GASTRONORMOUS

For our anniversary last month, we decided to take a tour of the Scharffen Berger chocolate factory in Berkeley. Long a haven for foodies, Berkeley offers up such pantheons of culinary distinction as Alice Waters’ Chez Panisse (at which we looked but didn’t touch!), but also caters to its college population and the aging hippies that still grace the parks and street corners.

Founded in 1996 and named for co-founder John Scharffenberger (he was required to split the name in two for copyright reasons), the operation is located in an old Heinz pickle factory in the industrial section of town. Quaint and fresh in that “old made new” aesthetic popular in many a historic district, the factory is surprisingly small. Even though the company was recently acquired by Hershey (as a part of their Artisan Confections Company, which also includes Dagoba Organic Chocolate and Joseph Schmidt Confections), the factory maintains an independent production process and only makes a few million pounds of chocolate a year. The big commercial chocolate factories top that in less than a week.

Sharffen Berger offers a large range of chocolate products, from roasted cacao nibs to three types of ganache–and of course chocolate bars. Although the company does produce what they call “milk chocolate” (it is 41% cacao as opposed to most other brands 10% or so), all Scharffen Berger chocolate is technically dark chocolate based on the percentage of cacao used (ranging from 41% to 82% cacao for bars and up to 99% for baking squares).

After an overview lecture (coupled with copious tasting), the factory tour was brief but hands on; in Scharffen Berger’s world, there isn’t much to it but selecting, roasting, pulverizing, and tempering the cocoa beans (a process during which cacao paste is melted along with cocoa butter, and in the case of the “milk” chocolate variety, milk) into the final product.

We each had to don hairnets (and even beard nets for the especially hirsute) before venturing into the racquetball-court-sized production room. The vintage European machines used to make the chocolate are unique on this side of the Atlantic, and can only process beans in small batches. On this day, no roasting or tempering was in process, but we did get to see the chocolate nibs crushed on a granite wheel into a sticky paste called a chocolate liquor. The aroma was incredible: not sweet, but rather earthy and deep, much like coffee grounds or a dark beer. During the lecture, our guide passed around a block of cocoa butter (“Rub it in!” he said, and I did. Smelling like chocolate is second only to eating it!) and offered cocoa nibs for each to taste (they taste much like the factory smelled, and most of our tour group visibly blanched in surprise). Among other interesting “nibs” of information, we learned that no chocolate goes to waste; if bars aren’t pressed properly, or don’t meet quality standards, they are simply re-tempered and put through again. College students make the factory’s dumpsters a regular stop in their diving tours, our tour guide noted, and always come up empty-handed. Fortunately, we didn’t leave empty-handed!

Like all factory tours, we were spat into the gift shop at the end and stuffed full of samples, but none of us minded a bit. Having taken a Disney-fied tour of the Hershey factory in Pennsylvania, I was pleased that this tour was its polar opposite; intimate, simple, and without artifice, much like the product. The tour, like their chocolate, has a lot to recommend it.

The building also houses a charming, light-filled café called Café Cacao that serves brunch, lunch, and an assortment of chocolate treats. We opted for little “whoopie pies” made of chocolate cookies and peanut butter cream and Scharffen Berger hot chocolate. An overload of chocolate, but excellent nonetheless. Of course, I bought an assortment of bars and a bag of nibs. Nibs can be substituted for chopped nuts in any recipe with interesting results; I also sprinkle them on ice cream or (gasp) in a peanut butter sandwich.

After the tour, we nipped into town to visit the first Peet’s Coffee & Tea store on the corner of Walnut and Vine Streets. Founded in 1966, Peet’s provided the first beans to what became the Starbucks chain, but refused to compromise quality and service to likewise expand into a full competitor. Today, Peet’s is a smaller, beloved chain mostly on the west coast offering up coffee and tea amid African artworks and brewing paraphernalia. Peet’s sells a Scharffen Berger mocha that is to die for; it’s the perfect marriage of chocolate and coffee, and what better way to celebrate local culinary culture (aside from nabbing that Chez Panisse reservation)?

1 hour Public Tours are free
7 days a week, 4-6 times a day
Reservations Required

Scharffen Berger Chocolate Maker
914 Heinz Avenue
Berkeley, CA 94707
(800) 930-4528