Avanaa Chocolat

To produce great chocolate, you need exceptional cocoa. To set out in search of the best cocoa in the world, Cath leaves her job as a geologist exploring deep in James Bay. From gold prospecting, Cath shifts her focus to the search for Mayan gold: cocoa. She embarked on a year-long journey to visit cocoa plantations around the world: Indonesia, Honduras, Colombia, Peru and more. She wanted to learn all about cocoa production, discover new flavors, and understand the issues that shape the daily lives of small-scale producers from one country to the next. Returning to Montreal a year later (with 23 kg of Peruvian cocoa hidden at the bottom of a backpack), she set about experimenting. Roasting, conching and tempering until absolutely everything in her apartment smelled of cocoa. All this, to give you the chance to experience bean-to-bar made-in-Montreal: taste the singular flavors of pure-origin cocoas and discover the steps involved in making chocolate. To name her chocolate factory, Cath pays homage to Nunavut, where she worked for several years: Avanaa is the chocolate factory that comes from the North. Fortunately, you don’t have to go all the way to Iqaluit to taste chocolate, just visit us in Montreal. Glory to cocoa! Unfortunately, there isn’t enough sun to grow cocoa in our northern lands.

That’s why we import our cocoa from small farms and cooperatives in Latin America. Then, all the steps involved in transforming the cocoa into chocolate take place in our factory in the Villeray district. It’s by controlling each of these stages, from cocoa fermentation to tempering to roasting, that we manage to produce chocolate of unrivalled quality. Buying our chocolate may not save the world, but by encouraging sustainable agriculture and direct trade with thecacaoteros – the farmers on the cocoa plantations – we (and you) are making a modest contribution to a better world. In any case, by making excellent chocolate from bean to bar, we’re convinced that we’re contributing to your daily happiness, and that’s something.