ChocoMotive and Camino: An old couple

Pssst! Visit ChocoMotive (502, Notre-Dame, Montebello) May 7, 8, 14 and 15 between 1 and 4 p.m. to sample our new MILK CHOCOLATE snack-format chocolate bars! Three new flavours: Hazelnut butter, Caramel and peanuts and Puffed rice and quinoa.

Our love story goes back to a little over ten years. Circumstances had it that Luc, my colleague, and I had decided to open a chocolate shop in Masson-Angers’ old train station in the Outaouais region. At this same time, La Siembra Cooperative, creators of the Camino brand, were looking to expand their business to chocolatiers. And, you can very well guess, one and one make two and off we were to a new start!

But, new beginnings aren’t always simple: the sales director at the time approached us with the lovely task of transforming more than 800 kg of dark chocolate. As a starting point, it seemed a little crazy! What were we going to do with all of this chocolate...The longest chocolate railroad of all times? Hum. We would have needed more than one day’s work of twelve people crafting the structure and, where would we have constructed this?

Finally, we were content with creating promotional kits, weighing each 1 kilo of chocolate. The structure we built: three rails and a locomotive. Believe me! We made so many of these little kits!

These creations got us invited to a chocolate show in Toronto to which we traveled with the Camino team to share our experience of working with the Camino chocolate couverture with our peers in the industry.

And here we are today, after ten years, moved into the old Montebello train station. We have even transformed part of our boutique into a chocolate museum which is recognized as part of the network of museums named the Société des Économusées du Québec. With sales amounting to over two tonnes of chocolate this year and proud to say to anyone who listens that we are part of a select group of chocolatiers in the world to use a very unique chocolate couverture, that is, Camino’s chocolate couverture. We are very fortunate to work with an exceptional chocolate that allows us to gain more and more fans of ChocoMotive creations every day.

Another dream of mine? Go to Peru to meet the family farmers that harvest OUR cocoa beans. Maybe I’ll get lucky after another ten years of a loving relationship!

Gaetan Tessier
Chocolatier
ChocoMotive