A Uniquely Local Review
Yesterday we spent a very enjoyable four hours with the incredibly knowledgeable and entertaining Maia from York Cocoa Works on their Bean to Bar Chocolate Making Experience.
My daughter and I had previously loved their Chocolate Bar Making experience and were keen to develop our chocolate-making skills, so we signed up for the Bean to Bar Masterclass.
We started right at the very beginning, with the cocoa bean itself, a shot of cocoa bean juice and a little bit of chocolate history. We learned where chocolate originally came from, how it was first consumed and how we eventually got from cocoa beans to the bars we know and love today.
After establishing that we were all dedicated dark chocolate lovers, Maia introduced us to some of the cocoa bean suppliers York Cocoa Works buys from around the world.
This was fascinating. We learned how different beans have their own flavour profiles and how things like climate, soil and even the crops growing nearby can influence the final taste. We sampled cocoa nibs from several different origins before choosing which we wanted to use to create our own chocolate recipe.
Next came the transformation from cocoa nibs into actual chocolate, with the help of our trusty melangers, essentially stone mills for grinding cocoa beans, and that well-known chocolatier’s tool…. a hairdryer!
While our nibs were grinding away, we moved on to one of my favourite parts of any chocolate experience: the tasting.
It was all in the name of research, obviously!
We sampled chocolates with different cocoa percentages to decide just how dark we wanted our own bars to be. Once we’d settled on the sugar content, it was added to our chocolate paste and left to grind a little longer while we enjoyed a well-earned chocolate break in the cosy café.
Then came tempering.
I knew tempering was important, but hadn’t appreciated quite how much science was going on behind the scenes. Done properly, it gives chocolate that lovely glossy finish, a satisfying snap and helps it release cleanly from the mould.
There is some pretty impressive molecular science involved in creating the right cocoa butter crystals. The National Library of Medicine explains the process in considerably more technical detail, involving different crystal forms, carefully controlled temperatures and pre-crystallisation.
Maia explains it in a much more accessible and entertaining way, which I won’t spoil here.
Once our chocolate was perfectly tempered, it was time to pour it into the moulds before heading off for a mini tour of the York Cocoa Works factory. It was brilliant to see how everything we’d just done by hand translated to chocolate production on a much bigger scale.
Then it was back to the fridge to collect our finished bars and, eventually, take them home to enjoy.
Before the experience I was slightly sceptical about how we would fill four hours making chocolate.
I needn’t have worried.
The time absolutely flew by, which is usually a pretty good indication that everyone is having fun. I learned loads, tasted a frankly heroic amount of chocolate and came home with considerably more of it than I really ought to eat.
But I will.
If you’d like to try it for yourself, or you’re looking for a gift for a serious chocolate lover, you can find out more about the Bean to Bar Chocolate Making Experience at York Cocoa Works here
The bean to bar chocolate making experience was reviewed by Rachel and Florence for Uniquely Local Experiences on 12th August 2026