About Joy Chocolates
There's more going on here than you may think
A lil about me and Joy Chocolates
We've moved to Cut Bank, Montana!
Joy Chocolates started in Houston, TX in 2020, but never really got rolling. During Covid, we decided to take a little break and spread a little joy after we've regrouped in Montana!
My name is Ian Karle, I grew up in the Pennsylvania (aka "The Land of Chocolate") where I studied at Penn State University to become an engineer. After school, I kicked around the automotive, medical device manufacturing, and oil and gas fields for the following twenty (plus) years...ranging in scope from design, to process engineering, research & development, to ultimately landing in quality...are you still awake? Long story short, the daily grind in industry wasn't catering to an overall blissful existence...but learned a lot of interesting things.
Then one day, a simple yet inalienable truth occurred to me: money does not equal happiness. My world changed. I quit my job in heavy industry. My wife (Melody) and I made the choice to move up to Montana (a place where we've been vacationing for years) to try a little something new, a change in career, and a chance at truly enjoying life!
That leads us right back to chocolate. Chocolate is a fascinating little thing. The manufacture of bean-to-bar chocolate is a pretty involved process, which can be daunting to most, but caters pretty exclusively to the world class process engineer in me. But aside from that, the look of pure joy on people's faces with that first taste is...well...inspiring. That's what I'm here to do, make some of the best chocolate around and help spread a little joy and inspiration to those who need it.
Everyone should have the chance to enjoy life. The daily grind can be tough for people...tough to a point where it clouds the rest of their life. This world is breathtakingly beautiful, and sometime folks just need a reminder of that. A reminder to unplug, stop taking the world for granted, refocus on what really matters, and help bring joy to those around you. It may be the simplest, yet single hardest thing you'll every try to do...to just enjoy the little things.
My goal is just to make people a little happier, and I've found that a little chocolate goes a long way. The smile on your face when you try it is why I do what I do and why I named the company Joy.
...and about Craft Chocolates
For those of you unfamiliar with craft bean-to-bar chocolate, its definitely something special. Making craft bean-to-bar chocolate means that we process the cacao bean into the rich, creamy chocolate that you may (or may not) be familiar with. Our sustainably sourced, organic, fair trade cacao beans are inbound from Ecuador and are absolutely perfect. We roast them, refine them, temper them, and pour them into bars for the world to enjoy! ...well, first Montana, then the world.
You may just be familiar with the big names in commodity chocolates (you know the ones). Unfortunately, they cut an awful lot of corners...yea, we're going the road less traveled. Why? Because its worth it!
The big commodity chocolate companies source their beans through less than ethical means to keep costs down. With all of the negative publicity around the slave labor and overall poor treatment of workers on Ivory Coast cacao farms, I wouldn't be doing my job (or succeeding at making people happy) if I didn't help support ethical farming practices and fair trade initiatives. I like knowing that my cacao beans come from and that the folks that supply them are getting the fundamental financial building blocks to help them live a happy life.
The other thing about commodity chocolate is the flavor. The large commodity chocolate manufacturers use excessive cocoa butter and mix cacao from multiple sources to make it easier to manufacture, eliminate seasonal/regional flavors inherent with the cacao, drown out the naturally occurring fruity flavors (that you may not have even known existed), and make sure it has the same bland (yet somehow over sweetened) chocolate flavor year after year. Don't even get me started on the tempering process. Sugar is cheap...that's why the conventional stuff is so sweet. However the more sugar that is added, the harder it is to temper the chocolate. As a result the larger commodity manufacturers cut this corner by adding soy to their mix. Thats right! Their chocolate isn't even tempered...its congealed!
Bean-to-bar chocolate is generally pretty dark (over 50% cacao even for the sweet stuff) because that's whats needed to make the chocolate temper properly. We like that nice tempered snap!
Bean-to-bar chocolates also like to embraces those seasonal flavor differences. Joy Chocolates has found the perfect recipe with 75% single source cacao beans to really draw out that fruity apricot finish...which (believe it or not) is simply the taste of the Cacao fruit. Check out the Old Spanish Trail when you have a chance!
A final thought with regards to the smaller chocolatiers and confectioners, generally speaking they will just buy chocolate chips from these large commodity chocolate manufacturers, add some secret ingredients, and mold them into basically the same chocolate bar you'll find on the impulse rack on store shelves everywhere...just a little more expensive. We're not bad mouthing the little guys here, we're actually here to help! Joy Chocolates is not there yet, but ultimately we'd like to step up and help provide an alternative source for ethical (and delicious) chocolate that can be melted down and remade into confections of all kinds!