'I see more interest in learning about real chocolate': Meet Cork’s chocolate makers

Chocolate has been making headlines for all the wrong reasons in recent times.

First came sharp price rises for cacao beans due to poor harvests.

Next came shrinkflation: remember the great Freddo outrage of 2025?

Then came news that some fan favourites contain so little chocolate, legally, they cannot be called chocolate anymore.

Under EU rules, a product must contain 25% cocoa solids minimum to fall under the legal definition of chocolate.

What’s going on, and why?

In a word: profit. Some brands reduced or removed the more expensive ingredients in chocolate (specifically cocoa and cocoa butter), with cheaper ingredients, such as palm oil for cocoa butter, in a process called reformulation. Reformulated bars with less than 25% cocoa are cheaper to make but recategorised as ‘chocolate-flavoured’ or simply white, milk or dark, dropping the word ‘chocolate’ completely.

Some may question if chocolate looks, tastes and is manufactured more like confectionery than real chocolate, is it worth the reformulated, shrinkflated price for something that is only chocolate-flavoured?

Here in Cork, chocolate fans are becoming more curious about what’s in their chocolate, where it comes from, and how it’s made.

Bucking the trend of big chocolate brands, Tory Top Chocolate, Home Chocolat and Hungry Crow are leaning into demand by customers for real chocolate made with care.

Tory Top Chocolate, Cork City

www.instagram.com/torytopcafeandchocolatefactory

Cork city’s only bean-to-bar chocolate maker specialises in single-origin chocolate bars using cacao from Peru, Brazil, Ghana, Cote d’Ivoire, Indonesia, India and Nigeria. As well as a chocolate factory, Tory Top is also a coffee and hot chocolate bar, and workshop space.

Founder, Paul O’Connell, tells me how he steered his business through a tumultuous first year.

“It’s been a fantastic year overall. The challenges, like every other chocolate company, were around the price of cacao, but we weathered that storm by doing more classes,” says Paul.

“Over the year, we’ve partnered with UCC with their food science division, who were working on a research paper on cacao. We also started working with schools looking at Fairtrade, zero waste manufacturing, fermentation and microbiology. In the past 12 months, we’ve hosted Apple, Eli Lilly, JP Morgan, Broadcom, NetApp, Pfizer, and Stryker for their employees – all repeat clients, too,” says Paul, “and we’re doing lots of birthday parties, especially for teenage girls.

“That’s what I want, to share this space with people. It takes time, but word has gotten out about our classes now with a significant uptick in demand since January.”

While Paul’s personal passion for chocolate is for celebrating cacao in its purest form, there’s no denying the enduring Irish taste for milk chocolate.

“Kids are so used to milk chocolate that I’ve started making a 55% milk chocolate now, using cacao from Nigeria and Irish whole milk. It has a luxurious taste, smooth and creamy with a natural fruitiness,” he explains. “It’s a perfect chocolate for the Kids Chocolate Pizza Parties we host. We partner with Nosta who make a cookie dough pizza base for us, which kids can decorate with fruits and chocolates.”

I ask if revelations about chocolate content in popular bars have brought people in looking for a real chocolate alternative.

“Not everybody knows about chocolate. Anyone who grew up in Ireland, Cadbury’s was the go-to, so it’s a learning curve. But people living in Cork that grew up around cacao in places like Mexico, they know what they’re looking for. They’re delighted when they find us because they are looking for pure chocolate.”

Focusing on fun-filled and informative classes helped Paul to ride out the volatility in cacao prices. Now there’s breathing space to try new things, including a Mobile Chocolate Factory so he can deliver chocolate classes wherever his customers are. He has been working on expanding their chocolate bar range to include a new range of flavours.

“We’ll be launching a Wild Atlantic Sea Salt bar and Cacao Nib Sprinkles bar on 70% dark chocolate, a Fruit & Nut and Pure Milk bar using our 55% milk chocolate. We’re also making hot chocolate stirrers and truffles.

“I’m happy with the year,” Paul says. “Shifting our focus onto classes from just bars worked to keep us afloat and we made it through. Now the price of cacao has come down, I just see open road.”

