William Marx sees himself as an intepreter.
“You have to pick beans that are good and just let them talk,” says Marx, owner of Wm. Chocolate. “It’s about knowing the beans and what will bring out their character the best, and processing to that.”
Marx officially launched his single-origin, bean-to-bar chocolate business in January 2016. Marx creates chocolate directly from the cacao bean. It is a time- and labor-intensive process — it takes up to four days to create one batch.
Currently, Marx shares commercial kitchen space with Underground Food Collective and produces 300 two-ounce bars a week as a solo operation. He prefers to work at night, beginning the production process at 7 p.m. and going as late (or early) as 2 a.m.
Marx begins by sorting the beans, removing sticks and damaged beans. Next, he roasts the beans and cracks them in a mill to separate nibs from husks. The husks are removed by a gentle vacuum process called winnowing.
Wm. Chocolate sells hot chocolate, which can be mixed with water or milk.
Marx uses a granite grinder to create a paste from the nibs called chocolate liquor. He then adds cocoa butter and dried cane juice to the liquor before pouring the chocolate onto a stone slab for tempering. The cooling and heating process of tempering gives the chocolate snap. Last, the chocolate is poured into molds and chilled.
As complicated as the process sounds, Marx describes making chocolate as one of the easier parts of running his business. During the day, he attends to sales, design, ad copy and hand-cutting compostable paper to package his bars.
He hopes the taste of his product will entice consumers to learn more about single-origin chocolate. High-quality cacao beans need rainforest conditions to grow, so more demand for the beans can help save rainforests. He gets his beans from John Nanci at Chocolate Alchemy, a specialty importer.
Marx includes notecards with his chocolates with “tasting brackets” to help consumers understand different taste categories and choose their favorites. There’s also information about the cacao bean’s varietal and history — as with wine, the origin, climate and age of the ingredients have a lot to do with the final product. “As chocolate makers, we need to tell those stories. I think it’s the only way for the craft chocolate industry to survive in the long term,” says Marx.
His chocolate bars are named after the bean’s origin. Ghana chocolate produces a bold taste with malt and coffee. Vietnam chocolate is fruity with vanilla. Wm. Chocolate products are available online and at eight locations in Madison, including Field Table, Fromagination, Table Wine and Chocolaterian. Prices range from $5.50 to $22.
