Written by Suzie
If you bring a bar of Bare Bones chocolate to the counter at Bellwoods and I’m working, the chances are I’m going to start telling you what I love about this brand.
Bare Bones is a bean to bar micro-batch chocolate company, with it's own chocolate factory and hot chocolate shop based on Osbourne Street in Glasgow. It was on a weekend trip to Scotland that I first became aware of them. I bought a bar of 60% Honduras Milk Chocolate and knew it wouldn’t be my last.
The soft pink packaging of the Honduras Milk Chocolate Bar was the first thing to catch my attention. I’m a sucker for minimal and simplistic design, so to me the beautiful palette of their chocolate bar wrappers are a visual treat. Each bar is distinct with it's colour - from pastel pink, to vibrant yellow, soft blue, to dark blue. As a self confessed paper fanatic, the fact that the soft, matte card wrapper also feels good and can be recycled or composted after eating appeals to my inner nerd and from an environmental standpoint.
Bare Bones are one of the only UK producers to use a Bean to Bar process - handcrafting the chocolate from organically farmed cacao beans through to a finished bar.
The Bare Bones story inspires me as the founder of my own small batch business and I find it exciting to watch how things continue to expand within their company. Lara and Cameron want to share their fascination for cacao and demonstrate how incredible it can taste – without soya lecithin, vegetable fats, additives or E-numbers. They believe that chocolate should be pure, delicious and ethical. Honouring the farmers, the cacao and the maker.
Bare Bones caught the attention of Rick Stein recently, and he paid a visit to the Factory Shop for Food Stories, using a bar of 70% Philippines dark chocolate in a profiterol recipe, which was so exciting.
The infamous Bare Bones Hot Chocolate was what found me completely obsessed and it’s been on every birthday and Christmas list since I first tried it. My favourite are the 68% Dominican Republic Salted Hot Chocolate Flakes. Mixing it up in your favourite mug is such a lovely little treat for a chilly evening.
If you’re ever in Glasgow, I recommend you take the trip to the Factory Shop, sit in, and treat yourself to a hot chocolate, or shop the Bare Bones collection at Bellwoods Lifestyle Store.
All photos courtesy of bareboneschocolate.co.uk