Tory Top Chocolate will be hosting two free Easter Egg hunts in the chocolate shop on Saturday, April 4. Check Instagram for updates.

Last year, Larry Cummins took a trip to Tory Top Chocolate to find out more about their work. Here, Paul tells Larry about making bean to bar chocolate. 

Home Chocolat

www.instagram.com/home.chocolat

Liora Omer is an inventor and self-proclaimed chocolate engineer! Her business, Home Chocolat, encourages us to have fun making chocolate at home using her unique CocoaBlox home kits and, later this year, is set to launch Chocolatier Pro, a small home-based chocolate tempering machine.

Liora says she has noticed people are eager to learn more about chocolate.

“I see more interest in learning about real chocolate and how it is made in the workshops we run,” says Liora. “During workshops, people are asking more questions about ingredients, where those ingredients come from, and the health attributes of real chocolate.

“Our workshops are hands on, so people can see what goes into making chocolate. It’s very clear when you work with our chocolate and taste it that this is something else. A lot of people still don’t realise chocolate starts its life as a bean – an agricultural product. I talk about that a lot during workshops.”

In her workshops, Liora encourages tasting of different types of chocolate; not just dark, milk and white, but also explains how chocolate can taste differently depending on where it’s grown.

“We taste chocolate from Brazil and Ecuador, and people can really taste the difference. It’s nice for them to experience it; they’re curious, surprised by what they learn, and they have an opportunity to really connect with what [kind of chocolate] they like best.”

Learning to taste real chocolate is something many of us have lost because, says Liora, much of what is consumed has been stripped of its flavourful character.

“It’s intentional for the big companies to lose any flavour difference in their chocolate products because they need to create a uniform product every time,” says Liora. “These products are great treats, but they’re not really chocolate.”

Liora Omer of Home Chocolat will host a chocolate dipping event and free demonstration of Chocolatier Pro at Tory Top Chocolate, on Easter Sunday, April 5.

Hungry Crow

www.instagram.com/hungry_crow_chocolates

For Niamh O’Reilly and Mark Stewart of Hungry Crow, 2025 was, by any standard, tough out.

After having to vacate their Lisavaird base, the pair were facing Christmas with no production kitchen and no shop.

Now settled into their new bijoux location on Casement Street, Clonakilty, Niamh says returning to the town where it all started for Hungry Crow has been worth it.

“We looked at so many places and there was nothing that worked, but then we were contacted about this shop being available... It was kind of magic: the builder that worked on our old space put off other jobs to come here and help us; we had friends who put shelves and window decals up as a gift, people were incredible. It was huge support and we wouldn’t be here without them. The community really made us feel loved and wanted, and now we feel like we belong to the community, too.”

Hungry Crow chocolates have always been made without dairy, grains or refined sugars, using ethically sourced single origin couverture Luker Chocolate. They are a luxury item, and their customers recognise that.

“People who used to take a bottle of wine to dinner parties will now buy a box of chocolates from us instead or buy chocolates for dessert” says Niamh. 

“Most customers say once they start eating our chocolate, they can’t go back to eating any other kind. Ours is such high quality. Luker is the best there is, and it’s stupidly expensive. I can’t pass all that cost on, but I don’t want to use any other chocolate either,” explains Niamh.

It’s impossible to compare Niamh’s beautifully made handmade chocolates with something mass-produced, occupying completely different ends of the chocolate spectrum. One really is chocolate, the other is chocolate-flavoured. “I tried some recently, just to remind myself. I’m not sure what it tastes like, but it doesn’t taste like chocolate!” says Niamh.

For Easter, Niamh has crafted a collection of handmade eggs, including an egg version of her award-winning Hazelnut Job with praline and edible gold dust. There’s a hand-painted Pistachio Crème Egg with layers of pistachio white chocolate and dark chocolate, an egg inspired by their original Cashew-Rose-stuffed date, a Sea Salt Egg with Cacao Nibs, a Mint-Choc egg, chocolate chickens, and a selection box of six miniature eggs and chickens called “Which Came First?”

Hungry Crow Eggs are made in tiny batches and are available in-store and at select independent stores.