Got a sweet tooth? These Black-owned chocolatiers have just what you need

Creative, expressive, reflective of culinary trends and fads, chocolatiers and chocolate-makers create some of the world’s most coveted confections on the market. A handful of Black-owned companies are directly involved with farming and sourcing cacao, while others look to ancestral lands for indigenous ingredients to employ unique flavor combinations not popularized in the U.S. Whether you’re looking for something sweet to eat after a meal or a gift to send a loved one, these companies satisfy.

Midunu Chocolates

This female-owned and -operated company is helmed by owner Selassie Atadika. Her artisanal, handcrafted chocolates use Ghanaian cocoa and feature fruits, spices, coffee, teas, tisanes and essences from Africa. The word Midunu is an invitation that means “let’s eat” in her mother tongue, Ewe.

SPAGnVOLA

Crisoire and Eric Reid offer gift boxes, hot chocolate, single-estate chocolate collections and a monthly chocolate bar subscription program from their operation in Gaithersburg, Maryland. With cacao sourced from Crisoire’s native home of the Dominican Republic, owning the land, cultivating, harvesting and post-harvest processing of their cacao is truly important to them.

Philip Ashley Chocolates

The Memphis-based chocolatier has partnerships with Cadillac, FedEx and Nike to design signature chocolates, many of which are available to the public. From the signature sweet potato-based truffle to the daring white chocolate truffle paired with bleu cheese, owner and chocolatier Philip Rix has an ever-growing list of signature confectionery collections that are sure to please.

Harlem Chocolate Factory

Each chocolate that owner Jessica Spaulding makes captures the essence of Harlem and offers customers a nuanced taste and feel of the neighborhood. The signature Golden Brownstone gift set, which includes three bars molded into historic Harlem Brownstones and dusted in gold, made it on Oprah Winfrey’s famous list of favorite things in 2020.

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This story was originally published August 1, 2022 at 9:00 AM.