There’s something so soothing about a nice bar of chocolate after a stressful day, but could chocolate serve as a complementary wellness therapy? According to David and Pamela Griffin, it can, as the Massachusetts husband and wife team are infusing healthful, therapeutic ingredients into the sumptuous sweet at their new Framingham location.
According to Pamela, ‘It’s not your average chocolate. We wanted something that was good for you, that would taste good, and that you wouldn’t feel guilty eating.’ Pamela was a regional director at Starbucks for 17 years, while her husband has a background in manufacturing engineering, so how did the couple move to opening the first Chocolate Therapy in Dedham in 2011, and the new Framingham shop in December 2012?
‘He started to say, “let’s do something on our own”,’ Pamela detailed. ‘He looked into gyms and a place that sold tools. Then he came home one day and started talking about chocolate.’ David took a course at the Cambridge Culinary Institute and started making his own chocolates. He explained, ‘I wanted to create a good chocolate experience. The ganache and the shell should melt at the same time. Some of the flavour ought to be released immediately. A lot of chocolate I’ve tried just didn’t get it.’
Pamela added, ‘We’ve tasted everything, but we wanted a different experience, which is where all the crazy flavours come from.’ The Chocolate Therapy truffle called “Refresh,” for example, contains milk chocolate, fresh ginger, and ginseng, as the Griffins say that both ginger and ginseng energises the body. “The Cure” truffle, on the other hand, contains cinnamon, bay leaf (which works as an astringent and digestive aid, among other benefits), and cayenne pepper (which is good for blood circulation, headaches, and arthritis).
Chocolate Therapy chocolatier Richard Gemme, of Millbury, noted that dark chocolate with sea salt caramel is the best seller, but all the chocolates are unique for their wellbeing-boosting properties. ‘We do use a lot of therapeutic ingredients,’ he said. ‘The dark chocolate, especially, but we do use things like cayenne, Tahitian vanilla. We use cascade hops that are used in beer production that goes really well with the raw honey in one of our truffles. I’ve never heard of anyone doing that before.’
