iSurprise Conspiracy Chocolate

Once upon a time

Amit and Celine, Conspiracy Chocolate’s founders, made chocolates as a hobby, selling at local markets, and gifting their creations to friends- who for a long time tried to persuade them to start their own chocolaterie. They took their deep dive when a befriended Chef - finally - approved of the chocolate’s quality. It started small, with Amit’s mum handwriting the wrappings, and steadily grew bigger.

Bean-to-Bar

Conspiracy is guilt-free chocolate. They work with Bean-to-Bar single-origin accountable farmers who supply quality cacao produced in a transparent, environmentally, socially, and economically good environment. A direct relationship with the farms is important to the ambitious couple: ‘From the selection of the trees, the harvesting of the crops and the fermentation of the beans – it’s a delicate process that determines the quality of the chocolate and the husk. We work with farmers who take pride in their work, and we value their labour. Chocolate is a luxury product, when produced in a decent way it can’t be cheap.’

Zero waste

From the beginning, the couple worked with the principle of absolute zero waste in their production. The packaging of the product is biodegradable in a simple home environment, and the business-to-business is completely single packaging free, using reusable containers. Cross-border shipping created challenges of its own, which still need to be sorted out. Amit shares: ‘We only take on what we can work with and do right, otherwise we shouldn’t take it on’.

Happy to share the lessons learned on the way, Amit and Celine now organize training sessions for chefs on responsible sourcing and ESG/sustainability workshops for companies in the financial sector.

Double happiness

Sometimes a little magic happens in the small fragrant Wong Chuk Hang chocolate factory. When experimenting with infusion techniques to create the Taiwan Oolong bar, it turned out they had created more than one new flavour. Not only did the toasty and flowery notes of the tea blend perfectly with the dark chocolate, but the by-product was also a pleasant surprise. Celine shares: 'A good by-product makes the process even more interesting, especially when we are able to give it to other kitchens to use.' Conspiracy’s tea leave syrup is so full of concentrated flavours that PDT bar now uses it for its cocktails.

Sweet ambitions

The Conspiracy crew - the origin of the name stays a secret unrevealed – is looking to produce more chocolate and add new cacao sources from multiple farms in Asia.

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