Search

Recent reports about cadmium and lead in chocolate have prompted questions about how much of each is in our chocolate.

Anything grown in the soil contains cadmium because cadmium is naturally present in the soil and is taken up by plants. Root vegetables and green leafy vegetables are known to accumulate cadmium from the soil. No limits have been established for these foods probably because it would be difficult to get a sample representative of each farm and too expensive to have this testing done routinely. Chocolate is processed in large lots and so a single sample can be representative of a large quantity of chocolate. The European Union has established limits on cadmium in chocolate that went into effect in 2019. The limit for dark chocolate is 0.8 mg/kg (also known as parts per million, see EU Cadmium Limits ). There only guidance from the US FDA is that food should not contain more than 10 ppm of heavy metals which includes both cadmium and lead and is much higher than the EU limit. All of our products fall below the EU limit based on recent testing of cacao we use to make chocolate. Our Maui Grown cacao is low in cadmium and when formulated into 70% dark chocolate the level of cadmium is around 0.3 mg/kg (0.3 ppm). Our Uganda cacao is lower still and when formulated into dark chocolate the level of cadmium is around 0.25 mg/kg (0.2 ppm). Our Ecuadorian cacao is naturally higher in cadmium and we blend it with the Uganda cacao to formulate our 65% dark chocolate used in our flavored products so that the blend is well below the EU limit. Our dark milk chocolate products are all proportionally lower than our dark chocolate products because they contain less cacao.

Lead in chocolate is due to contamination of the soil where the cacao is grown or contamination of the cacao at some point in the production process. Lead is not normally found in soil at any significant amount. The levels we found in our cacao from all sources are at or below the limit of detection, 0.01 ppm, of the testing method. This is far below any safety limit set by any governmental agency.

A napolitain is a tablet of chocolate that weighs 5 grams. Traditionally, a napolitain is served with a cup of coffee!

Our gift boxes, gift tins, and bulk bags are all filled with individually wrapped napolitains.

"Maui Grown" describes our farm-to-bar Hawaiian chocolate products. Our Maui Grown chocolate is made using 100% cacao grown at our cacao farm in Lahaina. We are thrilled to congratulate our farmers on winning Gold at the 2021 International Cocoa of Excellence awards. Our Lahaina cacao farm produces a very limited supply of cacao each year, so we're lucky to source cacao from other unique terroirs around the world.

Our other chocolate products are made using cacao from an award-winning family-run estate in Costa Esmeraldas, Ecuador. This is a farm that our VP of Farm & Factory Operations (and worldwide cacao expert), Dan O'Doherty, visits twice a year and has been building a relationship with for the past 8 years. All our cacao sourced from other origins has been handpicked by Dan. While he travels to remote locations to help farmers improve their cultivation and post-harvest techniques, he also looks to source the most unique and high quality cacao (so we and other factories around the world can make it into delicious chocolate!).

Cacao is similar to wine in that the terroir it is grown in is a main contributor to its taste and we are happy to celebrate how diverse cacao can be. To learn more about both our Maui and Costa Esmeraldas cacao, please visit our Cacao Origins page!

The cacao we source from Costa Esmeraldas, Ecuador has deep cocoa flavors and mild fruitiness; these beans provided great flexibility in recipe formulation and the opportunity to add complementary flavors. When we first began crafting our chocolate, we tried a range of cacao percentages and settled on a 65% dark chocolate because it gave the best balance of sweetness and chocolate flavors.

We also decided to craft a 60% dark milk chocolate to attract dark chocolate lovers to a chocolate with dimensions of flavor. Roller dried milk imparts a beautiful creaminess and caramel flavor to our dark milk chocolate. Our dark milk chocolate even converted our CEO to a milk chocolate fan!

All of our chocolate is made in our Lahaina factory! Our current chocolate offerings are sourced from our Maui Ku’ia Estate cacao farm in Lahaina, Costa Esmeraldas, Ecuador and Semuliki Forest, Uganda. The cacao from our Lahaina farm is used in our Hawaiian Maui Grown chocolate. All of our other products use cacao from Costa Esmeraldas, Ecuador and Semuliki Forest, Uganda. To learn more about our chocolate’s origins, please visit our Cacao Origins page.

All of our chocolate is made in Hawaii! Our chocolate factory is right here in Lahaina, Maui (next to our cacao farm).

Over time, chocolate has a tendency to bloom, which is when the cocoa butter begins to separate from the cacao solids. If you’ve ever seen chocolate turn a bit white around the edges - that’s blooming! Our dark chocolate’s best-of date is one year from when it is molded. Dark milk's best-of date is one year and a half from when it is molded.

