India’s first tree to bar chocolate

On World Chocolate Day, meet Karthikeyan Palaniswamy and Harish Manoj Kumar, who have just launched

“I have always been interested in food. I wanted to get into the food industry by the time I turned 40,” says Karthikeyan Palaniswamy, textile entrepreneur from Tiruppur who was also a gifted home chef and amateur mixologist. Two years ago, when he turned 40, he decided it was time to pursue his dream. His brother-in-law Harish Manoj Kumar was a third generation agriculturist who, for two decades, had been growing cocoa trees as inter-crop in the family’s plantation in the foothills of Anamalais. Between them, they decided to take the plunge into chocolate making. And that’s how Regal Chocolates came into being.

Harish started focussing on plant propagation, sustainable farming methods, harvesting, fermenting and drying of the cocoa beans while Karthikeyan took online courses, connected with the international craft chocolate-making community, visited craft chocolate makers around the world and learnt the fine art of chocolate-making. They started making small batches of chocolate bars and tested it among friends and family.

The process was tweaked based on feedback and they were finally ready with Regal Chocolate, a line of gourmet baking bars and couverture chocolate and Soklet, India’s first tree-to-bar chocolate. As the only participants from India at Chocoa Chocolate Show in Amsterdam earlier this year, Karthikeyan says, “We presented our gourmet chocolate bars, Soklet, here before launching it in India. The response was very favourable and we hope to put Soklet in store shelves in Europe soon.”

Soklet is a line of fine chocolate bars mostly dark but with a milk chocolate and blonde variation. The packaging, which draws inspiration from Kanchipuram sari borders, only reiterates their core theme of being local and regional. They do not use compounds, flavouring agents and preservatives in the bars and let the cocoa beans speak for themselves.

Chefs like Manu Chandra have acknowledged Regal Chocolate on their Instagram feed. Chandra describes the brownie dessert at Toast and Tonic restaunrat as “featuring Coimbatore Regal Chocolate in the most comforting way.”

On the eve of World Chocolate Day, Karthikeyan and Harish are excited about launching two new products: pure Dark Drinking Chocolate and Roasted Cocoa Nibs. “We are almost ready with a chocolate-and-nut spread that is made using unrefined sugar and will be a healthier alternative to similar products. For the festive season later this year, we will introduce chocolate truffles in a range of Indian flavours”, says an excited Karthikeyan.

Regal facts

Soklet bars come with 40%, 55%, 57%, 70% and 82% cocoa content. A bar of 50gm is priced at ₹220 onwards

Regal Chocolate bars come with 50%, 57%, 70% and 82% cocoa content. A bar of 200gm is priced ₹295 onwards