It’s better choco-late than never as new range launches

A new handmade chocolate business has been launched from a luxury small hotel in East Lothian.

Having worked in the property and catering industries in the Middle East, Angela and David Cockerton decided to return to the UK and set up a small hotel, Garleton Lodge, which offers a careful blend of five-star luxury in a homely environment.

One year on, and having received various quality and food awards for the hotel, Angela and David have launched their very own handmade chocolate business – The Chocolate Stag – which is a complementary business to Garleton Lodge.

David and Angela previously ran a very successful handmade chocolate business before they moved to the Middle East. This was Angela’s first step towards following her and David’s passion for food & drink after more than 20 years as an accountant in the corporate world.

The chocolate business has been ‘waiting to happen again’ – since their businesses in the Middle East focussed on catering and a Cookery School.

Relaunching the chocolate business has always been part of Angela and David’s business plan since their return to the UK and establishing Garleton Lodge.

In 2017, they launched Garleton Lodge primarily as an accommodation business.

In 2018, their plan has been to expand Garleton Lodge, with greater focus on the food & drink/restaurant side of the business and to (re)launch the chocolate business. This is now a reality. Next, the plan in 2019, is to add a cookery school onto Garleton Lodge – which recently received a Quality Assurance Gold Award from Visit Scotland.

Angela said: ‘There are strong linkages between Garleton Lodge and The Chocolate Stag, with guest room treats, end of dinner petit-fours in the restaurant – open to non-residents on Saturday evenings as well as private events – and with our famous afternoon teas. Before adopting the GL letter-based logo for Garleton Lodge, we had intended on using a stag as the Garleton Lodge logo.

‘This was dropped but the stag became embedded in our brand and internal décor – we have stags everywhere! With this, and the daily visits from local deer, including stags, the name The Chocolate Stag was a natural choice for our handmade chocolate business.’

David added: ‘Angela and I are delighted to launch The Chocolate Stag and we have further exciting plans in the pipeline – including the introduction of a cookery school aimed at showcasing not only Angela’s cooking but also East Lothian’s abundance of food and drink producers.’

The Chocolate Stag current selection includes: White chocolate truffle; White chocolate champagne truffle; Milk chocolate truffle; Milk chocolate caramel; Milk chocolate salted caramel; Milk chocolate caramel/almond crunch; Milk chocolate almond rocher; Dark chocolate spiced rum truffle; Dark chocolate coffee/chilli truffle; Dark chocolate baby Guinness cup; Kids’ lollies (Halloween, Christmas, stag etc).

The Chocolate Stag will be available through retail outlets or via their website www.thechocolatestag.co.uk.