Then

After finishing college in 2013, I came home with a budding culinary fascination. I was eager to expand my horizons beyond marinated chicken, rice, and sauteed vegetables, and the environment back home gave me every opportunity I needed to begin exploring in earnest.

For the next ten years I studied and experimented in the realm of food, cooking, and wellness. This process was mostly self-guided with the aid of cookbooks, but I also got a taste of professional experience as I wondered how I could integrate this passion into my life as fully as possible. In a nutshell, I came to learn that cooking professionally in a restaurant setting wasn’t the right fit for me. The work came easily to me, but my nervous system didn’t respond well to the stress of that sort of working lifestyle.

Experiencing burnout gave me a new appreciation for being being healthy and well. It took a while to recover that state of natural well-being, but once I did I knew more than ever that it was a state of the highest value, one to be intentionally nurtured and supported.

I still wanted to share my deep love of cooking with others somehow, even if being a chef wasn’t in the cards for me. In this spirit I began a little company called Wholehearted Health Foods in the fall of 2019. I chose to focus on three core offerings I could provide to my local community: sourdough bread, granola, and dark chocolate. This was my entire work from 2020 until now.

You may have noticed that this was the first time I’ve mentioned chocolate. It seems a bit late in the story, but it was there in the background throughout my entire journey with food and cooking. Early on, I asked to make my Mom something for Mother’s Day and she pointed me towards a chocolate truffle recipe in a cookbook she had given me. I dove right in and it really clicked for me.

I made little batches of traditional chocolate truffles every year once the cooler weather came around, and I found it delightful in every way. The sheer number and variety of creative possibilities with chocolate is astounding to me. Once I began my business, I saw a perfect opportunity to take my understanding of chocolate to the next level.

 

In 2023, I rebranded the business as Wholehearted Chocolate. I decided that my time making bread and granola was over- I’d taken it as far as I wanted to, and in the process I had clearly realized that juggling three categories of foods was too broad of a “focus”.

It was time to give chocolate the spotlight I felt it truly deserved.

For much of my personal history, I was more of a thinker. Even so, I knew what it felt like when my heart was no longer in something. Everything feels harder then.

The heart guides us in the direction of what feels expansive and full of opportunities for growth. For the past decade, chocolate has always been somewhere nearby, gently suggesting that there is something great there for me to explore.

 

It’s time now.

-Keenan