I lived with a host family, surfed every other day, joined a boxing gym, and ended the trip by traveling through Honduras, El Salvador, and a sliver of Guatemala — although I was asleep on the floor of a bus for most of the Guatemala portion.

Lauren joined me in Leon, Nicaragua for Christmas, and that was our first time really connecting with the people and places of Latin America. That trip in 2014 has kept us going back over the last ten years.

In the winters of 2022 and 2023, Lauren and I had the chance to spend six months in Latin America, living in Ecuador, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Mexico City.

In August of 2023, Lauren returned to Ecuador to live in a tent on the side of a volcano for almost a month — but you’ll have to ask her about that over some beers to get the whole story.

Last summer, I got shoulder surgery after a 30-day surf bender in Ecuador pushed an old hockey injury over the edge. I had a lot of time to myself in a La-Z-Boy recliner, and I started ordering 10-pound bags of cacao beans from Ecuador and other places that we had spent time in over the years. That evolved into buying a stone grinder to make chocolate, taking courses from the Ecole Chocolat Professional School of Chocolate Arts, and sharing what we made with friends and family. In December of 2024, we won a Silver award from the Academy of Chocolate in London for our single-origin Peru 70% dark chocolate, which was pretty cool.

As our name suggests, we love roasting raw cacao and making tasty things. Our focus is two-ingredient dark chocolate and dark chocolate that includes delivious local inclusions.

As part of our work, we want to have a positive impact on the communities and ecosystems that grow specialty cacao. To learn more about our plan to do that, you can check our our impact page.

We really appreciate your interest in our work! And we look forward to meeting you soon if we aren’t already connected.

If you have any questions about what we make, our process, our trade standards, or how we might be able to collaborate, don’t hesitate to reach out to us.

Take care and do keep in touch,
Logan & Lauren