Founder story
From holiday dishes to award-winning chocolate bars
Choco Del Mar is the home of one very curious cook who followed flavor all the way from the family kitchen to bean-to-bar chocolate making.
Single Origin Cacao
Bean-to-Bar Craft
Handmade in Small Batches
Direct Trade Cacao Relationships
A love letter to making
About Choco Del Mar
For as long as I can remember, making something delicious for someone I love has felt like one of life’s sweetest pleasures. What started as childhood curiosity in the kitchen grew into a deep fascination with flavor, technique, and that little bit of magic that happens when good ingredients are treated with real care.
Today, Choco Del Mar brings that same playful, detail-obsessed energy to every bar, with coastal charm, deep chocolate flavor, and a lot of heart.
A little timeline of how this all happened
I have been drawn to making delicious things for as long as I can remember. In middle school, I was already making the main dish for my parents’ holiday party. That mix of creativity, hospitality, and wanting people to light up at the table never really left me.
In college, chemistry deepened that fascination. Understanding reactions, texture, temperature, and balance made cooking even more exciting. Software engineering became the career, but food stayed close as a serious hobby, with years spent exploring fermentation, brewing, baking, and just about every culinary rabbit hole that looked interesting.
- Cat & Cloud
- Manresa Bread
- Sowaka Foods
The holiday party era
Long before chocolate bars entered the picture, the joy was already there: cooking for people. Making the main dish for my parents’ holiday party was one of those early signs that feeding people was never going to be just a passing interest.
Chemistry meets cooking
Studying chemistry gave me a new lens for flavor and technique. Suddenly, caramelization, emulsions, fermentation, and texture were not just mysterious kitchen moments, they were invitations to learn and experiment more deeply.
The side-quest that kept growing
I ended up in software engineering professionally, but outside of work I kept chasing culinary fascinations everywhere they led. Brewing became one of them, and that curiosity earned a blue ribbon at the Santa Cruz County Fair Homebrew Competition.
Falling in love with baking and chocolate
Home baking became a full-on love. Working with chocolate inside that world cracked something open. The first spark came from finding bulk cocoa at Staff of Life, and then a happy accident while trying to make a dark milk chocolate sent me deeper down the rabbit hole.
The book that changed everything
Making a less-than-perfect batch led me to Making Chocolate: From Bean to Bar to S’More. That was the moment chocolate making clicked from fascination into craft. It wasn’t just about baking with chocolate anymore. It was about making chocolate itself.
Full-time chocolate adventure
Now we’re on this chocolate adventure full time. We’ve competed in the International Chocolate Awards twice, earning 4 silver medals and 1 bronze, and we’re eagerly awaiting the results of the 2026 awards. Choco Del Mar is still growing, still experimenting, and still made with the same delight that started in the family kitchen.
How we source
Sourcing at Choco Del Mar
Our sourcing philosophy starts with relationships. We care deeply about direct trade, knowing who grows our cacao, and building connections with cocoa farmers whose work deserves both respect and real value.
That means we look for cacao partners who share our standards for transparency, quality, and stewardship. We want beans with beautiful flavor, yes, but we also want a supply chain rooted in fairness, trust, and long-term care for the communities growing them.
From cacao to supporting ingredients, we choose materials that feel honest and purposeful. Every ingredient has to earn its place by contributing something lovely to the final bar.
Direct trade first
We aim to work as directly as possible with cocoa farmers so quality and care can travel all the way from harvest to finished bar.
Flavor with a point of view
We choose cacao for character: distinct origin, expressive flavor, and the kind of complexity that makes a bar memorable.
Small-batch standards
Because we make chocolate in small batches, we can be fussy in the best way. Every ingredient matters, and every detail gets attention.
