By Catherine Metzgar
Artisan chocolates handmade at Cocoa Dolce
Beth Tully spends her days surrounded by chocolate.
Sounds like a pretty sweet career. How did Tully go from working in sales at a Fortune-500 company to a master chocolatier?
A foodie at heart, Tully stumbled upon some chocolate recipes in an issue of Bon Appétit in 1988. From there, the experiments began. Dissatisfied with her career, Tully began her chocolate endeavor in 2004. At her 50th birthday celebration, Tully had an epiphany that she needed to be doing something she was passionate about. This led her to seriously pursue chocolate.
The result was Cocoa Dolce, an artisan chocolate shop in Wichita.
After a year and a half of preparation, Cocoa Dolce opened with three
Beth Tully courtesy photo
employees. Before opening, Tully attended culinary school in Vancouver to become a Master Chocolatier. With training specifically in the chocolate arts, Tully expanded her knowledge of professional aspects of chocolate making including equipment usage, the science of chocolate, and developing a business plan.
Tully was at loss for a name. After some online searching and finding an exercise with tips on naming a business, she came across the term ”cocoa dolce” which means sweet chocolate in Italian. A name was born.
Five years later, Cocoa Dolce has grown from three employees to 39, and still offers artisan confections that are primarily ganache based. Over the years, chocolate flavors have expanded to include strawberry, maple cream, PB & J, gray salt caramel, and the signature Cocoa Dolce chocolate, cinnamon-orange, each costing $1.80 per piece.
Cocoa Dolce offers something for everyone with 50 different confections, 24 artisan bar flavors, 10 single origin bar flavors, six fruit and nut bars, six flavors of hot chocolate, and six wine-infused flavors in addition to novelty items. Once a year, Tully goes into research and development mode; current flavors are evaluated and new ones are added and subtracted based on current food, flavor, and chocolate trends.
Tully says Cocoa Dolce offers chocolates in over 25 wholesale accounts and ships products across the United States and Canada. Some of Cocoa Dolce’s customers include Dean & Deluca, Vino Volo, Cosentino’s, Reasors, Kroger, and Emerald City Market.
Numerous special events are held by Cocoa Dolce each year, including wine and chocolate tastings, beer and chocolate tastings, private parties, and even the occasional birthday party. Basic chocolate making classes are in works for this summer as well.
Tully takes great pride in the quality of each ingredient. The chocolate comes primarily from Belgium, but chocolate from around the world is also used. Butter comes from a dairy in New Jersey, honey from Zambian beekeepers, and balsamic vinegar from Italy. Only the best ingredients are selected for chocolates and Tully takes great satisfaction in sharing the origins and stories of each.
A typical production day is 7:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. during which 500 to 1,000 chocolates are made by hand. During the holiday season, this number can increase to 6,000 chocolates per day. Each individual chocolate is different and takes from eight hours to two days to finish.
One of Tully’s favorite Cocoa Dolce moments occurred recently when she received a thank you from President Obama. A mutual friend of Tully and former Kansas governor Kathleen Sebelius brought chocolates to Sebelius, who then personally delivered them to the President. He had an official White House photo taken and wrote a personal thank you to Tully. Even the President of the United States enjoys quality chocolate.
Tully stresses the importance of passion and dreaming big, not only in the chocolate business, but in life as well. For more information on Cocoa Dolce and to get your own chocolates, visit www.cocoadolce.com or 2132 N. Rock Road, Suite 100 in Bradley Fair.
