How does Solkiki offer the highest quality?
We find the best whole ingredients in the world.
We process them personally by hand in.
No pesticides, no herbicides, no GMO.
No added fats. No shortcuts.
No lecithin. No Vanillin.
Taste Solkiki.
Explore the shop and discover the flavours of craft chocolate
Tell me more about Solkiki Quality...
We work by hand, with minimally-processed tiny batches of the best ingredients in the World and don't cut corners.
Its how we compete with industrial chocolate, where heavy processing takes it's toll and quality starts low and gets worse.
The bean, soil and climate found in a particular plot of land ('Terroir') produces a chocolate unique to that plot.
Our mission is to highlight these unique differences for you without compromising on flavour or integrity.
Fine chocolate needs fine beans, like wine and grapes
We are fascinated with natural, fine flavour and use the most delicate, fickle and flavoursome beans we can source.
Heirloom cacao is a special status awarded to unique plantations that grow cacao with outstanding flavours.
Grown without herbicides and pesticides, certified organic
Our wise farmers understand that fine cacao doesn't respond well to short-term thinking.
All our cacao undergoes laboratory analysis for organic approval.
We and many of our farmers choose not to subscribe to (unweildy, well-intentioned, unfit-for-purpose, failing) regulatory bodies.
Hand-Processed by Solkiki at every step using intricate techniques all in the name of flavour and nutrition
We remove shells for a much cleaner taste that is lower in bitterness, and discard 20-30% more bean than most during our handsorting phase. Flats, shrunken, doubles, triples, cracked, too big, too small... any beans we dont like the look of are discarded. Many of our farmers follow suit and now discard more beans during a post-fermentation sorting process that selects only the best beans - to keep flavours as brilliant, clean and authentic as possible. We also work with vanilla that we process from the pod in our workshop, we don't rely on shortcuts like vanilla essence or lecithin. We use organic nuts which we presoak to activate the enzymes so you enjoy the best tasting, creamiest nut you have ever had. Also makes them very easy to digest and frees up all their nutrients. You can really taste the difference and if you're going to indulge in a treat, makes sense to do it properly with a chocolatemaker who is looking out for the best for you.
No added fats.
We don't dilute our chocolate with low grade fats. This approach increases Solkiki chocolate melting time, prolongs your taste experience and keeps the flavours really clean. It also demands a higher level of artisan skill since undiluted cacao is difficult to work with... but we embrace the challenge; you and the beans are worth it!
Making chocolate better
Why is Solkiki the most ethical chocolatemaker?
No people, planets or animals are exploited by Solkiki.
We trade ethically via trailblazing Direct Trade that allows farmers to set their own prices.
We never use any animal products and never will.
We don't exploit any lack of knowledge of real chocolate and don't use industrial ingredients.
We work off-the-grid using renewable energy .
Explore the shop to see what flavours are achievable with great beans and a little sugar.
Tell me more about Solkiki's ethical position...
No people, planets or animals are exploited by Solkiki.
We're here for the longhaul and represent the change we want to see in the world.
Direct trade means we pay farmers. Not people who pay farmers.
Industrial price per kg: $2.50
Fair Trade: $2.80 (this has not increased since 1994)
Solkiki 2022-23 average: $17.75 - direct to farmers.
Thats about 65 times the premium that Fair Trade pay to co-op owners.
The co-op owners are free to do what they like with the extra funds.
They may opt to pay themselves a bonus, they may opt to give their farmers a little more.
Designed for industrial coffee, fair trade doesn't make sense for tiny, fine cacao farms.
~90% of our ingredients budget goes as DIRECT to PRODUCERS.
The other % represents producers who can only operate using a middleman
In practice, a huge amount more cash reaches the farmers under true direct trade, when compared to fair trade
Think how worryingly cheap any industrial (almost all chocolatiers, heath store or supermarket) chocolate is.
No milk, no bones, no hooves, no animal ingredients of any kind in Solkiki chocolate
We get creative and evolve old recipes found in traditional chocolate-making.
We accept no compromise: if we cant create sensational chocolate in an ethical way, then we won't make it.
MCS-accredited renewable energy at Solkiki
Our chocolate is made off-the-grid in a pair of cottages from 1650. The thick walls, small windows and low ceilings create a stable climate perfect for our chocolate to mature and get a great temper.
Buying Solkiki chocolate gives natural rainforests a future
Fine Flavour Cacao Theobroma (rare Chocolate trees - literally Gods' Food) thrives in the shade of other bigger trees; which means diverse healthy rainforest, not monocrops. We encourage some farmers to continue growing fine flavour cacao, when they may otherwise be tempted to join the cattle industry or palm oil industry.
We only sell to independent retailers and fine folk
Micro-batch chocolatemaking allows us to focus on quality and deliberately exclude chain retailers, where quality inevitably suffers as production rates are forced higher. Top London outlets wanted to charge us for the privilege of having product on their shelves. Can you imagine?!
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No nonsense.
Enjoy the transparency that purity offers
That cocoa % you see on chocolate is a combined figure of cocoa solids + added cocoa butter. It is a good indicator of how much sugar is used but can be misleading about the strength; 75% could be whole bean and nothing else or be mainly cacao butter with a few beans added. 100% chocolate bar could be pure bean OR pure butter or some combination of bean and butter. What we do know immediately is that there is no added sugar or substitute fats in a 100% chocolate.
There is more bean in our 68%, then there is in a traditional 75%... we just don't add fat, so our % is lower, but is indeed much more potent. Always read the ingredients! 68 bean + 0 butter is stronger than 65 bean + 10 butter... the 68 in our case is stronger (contains more cacao bean) than a 75.
We believe the bean, soil and climate found in a particular plot of land produces a chocolate unique to that plot. Our dark bars each have their own distinctive and exceptional flavours. Enjoy!
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Explore the shop to see what flavours are achievable with great beans and a little sugar.