Gourmet chocolate from Northern Irish artisan
Artisan chocolate maker Neary Nogs, Northern Ireland's only stoneground bean to bar chocolatier, has launched a range of single-origin chocolate products.
The family-run enterprise, based at Flurrybridge on the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, has developed single-original chocolates from estates in the Dominican Republic and Ecuador.
The chocolates are 70 percent single-origin chocolates from organic cacao. The small batch products are both gluten and dairy-free and are made with organic raw cane sugar.
The small business, an enterprise founded in 2005 by husband and wife team Shane and Dorothy Neary, has developed a reputation as a specialist chocolatier.
"Our focus is on sourcing beans from the very best estate. We make chocolate from the cacao bean to bar using minimal ingredients. We carefully source, sort, roast, crack, winnow and stone grind to small batches. Everything we produce is under our control and has total traceability and provenance.
"We also age our handcrafted chocolate to bring out the origin of each bean and making it ready to be tempered or crafted into chocolate that we believe is fantastic. This handcrafting gives the chocolate a deep and rich flavour with notes of fruits, red berries and a hint of caramel.
"Our approach is also to slow roast and stone grind the beans for a smooth, mellow finish.
"We are certainly the first bean to bar chocolate producer in Northern Ireland and, we believe, only the second in Ireland. It gives us a distinct marketing edge. It's quite a skill turning small batches of cocoa beans into chocolate for moulding and bagging," Shane adds.
Single origin bars are becoming increasingly popular particularly with connoisseurs interested in the provenance of what they eat and keen to know the stories of the people making their food. It's a concept that has spread to Britain from the US.
"We view chocolate as precious, it's great in small bites. It can be that perfect last minute gift, that romantic gesture."