If winter is leaving you feeling blue, Ruby Hue in the city centre might help to cheer you up with decadent hot chocolate and rich bakes to indulge in. The new Bristol new eco chocolate shop and cafe opens up a whole new world of hot chocolate with the sheer variation of choices - customers can chose from a whopping 2,340 possibilities.
Tom Hughes and Ruth Scanlon recently opened their dream chocolate store in Finzels Reach, where customers can watch the entire chocolate-making process from bean to bar, while also enjoying a comforting cuppa of hot chocolate, coffee or tea. The hot chocolate is made up of three choices: the chocolate, the milk and the topping.
There are six different types of chocolate, a variety of milk choices, including hazelnut and coconut, while the toppings make up step three with variety choices such as blackthorn sea salt, guajillo chili, bourbon vanilla or simple Chew Valley whipped cream. For coffee lovers if you feel like a change from your typical Americano, there’s the house speciality Chocspresso, the name says it all, while teas include choices such as wild rooibos or hibiscus flowers.
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Tom said: “A friend of ours who’s a maths whizz worked out that we offer 2,340 variations in hot chocolate. Everything we serve is ethically sourced across the board, even our sugar. Sugar is normally harvested from a burnt crop, but I'd heard about sugar which is harvested only by combine harvester in Brazil and spent about four months trying to source it in the UK before finding a supplier. It really is the best sugar in the world in my opinion.”
The sugar is called Native and is vegan as it is not filtered through bone char, which process has been used in the sugar industry to whiten the final sugar product. This attention to detail encompasses everything the Ruby Hue team creates, including Ruth’s giant marshmallows which is Ruby Hue’s signature topping for the hot chocolate.
The trim from the giant marshmallows is used in Ruth’s ‘Rocky Road’ bake, while her sea-salt chocolate brownies are also proving to be a big hit. Tom said: “This is our fourth week since opening and people are going crazy for our hot chocolate.
“The most popular choice so far is our Peruvian 50% which is a silky, smooth chocolate which we recommend with sea salt. Our 85% hot chocolate is for the eccentric or the brave, it’s a rich chocolate sludge which we melt down and serve with guijillo chili,” he said.
The big glass windows are also part of the ethos of transparency where passers-by can watch the cacao beans being crushed and the interior design harks back to the 70s with all natural products on display. Tom said all the furnishings and fittings in the shop were made from reclaimed materials.
Fittingly the Finzel’s Reach area, where the shop is situated, was the home of Finzel’s Sugar Refinery in the 19th century. Tom said that since opening, their chocolate sales have done “really well”, adding that, “Together with our sourcing, there is a length to the flavour of our chocolate which lasts like a good whisky, I think Bristol gets it.”
Ruby Hue is located along Hawkins Lane in Finzels Reach
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