Chocolate

THE ROANNE MANUFACTURE

The heart of the Pralus house

By taking over the family business, François Pralus realized the passion that had driven him since his training at Bernachon: producing his own chocolate from cocoa beans. After a few tests on the pastry site, in the center of Roanne, the need quickly arose to install a site dedicated to the manufacture of chocolate: a factory bringing together all the stages of production, from the reception of the beans to candy making through roasting, conching and molding. In addition to the production of chocolate, there is the on-site making of pralines, pastries and Pralulines for the Roannais shops.

In this completely redeveloped former textile factory in the suburbs of Roanne, around forty employees carry out the various production processes, then packaging, preparation and shipping to stores and customers throughout France and abroad.

“From the bean to the bar, I do everything myself,” explains François Pralus, who is among the pioneers of bean to bar. Here, all the chocolate is produced from beans chosen from around fifteen producing countries around the tropics and regularly transported to the Roanne reserves. No or very few mixtures: each origin has its own qualities and flavors, brought by the terroir, the work of the planters and finally revealed by the work of the master chocolate maker. François Pralus chose to work his chocolate at 75%, the ideal percentage according to him to appreciate the qualities of each bean origin.

After its arrival at the factory, the processing of cocoa is a long and delicate process. Each bean is in fact treated differently depending on its quality, more robust like the trinitario or more delicate like the criollo. It all starts with roasting, a very important step which will allow the aromas of the cocoa to develop. “It requires slow, gentle roasting; not too violent but quite long,” explains François Pralus who developed the process for each origin, as well as the recipes for some blends. Once roasted, the beans are peeled, crushed and ground before adding sugar and cocoa butter. A long refining process precedes the molding which gives the final shape to the chocolate bars. “Real” chocolate, as François Pralus likes to call it; this couverture chocolate which will be the raw material for pastry chefs and chocolatiers to make their candies.

At the Roanne factory, around forty pastry chefs and chocolatiers produce chocolate bars and candies as well as the entire range of confectionery and pastries.

DIRECTION NOSY BE

The plantation of Madagascar

On the heights of Nosy-Be, past the rice fields, between vetivers, frangipani trees and raffia trees... it is on red and fragrant soil that François Pralus' cocoa trees grow.

On the hillside, the plantation was created from scratch, starting with the nursery which saw more than 25,000 cocoa plants born on site. The beans chosen, from a variety of criollo, are very typical of this Malagasy terroir where the white bean is grown, particularly appreciated for its finesse. The plants, which had become robust, were installed in a preserved primary forest, in the shade of large trees where they were able to flourish for a good five years before giving their first pods.

The production of this small plantation remains modest, the sloping ground and the lack of water for several years do not allow it to produce in quantity. It nevertheless keeps the twenty Malagasy planters responsible for making compost, maintaining the trees and harvesting all year round. They all live in the neighboring village and their children attend the school supported by François Pralus, who rebuilt it after a cyclone. Planters and their families also benefit from medical support when needed.