We interviewed Kendra Leighton in the previous issue, who not only wears an Omnipod insulin pump ‘pod’, but it transpired that she also makes a living working with cocoa pods!
Described on her website as a ‘voracious reader and chocolatier,’ Kendra Leighton is multi-talented. With her partner she set up and runs Rawr Choc. “We started by selling our handmade chocolate bars on a market stall in Cambridge, then shops started to approach us to stock it, and now we run our own factory. We wanted to focus on organic raw chocolate, which is to say that it has had minimal processing. Most of us are aware that raw vegetables contain more enzymes and vitamins than boiled ones. The same is true of all foods, including chocolate, but modern mass-processing techniques leads to a chocolate that is very distant from its cacao origins.”
Rawr chocolate has a naturally low glycaemic index. It’s dairy-free, has no added refined cane or beet sugar, no artificial ingredients, no hydrogenated or chemical preservatives, emulsifiers, or colourings.
The carb content of Rawr’s organic, Fairtrade bars ranges from 40g per 100g (17g sugar) for its darkest bar, to 48g (25g sugar) for its lightest. (In comparison, a well-known brand of milk chocolate contains 57g carbs per 100g, of which 56g is sugar.) Leighton finds that her chocolate has less of a volatile effect on her blood sugar than a typical supermarket bar, though it is of course still chocolate, and still has to be carb counted and eaten wisely!
Brief encounter
Having started up the chocolate business, Leighton is also a published author, having written Glimpse, a ‘ghostly romance’, which was published in 2014. It was inspired by Alfred Noyes’ poem The Highwayman(‘When she inherits the infamous Highwayman Inn, Liz hopes the move will be a fresh start.’). Aimed at theyoung adult market, the novel is ‘something I did on the side’ when not running the chocolate company. Leighton says, “I wrote the book for young adult or teenage market as I’m a fan of that age group and the fiction aimed at it, which is actually read by just as many adults. I hope to do a follow-up soon.”