From 12:30pm until close, the pavilion is open seating! The pavilion is not open seating from 10:30am-12:30am, because we host guided tastings during that time. Click here for more information and to book a guided chocolate tasting with optional alcoholic beverage pairings, hosted daily by our owner and founder, Gunars Valkirs.

We can no longer allow anyone to bring outside alcohol onto our premises. During our guided tastings, and any time before 5pm, our pavilion will be divided into two sections: over 21 area and non-consumption area. In order to sit in the 21 and over section, you must have a valid photo ID with you proving that you are at least 21 years of age. After 5pm, the pavilion is 21 and over only; you must have a valid photo ID with you to enter the pavilion after 5pm.

Unfortunately, our liquor license strictly limits us to only serve alcohol in a designated consumption area and that no one under the age of 21 be allowed in the consumption area at any time. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Unfortunately, our liquor license strictly prohibits anyone from bringing in outside alcohol. We apologize for the limitation.

We are legally bound to ensure that everyone in the consumption area has a valid photo ID on them to prove they are at least 21 years of age, regardless of what age they appear.

No. You must be at least 21 years of age and have a valid photo ID to sit in the consumption area, but you do not need to order any alcoholic beverages once seated.

We will! At first, however, we are focusing on wine and other fermented beverages that are complex in the same ways chocolate is- from the terroir the crop is grown in to post harvest processes to the production methods. These wines, spirits and beer have been chosen specifically by Gunars and our team to pair with our chocolate. We also need to acquire an ice machine, which will be soon. Stay tuned! We are very excited to eventually serve chocolate cocktails and more. In the meantime, feel free to let us know what you think would be a delicious addition to our beverage menu by emailing aloha@mauichocolate.com

Yes! Come visit our retail store and cafe at our factory in Lahaina, Maui. We’re open 7 days a week from 9 am - 4:30 pm. To visit the farm, please schedule a farm tour.

We offer tours of our cacao farm in Lahaina, Maui! Our cacao farm tour also includes a 9 piece chocolate tasting with an incredible ocean view. To learn more and book, please visit our Cacao Farm Tour and Tasting page.

Yes! Our guided tastings take place at our Lahaina factory in our beautiful upstairs open-air pavilion. Take in panoramic views of the ocean and surrounding landscape, indulge in 9 pieces of our award-winning chocolate while learning about our story, cacao, and chocolate-making! We also have chocolate tastings that benefit our Laulima nonprofit partners on the weekends. Laulima chocolate tastings are hosted by our founder and CEO, Dr. Gunars Valkirs, and our VP of Operations and Cacao Expert, Dan O’Doherty.

We also offer unguided chocolate tasting flights at our factory store and cafe. In-house pavilion cafe seating is only available when there is not a guided tasting taking place. Please call us at 844-844-5842 to see what time the pavilion is open for seating!

We are available on Maui Food Hub.

Limited stock available at the following locations: Kuau Store, Wailea Wine

Yes! We offer in-store pick up at our chocolate factory retail location in Lahaina. 

Yes! We offer e-gift cards.

In order to protect the public as well as the integrity of our Chocolate Factory, an FDA Certified Food Production facility, we will not be able to accept product returns.

If there is a problem with your order or concern with our chocolate, we want to hear from you immediately. Please email us your order number, name, phone number, a preferred time to reach you, and tell us what happened. We will contact you promptly and work with you on the situation.

For questions and issues regarding orders, wholesale, products, and shipping please email orders@mauichocolate.com.

We accept all major credit and debit cards.

In our retail store we do not accept cash at this time. We apologize for any inconvenience.

We generally try to send your order within 48 hours of receipt on the days we ship (we currently ship Monday - Thursday). Orders received between Thursday morning and Sunday will ship out on Monday at the earliest.

Through Fedex and UPS, we offer 2-day shipping. Through USPS, only 3-day priority is offered, but please note that it could take longer than 3 days. We strongly encourage choosing expedited 2-Day shipping at checkout!

Yes! We ship worldwide with either UPS or Fedex.

We prefer to not ship to a PO box, but can do so if necessary. FedEx and USPS are the only carriers that deliver to PO boxes. Please note that we do not offer USPS shipping to the continental United States during the warmer months of the year.

Yes! Every order is packed with care in an insulated cool bag with sweat-proof ice packs. During the hot summer months, we only use Expedited 2-Day shipping to ensure your orders reach you in great condition. We prefer to ship Monday - Thursday to avoid having your package sit somewhere hot and unprotected over the weekend. During these hotter months, there might be a delay in sending your order.

