On a Wednesday morning in Manhattan Beach last September, Nicole Trutanich pulls the lock off a construction gate five blocks up from the pier just as a police officer stops to ask what’s going on.

A chocolate factory hums in a Chandler backyard. It’s located just past a leaf-covered trampoline, in a guest house. The property and chocolate operation belong to Denae Hostetler. Denae crafts ...

There’s a reason that very few chocolatiers can claim to manufacture their chocolate from bean to bar. Transforming raw cacao beans to molded bars is a time- and space-consuming process that doesn’t ...

It must have taken an enormous amount of curiosity — or sheer need from hunger — for the first human to explore the possibilities of the cacao pod. Roughly the size of a football, the pod looks ...

EUREKA,Calif. -- Adam Dick and Dustin Taylor, founders and owners of Dick Taylor Craft Chocolate in Eureka, California, realize that making chocolate can be magic. "Chocolate swirling in a vat is ...

These internationally lauded bean-to-bar chocolate makers source their cacao with care through direct trade with farms, a trusted bean broker or a combination. Some are reconsidering aspects of their ...

SEATTLE — At Spinnaker Chocolate, the details are everything. Cocoa beans are mechanically sorted and then checked again by hand. "Bad beans," meaning they are not properly fermented, are filtered out ...

Third Wave Chocolate, founded by Joel Bogdanoff last year, offers handmade craft chocolates in Colorado Springs. It started as a hobby, with Bogdanoff whipping up chocolate treats in his apartment, ...