Back, when I was still in Wales, DmentD sent me the link to a blog he thought I might be interested in, he’d found it browsing about the web and after passing it onto me he promptly forgot about it *grins*

The blog belonged to a girl who was in the final stages of a Baking and Pastry program at the Culinary Institute of America called Sweet Napa since it was in the Napa Valley in California that she was studying.

Since I’ve been following her she graduated from class and has been opening her own business making chocolates and candy bars. She moved back to LA and making a policy of using local ingredients (organic where possible) and nothing artificial, her business has been steadily growing.

BonBonBar started off at farmers markets, she then progressed to offering a mail service and now her chocolates are available in a wide number of stores in LA.

Just before Christmas I finally ordered some of her products. I had wanted to since I got over here (she doesn’t ship overseas) however she is very proud of her products and doesn’t want anything to damage their quality and so until the cooler weather hit it was overnight shipping or nothing.

As soon as the cool weather arrived I ordered some. A small selection containing some of the Single Malt Scotch Ganache Bars, Caramel Nut Bars and the Malt Bar, along with the Pumpkin Pie Bar, available for the holidays only. The only bar I didn’t try was the Orange Bar.

I also had some of the Caramels (I had the original and the salted nut.. She also has wildflower honey, cinnamon almond and single malt scotch), but not the marshmallows (available in vanilla or passionfruit). They arrived in the cutest little box and I couldn’t wait to try them out.

I have to say, these were some of the best chocolates I have ever had. The flavours were well balanced, a fantastic use of salt made the flavours pop and also helps cut through the sweetness of the chocolate. I will not hesitate to buy more of her products next time I want to treat myself.

They have a short shelf life, due to no artificial ingredients. It’s hard to imagine a ‘fresh’ chocolate rather than a bar that’s been sat on a shelf for no one knows how long, but you can taste it, you can tell from the first bite that these are something special!

It was chocolate even DmentD enjoyed!

I’m trying to encourage people to support her not only because they are amazing chocolates but because I admire what she’s done.

She finished culinary school and immediately set to working on what she wanted to achieve, and she is doing well at it, she’s having to hire staff now.

I want to promote and publicise her work in the hopes that on that day in the future, when I set to starting my own business, opening my dream bakery (which won’t be immediately out of culinary school, but one day!) people will taste my work and want to do the same for me.

Please do support BonBonBar, I want to see her suceed.