Article today 2/25

One-man Chocolate Factory Flourishes

The main ingredient in Ben Rasmussen's one-man chocolate factory in Woodbridge, Virginia, is cocoa beans.

"Once the beans are cracked in the winnower, the nibs, which is the meat of the bean, goes into the grinder. ... And it just spins round and round and grinds the nibs into liquid called cocoa liquor. To that I add sugar. That is all my chocolate is. Just cocoa beans and sugar," he said.

Rasmussen’s love of chocolate started about eight years ago when he tasted a sample of gourmet dark chocolate. He said he fell in love with it instantly and started learning to make it himself.

"I learned how to make it just through the Internet and trial and error and kind of teaching myself on reading old books and just doing it, got some used equipment and started messing around with it, fell in love with the process, and that's basically how it started," he said.

In very short order, his company, Potomac Chocolate, was born. The bar from the first batch of chocolate he made in his kitchen was a finalist in that year's Good Food Awards, which is based out of San Francisco.

"That bar also won an Academy of Chocolate Awards in 2011," Rasmussen added. "I won a couple of Academy of Chocolate Awards and a few International Chocolate Awards for four different bars."

Winning those awards led to a high demand for his chocolate, and soon he moved his production out of his kitchen and to his basement, where he now makes the chocolates.Rasmussen also has built most of his equipment by himself. But chocolate-making is not his full-time job.

"I'm a Linux system administrator, a computer nerd," Rasmussen said. "So finding out how to balance the work at my day job and chocolate is a real struggle, especially considering the fact that I've got family, four kids; I am a busy guy."

The busy guy makes about 140 kilos (300 pounds) of chocolate every couple of weeks, and sells it online and in high-end gourmet specialty stores and coffee shops.

Rasmussen's cocoa beans are from four places: Costa Rica, Venezuela, Peru and the Dominican Republic. Each of his 10 flavored bars indicates the origin on the wrapping.

"I make all of the chocolate myself, so it's a very small company, but it continues to grow," he said. "Every year has been better than the year before. Last year was the best by far."

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