Local confectionery shares sweet stories

Looking for something sweet for your valentine? Look no further than Sky Bear Confections for some of the most interesting hand-crafted candies and chocolates.

Sky Bear Confections was founded by local chocolatier, Marla Graves, with a mission to share sweet tiny works of art with the surrounding communities. With a range of menu items including old-fashioned fudges to the most modern techniques in chocolatiering, there is something special for everyone’s taste buds.

“We are a new small confectionery that makes hand crafted artisan candies and chocolates,” Graves said. “We specialize in hand-painted bonbons, hand-wrapped homemade caramels and truffles.”

Sky Bear Confections was just formed this year, but Graves said the idea has been evolving for years.

“I have been baking and cooking in many capacities for several years,” Graves said. “I became interested in chocolate three years ago and developed this new skill while traveling and visiting a beautiful artisan chocolate shop.”

According to Graves, chocolatiers source and blend pure chocolate for specific properties and flavor profiles and then use it to create recipes for their own unique bonbons, confections and bars. This involves the understanding of the physical and chemical aspects of chocolate to create chocolates and other confections. Perfecting the technical aspect of design and art of flavor takes many years of practice.

“I didn’t know what I was getting myself into,” said Graves. “Learning to work with real chocolate was a bigger undertaking than I anticipated, but it has definitely become a labor of love. Also, candy, especially chocolate, is a completely different beast than baking or cooking, so I began researching and explored a test kitchen. I also took a class in chocolate making, traveled to learn about candy making from several different chocolatiers, while learning the trials and errors until I perfected the products I wanted to call my own.

“I didn’t know when I started this adventure that this would be something I would become so taken with, but I am glad I stumbled into the world of chocolate,” she added.

Graves said that learning to work with chocolate and sugar is very interesting and sometimes feels more like science than cooking.

“You have to take into consideration humidity, temperature, and all sorts of other factors to make sure chocolate stays in temper (a process that reestablishes the cocoa butter crystals that are in real chocolate) and stabilizes with that gorgeous shine and snap you only get from real quality chocolate,” she said. “Sugar is that way too. Temperature is very important, with a few degrees being the difference between perfect caramel and caramel that is too hard to chew or too soft to set. It took a lot of practice and patience to figure it all out, and I feel like I still have a lot of things I still want to learn and try to master.”

Together with her husband, David, the two work in their home.

“We are something completely different from anything available in the area,” Graves said. “We pour our heart and soul into each piece to create the best possible experience to our customers. We not only have created a treat, but also something people can share with others, especially for that person who has everything.

“My personal favorite is our mocha bonbons and coffee caramel. I am a huge fan of the espresso inside and the passion fruit. Nothing tastes like real passion fruit, so we use real passion fruit as the base for the filling,” Graves said.

Graves’ passion for confections is not only in the challenge of mastering the art of candy-making, but in sharing the sweet experience with others.

“I love watching people try our candies,” she said. “We try to let the real flavors shine through while using high-quality ingredients, which makes all the difference in the world. We worked very hard to perfect the texture of our candies, such as our popular caramels, to make sure it has a pleasant, dreamy texture that doesn’t really stick to your teeth, but holds the ever-so-lovely, buttery caramel taste.”

Graves also aims to use the best ingredients to satisfy every customer.

“We are passionate about the quality of our products and hope the local community will be too,” said Graves. “We use as high quality ingredients as possible, and we feel like it really shows in the taste and presentation. We also like to take the time to really talk to our customers about what they are looking for and hopefully filling their needs, including vegan and gluten free, ensuring there is a little something for everyone.”

Sky Bear Confections is on Facebook and Instagram which is the best way to keep up with happenings in the company.