Redmond Chocolate

Redmond Chocolate Handcrafted, artisanal, bean-to-bar chocolate made with love. Always single origin, fair or direct traded ingredients.

I love everything about chocolate, but especially the look on someone's face the first time they taste mine. :)

Finishing up with my holiday collection orders for shipping tomorrow. And...office work with Runaway Bride in the backgr...
12/13/2020

Finishing up with my holiday collection orders for shipping tomorrow. And...office work with Runaway Bride in the background. Happy Sunday!

Test batching different roast profiles today for one of my cacao bean origins- Trinidad Ramnath Estate. —I spent all las...
09/28/2020

Test batching different roast profiles today for one of my cacao bean origins- Trinidad Ramnath Estate.
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I spent all last week doing a roasting intensive class taught by Mackenzie Rivers (The Next Batch). It was amazing to do a DEEP dive into the science of roasting cocoa beans.
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My mission is always to do what I can to coax the full potential out of the wonderful cocoa bean origins I work with. This origin- Trinidad Ramnath- is a tricky bean to work with. I’m wanting to bring out the underlying chocolate tones without obliterating the fruitiness of the bean.
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I’m not new to this bean- I’ve roasted and made chocolate from about 150 pounds of it so far, but this new (to me) method of roasting makes me feel like I’m just now discovering what flavors this bean has to offer.
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I won’t know if my roast is successful until I make chocolate with the cocoa nibs next week. Wish me luck!
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I wish you could smell this!!

I'm making ooey, gooey brownies with our Redmond Chocolate. Will be doing a brownie flight using the Dandelion Chocolate...
09/17/2020

I'm making ooey, gooey brownies with our Redmond Chocolate. Will be doing a brownie flight using the Dandelion Chocolate recipe from their book "Making Chocolate".

Three brownie batches made from three different origins. I'm thinking I'll use our 70% Madagascar, 70% Ecuador Camino Verde, and 70% Tanzania Kokoa Kamili bars in the recipe.

These are three very different cocoa beans, so it will be fun to taste their differences in the brownies. Yum!

Thank you to for the original post, and for keeping this conversation front and center for your audience. The “white” e...
06/13/2020

Thank you to for the original post, and for keeping this conversation front and center for your audience.

The “white” elephant in the room is that nearly ALL of the chocolate and cocoa products WORLDWIDE are made using cocoa beans sourced with slave labor. African, black, indigenous, and often child slave labor. Millions of slaves.

It is estimated that 2 MILLION child slaves are used each year to help the big cocoa bean companies produce their cheap product. Often, these children are stolen from their families, transported across borders to West Africa, where they are sold and will spend the rest of their lives as slaves on a cocoa plantation. This is reprehensible! And it MUST stop!

This isn’t a secret. Chocolate companies know this is going on. The big five or six cocoa bean buyers promised to do something to change business as usual ten years ago. Lies. They are still using slaves to source their cocoa beans.

In fact, no one seems to want to have this conversation, let alone DO anything to change this decades (centuries?) long practice. Why??

When are we going to stop supporting slave produced chocolate and cocoa products?

When are we going to talk about what really matters?

The “white” elephant in the room...almost ALL chocolate and chocolate/cocoa products available WORLDWIDE are made with c...
06/13/2020

The “white” elephant in the room...almost ALL chocolate and chocolate/cocoa products available WORLDWIDE are made with cocoa beans that have been sourced using black, indigenous, African slaves- millions of them are children. Some of those children are sold into their slave lives; others are stolen from their families and transported to West Africa where they spend the rest of their lives as cocoa plantation slaves. This is reprehensible! And it’s NOT a secret!! The chocolate companies know this is going on, but do nothing about it. In fact, no one seems to want to have this conversation. Why??
When are we going to stop supporting slave produced chocolate and cocoa products? When are we going to talk about what really matters?

After a much needed break from the cray cray of the holidays, I’m FINALLY back in my lil’ chocolate workshop working on ...
01/15/2020

After a much needed break from the cray cray of the holidays, I’m FINALLY back in my lil’ chocolate workshop working on restocking the near empty chocolate closet (and web store).

BUT, it’s cold in here!!!!
WAY too cold to temper and mould chocolate! Burr!!

My life these past 8 weeks in pictures (below). It’s pretty much been one focus...trying to make, and then make MORE, ch...
12/17/2019

My life these past 8 weeks in pictures (below).

It’s pretty much been one focus...trying to make, and then make MORE, chocolate to keep up with the demand. It’s a great “problem” to have, but WOW!!

If you visit our web store, you will see mostly “sold out” stickers for most of our chocolate bars and Majik. Sorry about that...I’ve been making it as fast as my two hands can, but handmade, artisanal, bean to bar chocolate cannot be rushed.

It takes me at least a week to make it for you—from the first step (sorting and roasting) to when the wrapped bar is ready for you to buy and enjoy.

