s studded with grapefruit-infused crispy bits Serge calls “sour candies” for textural oomph. It tastes exactly like a grapefruit G&T without the actual G. Another must-try is his 68% Jesus Maria Mexican cacao-based Spruce Bud bar. This citrusy flavour adventure is made with wild foraged spruce buds from British Columbia. You think you’re going to get a Douglas Fir bomb—but what you taste is the first crop of springtime strawberries!
DWN raspberry toffee bar courtesy of Dawn Nita of DWN Chocolate
Dawn Nita is the award-winning chocolate maker behind Orillia, Ontario’s DWN Chocolate. She’s worked in various food-based endeavours, including as a chocolatier for two other big Canadian independent brands, before deciding to go solo. I’m a fan of her “Hearing the Ice Cream Truck on a Summer Day” (aka Neapolitan Malt Balls). Crisp, house made malt balls get bathed in layers of vanilla white chocolate, milk chocolate and strawberry chocolate. A winning trifecta! For Valentine’s Day, I featured DWN’s fan favourite, the Raspberry Toffee Bar made with crunchy bits of house made toffee flecked throughout a raspberry white milk chocolate bar. There’s no sweeter way to say, “I care,” even beyond Valentine’s Day.
Sirene chocolate
I’ve been a long-time admirer of Taylor Kennedy’s Victoria, BC-based Sirene Chocolate. The former travel photographer is also one of this country’s most lauded bean-to-bar makers. I got to meet him at this year’s show and, of course, picked up a bar of his Winter Warmer – a 65% cacao bar made with beans from Kokoa Kamili in Tanzania. The fruity chocolate is spiced with warming nutmeg and clove to give you a ray of sunshine in the middle of winter. Do yourselves a favour and pick up a bar of his 65% Dark Milk bar made with Guatemalan cacao. The maple-caramel notes in the cacao, with the addition of milk powder, make this a creamy, dreamy bar that’s cacao-forward. It’s the gateway bite for those who say they don’t like milk chocolate. Prepare to be converted!
Allo Gianduja dark chocolate with coffee & lemon
Montreal, Quebec’s Allo Simonne is both an ode to Belgian co-owner Quentin Ryckaert’s grandmother Simonne, as well as the finer things in life that are meant to be shared. Working with Mexican co-founder Vincent Coja, the two are well-known for their incredible chocolate hazelnut spreads (think of that big brand but only 100 times better!) and for their bean-to-bar tablets. At this year’s show, my husband discovered their luscious Gianduja, Coffee & Lemon long, filled rounded bar. It’s a flavour explosion of creamy gianduja infused with Totem Roasters coffee (from Honduras, made with shade-grown Smithsonian Bird Friendly® certification) and a layer of candied lemon. Enrobed in a 70% dark chocolate, this is like having the best espresso of your life on the Amalfi coast. Just close your eyes and perfetto!
DesBarres anise hyssop fig
Erik and Arianne Hansen are partners in life and in chocolate. The dynamic duo make award-winning, bean-to-bar chocolates in Uxbridge, Ontario. One of my new favourites is their Anise Hyssop Fig bar, a fab collab with Foggy River Farms, made from their anise hyssop. The result is a slight licorice flavour and crunchy bits of Black Mission dried figs embedded in a fruity 72% Dominican Republic cacao. If you’re a licorice skeptic, this is where you should start because it’s a revelation! I always say that DesBarres Apricot Bergamot bar is one of this country’s unsung heroes. Made with that same, fruity cacao from the DR, this one features dried apricots from RH Jones Farms in the Niagara region and fragrant bergamot. The result is a bar that rides that sweet-bitter edge of exceptional flavour.
Kin + Pod sponge toffee
The award-winning chocolate maker behind Vernon, BC’s Kin + Pod is Geordan Spicer. Her aim: mix kindness with ethically sourced cacao that makes a difference to the farmers growing it, and the beautiful treats and bars she makes. There’s a lot to like about Kin + Pod, including the crunchy, munchy mouthfuls of Espresso Milk Chocolate-enrobed sponge toffee. The addition of espresso adds depth and amplifies the mix of bean-to-bar cacao used to enrobe every golden nugget. These literally melt in your mouth. Fair warning though - they’re addictive!
Mayana drinking chocolates photo credit Mayana
Maria Mancini Cenobio is the Mexican-born powerhouse behind the thoughtfully created Mayana. Her hot chocolates are made bean-to-bar, often with other superfoods and the tiniest amount of sugar. XOCOLATL, for example, is based on an original Aztec recipe that was made by grind seeds from the cacao tree, mixing it with water, and chili peppers until a frothy foam is created. Her version is slightly spicy, creamy and rich. Her Amazing Superfoods Cacao with 82% cacao nibs, yellow maca, lucuma, Ceylon cinnamon and Himalayan salt tastes like a feel-good elixir with the decadence of a rich hot chocolate. The best of both worlds!
This is merely a snapshot of the show’s many vendors – there are so many others to discover including Mont Tremblant, Quebec’s Palette de Bine’s fine bars, Finnia Chocolate and Toronto’s Chocosol for MesoAmerican style bars made with panache. See you at next year’s show!