Sirene Chocolate Fleur De Sel

Founded in 2016 in Bundibugyo, Uganda, Semuliki started with a mission specifically to increase incomes and reduce financial risk for their cacao growers. They now work with over 1,000 small family farms. By centralizing fermentation and drying they are able to control the quality of these flavour-building processes. With a rich fudge flavour, it is a natural pairing with the salt from the Vancouver Island Sea Salt Company .

Ingredients: Organic cocoa beans, organic cane sugar, organic cocoa butter, fleur de sel

Sirene Chocolate is a award winning Chocolate Company based in Victoria BC. They start with a cocoa bean, and make chocolate out of it - but to tell the full story, it actually starts quite a while before that. The process really starts when they identify a farm they are interested in working with. They look at a variety of factors including whether they like the taste (ie quality) of the beans, whether they can pay the farmer directly, what working conditions are like at the farms and more. They consider their relationship with the farms as a working relationship between two small businesses: the small business that is Sirene, and the small business that is the farm. Equals working together trying to deliver the best chocolate possible to their customers.

Taylor Kennedy founded Sirene in 2013 after 18 years at the National Geographic Society. Kennedy was looking for a change in his life and was fuelled by a life-long obsession of wanting to know how life works. The long and persnickety process of making chocolate became a captivating obsession.

The whole process from bean to finished bar takes them about three weeks to a month, depending on the bean used. It is a detail-oriented process that demands their full attention the whole way along, and is deliciously, gruellingly fun.