The last few weeks sharing and selling my chocolate at the Carnation Farms Christmas Market have been a learning experience. One of my lessons learned is that the “experts” I listened to when designing my launch product lineup were WRONG about at least one thing.

They told me that most people don’t like dark chocolate, and that I should focus on making what people want to buy, which is (according to them) less dark chocolate (more sugar) with flavors and other stuff added to it.

I ignored that advice because that’s not the chocolate I want to make or, for the most part, eat. I like pure chocolate. Two ingredients only. Cocoa beans and sugar. That’s it. That’s the chocolate I decided to make, and then crossed my fingers and hoped you would love it too.🙏

Apparently, the “experts” don’t know about you guys!!

You LOVE my SUPER dark bars, and bought EVERY bar I had all three weekends we were at the Christmas Market!! We’re talking about 80% cocoa bean and above!

I’m very impressed by this, and SUPER excited too since this is the chocolate I MOST love to eat and make.

So...look for more 80% and above options on our web store very soon, as well as our very popular 70’s and, of course—the crowd favorite—Mac Majik. 😁

But, first...I need a nap. 😴😴

Another busy fun day at the Christmas Market sampling and selling our chocolate to so many chocolate loving people! You...
12/15/2019

Another busy fun day at the Christmas Market sampling and selling our chocolate to so many chocolate loving people! You guys LOVE our super dark two ingredient bars- 80% and 85% continue to sell like crazy! I did not see this coming!! LOL! 🤪

We’re wrapping it up tomorrow (Sunday Dec 15)- come see us before 4pm!

I (almost) don’t mind when one I end up with a bar with a tempering ‘boo-boo’...it goes into my stash for enjoying with ...
12/05/2019

I (almost) don’t mind when one I end up with a bar with a tempering ‘boo-boo’...it goes into my stash for enjoying with my morning coffee. 😊❤️🍫🍮

This is Peru Ucayali River 70%. The rest of the bars turned out beautifully!!

The not-so-glamorous part of being a bean-to-bar chocolate maker. Gotta protect my lungs and hearing from the dust and n...
12/03/2019

The not-so-glamorous part of being a bean-to-bar chocolate maker. Gotta protect my lungs and hearing from the dust and noise of the winnowing process (separating the roasted husk from the cocoa nibs). Ain’t I pretty? 🤪

12/03/2019

I stayed up until 2am this morning to get these babies loaded. Number 4 will be loaded up later today.
The first two melangers are grinding 100% Peru Ucayali River beans (no sugar yet) destined for a bunch of 80% bars, and a few 70% bars. The 80% are selling as fast as I can make them!!
Number 3 melanger has 100% Ecuador Camino Verde, which is going to be made into my darkest bar so far...85%. If you’re local to the Seattle area, and attending the Christmas Market this weekend (12/7 and 12/8), you will be the first to get your hands on this bar.

Number 4 is going to be loaded up with Madagascar Sambirano Valley beans from the Bejofo Estate. All of this batch will go into my 80% bar, which sold out in a few hours last weekend!

Preparing for all of my loving peeps! 😄❤️🍫

First weekend of the Christmas Market is in the books! We sampled and sold a lot of our handmade craft chocolate. Sold ...
12/02/2019

First weekend of the Christmas Market is in the books! We sampled and sold a lot of our handmade craft chocolate. Sold out of all of our 80% bars-you love our 80’s!!! Yay!
I’m already back in my chocolate workshop making new fresh chocolate to share with everyone who shows up for the Market next weekend.
See you then!

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Redmond, WA
98053, 98052, 98073, (98000-98099)

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Handcrafted for you.

I fell in love with artisanal small batch craft chocolate in Hawaii a few years back. Walked into a “chocolate factory” in Kailua on Oahu and never wanted to leave. It was heaven on Earth...for me. A couple weeks later, I arrived back home in Seattle dreaming of starting my own chocolate factory. I’ve been reading, learning, practicing, practicing, practicing and practicing the art of bean-to-bar handmade chocolate for several years now. Chocolate is my passion and, in a very odd way, it feels like my calling. Weird, I know.

My husband and I decided to give a name to this pretty much daily chocolate making practice I’ve developed -- we call it “Redmond Chocolate”. Redmond, because that’s our home town. Redmond is the self-proclaimed bicycle/bicycling capital of the PNW (pacific northwest), and I’m a HUGE fan of anything bikes and biking (road, MTB,...you name it, and I love it!). So, when we get around to designing our brand, we will be including bicycles and cycling...somehow.

I invite you to follow along with me as I practice and share what I’m learning about this creative and challenging chocolate adventure I’m on. One of my favorite things is to introduce people to this type of chocolate - pure, fine chocolate made with the very best ingredients (usually only two or three of them) and lots of loving care. So, keep an eye out for my invitations to local in-person tasting and pairing parties as well as my virtual tasting parties (yes, we taste real chocolate).

Thanks for reading and letting me share my chocolate journey with you.