Meet the maker
La Naya
La Naya is Lithuania’s first craft chocolate maker. Its workshop and boutique is located just twenty minutes from Vilnius in the small village of Rudamina. Through its chocolate La Naya is hoping to bring people a little bit closer to a perfect world.
Of all the makers we’ve worked with, La Naya has one of the most unusual (but comprehensive) chocolate philosophies. Bringing together Plato and the Mayans, La Naya describes its bars as ‘bean-to-emotion’ chocolate, a small square of which will help you to transcend your everyday reality. Whatever your views on the transcendent powers of the craft chocolate, we certainly think La Naya’s bars are worth trying.
We spoke to Jovita from La Naya about the company and where they saw themselves going.
When did you start your company — and with whom? How many are there of you?
Our technologist Justas started his first steps to chocolate world about three years ago while he was working in raw restaurant. And his first chocolate was of course ‘raw’ (unroasted). Getting more knowledge, tasting of different chocolate lead further.
Common dreams connect people. Our team of ten chocolate professionals with diverse education and profiles is driven by the same dream – to share passion for high quality and delicious chocolate. Commitment to excellence enforces us to do our best on daily basis, to keep learning and to follow latest worldwide tendencies.
What mission have you set yourselves for making chocolate?
Pragmatists define us as a bean-to-bar chocolate boutique located in the village of Rudamina, a 20 minutes drive down south from Vilnius, Lithuania. Romantics, however, call us the factory of emotions.
While other chocolatiers work their way from beans to bars, we go one step futher. At La Naya, our production processes are all about purifying emotions and expressing them through outstanding chocolate.
Upon leaving our little factory of emotions, the mountain-shaped La Naya bars travel across the world to reach the true chocolate aficionados. The one and only bean-to-emotion chocolate in the universe, La Naya will let you escape the cave of shadows and enter the world of perfection.
Where do you want to go next? New bars? New beans? New markets?
So far we have single origin dark chocolate bars from Tanzania cacao beans infused with the emotion of chrystalism or sonder, dark chocolate from Costa Rica cacao beans infused with the emotion of zenosyne and dark milk chocolate bar from Vietnam cacao beans infused with the emotion of liberosis. This is just the begining. We keep on exploring new emotions and sharing our passion for chocolate.
How did you source your beans?
We source our cacao beans from Panama, Vietnam, Tanzania, Costa Rica and other locations. From the bean sorting room to raosting and refining, to conching and tempering, all the chocolate bars with our dearest emotions in their absolute forms.
What inspired your choice of wrapper/mould design?
Far across the waters, surrounded by the glorious green mountains of Guatemala, washed by the warm summer rains and kissed by the bright sun, hides the precious jewel of nature – La Naya village. Unique, exceptional design of La Naya bars is portraying the mountains and valleys of La Naya village.
The design of the package is created by Lithuanian artist. In 2015 this package won the National Package Design Award.
What is your favorite food? Wine? Other chocolate makers?
Our favorite food is chocolate, chocolate and chocolate
Want to explore more makers of the world's best craft chocolate? Just start typing their name (or any letter) into the search box to discover them.
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