A for profit social enterprise, all about food

Joan Coukos is a Chocolatier & CEO of CHOCOLAT MODERNE. She graduated magna cum laude from Duke University with a degree in French and Russian, and received an MBA from UNC Chapel Hill before entering the New York banking scene.

Her extensive career included six years in Moscow during the rough and tumble days of Russia’s transition to a market economy, after which she returned to New York and Wall Street in 1999.

Then Joan fell in love with creating one-of-a-kind hand made chocolates

AH: What led you becoming a chocolatier?

JC: I think it was one of those epiphanies that people have where at the moment it happens you are not even aware of all the things that are lining up. Let’s just say by way of background I was someone who was pretty much a humanities major, I loved the arts, I was a language major.

AH: What did you do before this?

JC:I loved food and cooking and was very much a foodie throughout my adult life. I kept up with the latest dining trends in Paris, New York, and Rome and even scheduled my vacations around eating. Professionally I switched gears and became a banker. I had a very practical financial career for 20 years. In December of 2000 I was going on a vacation to Brussels and had not planned a lot ahead of time as far as what I was going to do there. In the flight going over there I read in the inflight magazine about the hot new chocolate trends and chocolatiers that were doing exciting things. I was so impressed by what I was reading, particularly about chocolatier Pierre Marcolini. I decided I really needed to check out his shop and some of the other top chocolatier’s shops in Brussels.

Joan in Brussels

AH: Tell me about the chocolate molds you found in Brussels and how they helped to get you into the chocolate business yourself?

JC:My first morning in Brussels I just happened upon a big antique market and happened to see a booth where people were selling something that looked like kitchen equipment. I didn’t know what it was at first, but it looked culinary and I thought it looked interesting. It soon dawned on me that what I was looking at was antique chocolate molds. That was the second chocolate message on that trip! When I saw the stand with the chocolate molds I just said: I have to buy these molds and teach myself how to make chocolate because I think it’s going to become this really big new thing in the States to have exciting new kinds of chocolate creations.

Antique chocolaté mold's Joan found in Brussels

AH: How and what did you do to get started?

JC: When I got back from Brussels I Googled truffles on the Internet because I didn’t know anything about how chocolate was made at all! Nothing. I didn’t bake with chocolate, nothing at all. I started making rolled truffles and molded chocolates in my apartment. I was still working for the bank, I was part of the Chase side and then the merger happened with JP Morgan and people started getting laid off. So when I bought the molds I started joking that if I get laid off I’ll be able to make something with my hands and sell it on the street if I have too. I was laid off 10 months later.

AH: How did you learn to make truffles?

JC: So every month between January and October when I was laid off, one weekend a month I’d lock myself in my apartment and just try to make chocolates and experiment and act like I was already developing a chocolate line trying to see what it would really feel like. I just kept getting more and more into it. Because I was a good eater, I immediately had ideas about what kind of chocolates I wanted to make. I wanted interesting flavor combinations and wanted them to look different in addition to tasting different.

AH: What are some of your newest flavors?

JC:We’re known for unique, cutting edge, like first time-tried flavors. We do a number of savory flavors. We have Blood Orange and Bergamot Caramel, the Tomato Lemon Caramel, and a flavor called Cashmere Spice, which is a Ganache with cardamom, cinnamon and clove. We make over 50 flavors so I never really get tired of chocolate because there’s always something different to eat up here. One of our Valentines white chocolate hearts, which is one of our assortments, is Oprah’s top pick for Valentines Day!

Joan Coukos (on donkey) as a child in Greece

AH: Tell me about your unique flavor combinations and how your heritage and culture shapes them?

JC:I grew up appreciating food and ingredients, I mean we’re Greek too so we’re always talking about food. And my mom and grand-mom were really great chefs. We had a garden in the backyard and there was just a lot of conversation about food and the quality and freshness of ingredients. From the very beginning some of the flavors I made were inspired by things I ate at home. For example, my original signature flavor that I won some awards for and got a lot of press for was a Grapefruit Caramel called La Dolce Grapefruit. I made that flavor because I remembered when I was a little girl whenever anyone came to visit, my mom and grand-mom would give them some candied fruit preserves with pieces of the fruit in not like a jam along with a cognac. So we used to have candied pistachios and we used to have candied grapefruit rind. And so two of my first flavors were the Pistachio Praline and the Grapefruit Caramel. Eventually I came out with a Greek assortment called Greek Revival that is made with traditional Greek ingredients like Kalamata Olive and a Rosewater Caramel and a Dark Ganache with Ouzo and a Ganache with Mastic, which is a resin on a tree that only grows on one island in Greece. That island is right next door to the island my parents are from so I knew Mastic from when I was a little girl.

AH: What are your hopes for your business in the coming 10 years?

JC: I would really like to see it grow a lot. I really don’t want it to be a little mom and pop thing that’s why I started out in a larger manufacturing space selling wholesale. I really want it to become a well-recognized brand – one of the luxury household chocolate brands in the states and overseas too!

Visit Chocolat Modern at: www.chocolatmoderne.com