Each order is packed with care in an insulated cool bag with sweat-proof/non-condensing ice packs to prevent the chocolate from melting.

Yes! All of our chocolate is kosher certified. Our dark chocolate is Kosher Parve certified and our dark milk chocolate is Kosher Dairy certified. Please visit our Kosher Certification page to learn more.

All of our dark chocolate is vegan. Our dark milk chocolate does contain dairy.

We go to great lengths to ensure that milk cannot contact our dark chocolate. We run two independent production lines to keep the dark milk chocolate separate from dark chocolate.

Our dark milk and milk chocolate contain dairy. All of our dark chocolate is dairy-free.

We go to great lengths to ensure that milk cannot contact our dark chocolate. We run two independent production lines to keep the dark milk chocolate separate from dark chocolate.

Yes, all of our chocolate is gluten-free.

Yes, all of our chocolate is soy-free.

Sugar: we source organic cane sugar from Brazil.

Cocoa Butter: we source organic cocoa butter from Peru.

Milk: we source old-fashioned artisanal roller-dried milk from Verndale in Detroit, MI.

Most of our fruit flavors are sourced from fruit picked locally on Maui. We grow Mapulehu mangoes on our farm, guavas are handpicked up north in Kapalua, and our CEO grows calamansi limes at his home orchard. 

Food grade essential oils are available for a variety of plant-based sources and are highly purified by steam distillation. We use essential oils in our blood orange, lemongrass, and peppermint chocolate products.

For questions and issues regarding your farm tour, tasting, or bookings please contact 808-793-6651 or email info@mauichocolatetour.com. 

For questions and issues regarding orders, wholesale, products, and shipping please email orders@mauichocolate.com.

For all other questions and issues please contact aloha@mauichocolate.com. 

You can also reach us at 844-844-5842.

Our cacao farm is located within the ahupua'a named Ku'ia. An ahupua'a is how the Hawai'ian people traditionally divided land in triangular form from mountain to sea. The ahupua'a system defined a way of life among the  people that lived within each specific land division, and the community could only flourish when each individual worked hard and fulfilled the responsibility entrusted upon them. Learn more from our “Ahupuaʻa: a story of land and life” blog post!

For a video tutorial, please visit our Subscription Management FAQ page.

1. Sign into your account. If already signed in, click on the Account Details icon.

2. Click "Manage Subscriptions."

3. Click “Shipping Addresses.”

4. Click "Add Shipping Address." Enter the information for the new address and press "Next."

5. Select which payment method to use with this shipping address. If you only have one payment method saved, it will already be selected. Click "Add shipping address."

6. Click "Subscriptions."

7. Select which subscription/product that needs the shipping address changed.

8. Click "Shipping and Billing."

9. Click "Use this Shipping and Billing Pair" that is located directly below the address you wish to select for shipping.

*Please Note that you will need to change the shipping for each subscription/product. * If the charge for your subscription has already gone through, we do not receive the updated address until the following order date. Please contact us at orders@mauichocolate.com ASAP if you need to change your address after the charge has already gone through.

* If you would like to temporarily change the shipping address for one of your orders, just use the same process but make sure to change it back to your normal shipping address after your order processes on the first of the month. This is great to use if you will on a trip when your order is supposed to arrive or if you'd like to send one of your monthly boxes to a friend, etc. 

For all subscription questions, please visit our Subscription Management FAQ page.

You have the ability to skip any of your upcoming orders. Once successfully skipped, your subscription will resume as usual.

1. Sign into your account. If already signed in, click on the Account Details icon.

2. Click "Manage Subscriptions"

3. Click “Subscriptions.” 

3. Select the subscription you would like to skip

4. Scroll down and select “Skip this Order.”

5. Confirm one more time by selecting “Skip this Order.”

6. After loading, your next order date on your subscription should have been updated. 

For all subscription questions, please visit our Subscription Management FAQ page.

Whether you want to add a new item to your subscription order as a one-time purchase or a reoccurring addition to your subscription, it can be easily done through your customer profile.

1. Sign into your account. If already signed in, click on the Account Details icon.

2. Click  "Manage Subscriptions"

3. Click "Subscriptions"

4. Click "Add a Product" on the upper right. 

5. Search or select the product you would like to add.

6. Specify the quantity, whether it will be a one-time purchase or subscription item, order frequency, shipping address, and first shipping date. 

7. Scroll to the bottom and click "Add a Product."