Seattlest and the Chocolate Factory

When a sex offender moves into your neighborhood, you get a notice. It's called Megan's law. But when a new (and oddly, odor-free) chocolate factory opens a stone's throw from your abode, it could be weeks-- months even,
before you get wind of it.

There oughtta be a law.

Seeking vigilante justice, consumer safety, and some high-grade Venezuelan, we infiltrated 3400 Phinney, which happens to be the address of the former Red Hook Brewery. The first bar from the nation's first organic, varietal, fair-trade independent chocolatier rolled off the
line about six weeks ago, but alas, no golden ticket.

Donning the required bandanna do-rag, which made us very look very Julia Stiles-in-Save-the-Last-Dance, we examined the cacao grown by presumably empowered farmers in Venezuela, Ghana, Cote d'Ivoire, Panama, Ecuador, and Madagascar. For the definitive history of varietal chocolate, check out this
book.

Molly, our guide, stabbed a saber-like implement into the bag, the better to ensure farmers haven't bulked them up with rocks. (Fair traders aren't fools, mmmkay?)

Amid the suspiciously clean belts and ball bearings and shit (all but one are secondhand antiques from Europe) sat a contraption they call the de-stoner, because after you run the cacao beans through them, they're no longer stoned. Bummer.

The roaster, a 1930s model from Germany, imparts a smoky, Marlene Dietrich flavor in the double-roasting process. Did you know that there are only 20 or so other chocolate roasters in America, and they're owned by a eleven
companies, or that Scharffenberger was recently bought out by Hershey's? Ok, then.

We're dark chocolate freaks at Seattlest, but the real standout was the spicy-sweet Coconut Curry milk chocolate, which is Bhangra meets Miles Davis in your mouth. Or something.

We also tried the nutty roasted nibs, which are added to bars, sold as nib brittle, and can also be purchased separately ($16 a pound) for use in baking, or hey, throw some on a salad, if that's how you roll.

You can eat your money's worth in samples on the $5 tour (Saturdays at 1 and 3 p.m.) but that didn't stop some goober from pointing to a glob of excess chocolate encrusted on machine and asking, "If that's just gonna be thrown out, can I eat it?"

The answer, in case you're wondering, is no.