A flavor for every chocolate sweet tooth

Blue Spruce Chocolates in Kittredge creates handcrafted treats

BY DEB HURLEY BROBST DBROBST@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

While chocolate makes most people happy, it takes on a larger happiness dimension for Mark Joyce.

Joyce has opened Blue Spruce Chocolates in the Adobe Creek Center in Kittredge, and this isn’t your average chocolate shop. Joyce sells chocolate from bean to bar, which means he imports the cacao beans and works his magic to create the chocolate.

e results are handcrafted white, milk and dark chocolates, and Keto-friendly and vegan chocolates of a quality not found in an average grocery store.

It takes 84 hours from start to nish for one batch, and since Joyce opened his store, he’s been using every hour to make his bar-chocolate creations. Half of his building is the kitchen while the other half is the retail store.

Joyce, Blue Spruce Chocolates’ president and alchemist, is proud that his white caramel chocolate with roasted hazelnuts took gold in the 2023 international Craft Chocolate Challenge hosted by the Chocolat Inn and Café in Kentucky. Blue Spruce Chocolates also took the overall silver in the competition with about 30 chocolatiers who make bean-to-bar chocolate. e medals hang in the retail store.

Ironically, although his life has become all about chocolate, he doesn’t eat much of it.

“I’m not a sweets guy,” Joyce said.

“I appreciate the avors, and most of my chocolate eating is tasting.”

A path to chocolate

How does someone living in Kittredge suddenly decide to make chocolate? Joyce was exposed to the art of chocolate making on a trip to Belize.

“It was pretty impressive,” he said. “ e chocolate tasted di erent.”

So ve years ago, Joyce decided to give chocolate-making a try as a hobby, and as it became more of a passion, he began doing it professionally three years ago.

Chocolate was a new endeavor for the retiree as he has learned what it takes to maintain health-department standards for the kitchen plus the nuances of chocolate avors. Chocolate making is both a science and an art.

“I’m not trying to compete with the grocery store chains,” he said. “I’m making a quality, handcrafted product.”

Joyce’s wife, Yuri Weydling, who is the director of avor development and community relations for the business, has taste buds attune to the di erent avors of chocolate.

“She has gained an appreciation of the subtleties of chocolate,” he explained.

He said while they like dark chocolate, the white caramel chocolate has “a wonderfully unique taste.”

One of the chocolates that Joyce produces is called “Stuart’s Smile,” named after Joyce’s neighbor and friend Stuart Collins. Collins said he’s not a big dark chocolate fan, so when Joyce created a chocolate that mixes dark and light, Collins smiled.

“His chocolates are quite avorful,” Collins said. “It started o as a very fun hobby. He’s the type of person who always needs to be busy, and this ful lls his need to always be challenging himself.”

Both Collins and Joyce envision the shop becoming a place for people to hang out with a cup of coffee or tea and a bit of chocolate. e chocolate shop is near Bear Creek, so Joyce wants to have tables outside for people to stop by in warmer weather and enjoy his creations.

“I look forward to (the shop) being another social center, where we can have a cup of co ee and a bit of

High-quality ingredients

“ e rst step is choosing the right beans,” he said.

Joyce’s cacao beans come primarily from Ecuador, with some beans from Nicaragua, Bolivia and Peru mixed in. He especially likes the beans that the indigenous peoples harvest from wild trees because they provide complex avors. e beans arrive fermented and dried.

Once in Kittredge, the beans are sorted and roasted. Joyce uses two roasters that look like toaster ovens. Once roasted, the beans are cracked, winnowed and ground. e grinding takes 72 hours and is done in something that looks like a crockpot with granite stones that create smoothness. en the chocolate is tempered and molded.

“Chocolate is critically tempera- the Netherlands and Madagascar vanilla. e milk powder is important because it can change the taste and the chocolate’s fat content.

“I spend about half my time looking for sources for ingredients,” he said, adding that he’d like to use a more local beet-sugar company. “It’s all about mixing and matching the ingredients.”

A new profession

He said the community has been generous and supportive as he prepared to open his shop, helping him obtain the shelving and furniture. Joyce also hopes to o er chocolatemaking classes, and he’s talking with area businesses about co ee-chocolate and wine-chocolate pairing events.

“I’ve always been a foodie, but I

BY ELLIS ARNOLD EARNOLD@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

Type in “restaurant” on Google Maps and set the lter to “open 24 hours.” You’ll be hard-pressed to nd any local restaurants serving up food to the night owls, late workers and early risers.

Unless you’re seeking around-the-clock Mexican food.

“We’re open 24 hours, and it’s something fresh, you know?” said Govanny Alvarado, a member of the family who runs Alvarado’s Mexican Fast Food. Compared to other restaurants, “you can taste the di erence,” Alvarado said.

e new Englewood spot that opened in August adds to a small but mighty list of Mexican joints that o er all-day, all-night service in the Denver metro area — a type of restaurant that’s becoming more di cult to nd since the COVID-19 pandemic struck.

“Most people like us, you know, we’re always looking for a late-night snack,” said Alvarado, 21, adding that his family “understands the struggle” to nd restaurants that are open late.

His family members, longtime workers in the Mexican fast-food industry, gained experience at his uncle’s restaurant in Arizona. ey later started working for Taco Star and Tacos Rapidos, two chains with 24-hour locations in the metro area, Alvarado said.

“And Taco Star, the one in ornton here, that’s where my dad worked, and that’s where I started as well when I was young,” Alvarado said of the location near 84th Avenue and Washington Street.

When his family members had the chance to start their own restaurant about six years ago, they opened Tacos Los Compas — another 24-hour eatery, near downtown Denver and the Auraria Campus.

“Most of the people that I’ve known or talked to customer-wise, they’re all from Arizona or California, and they all say they miss that taste of authentic Mexican food,” Alvarado said.

Carrying on authentic recipes is part of the job as well for Tamale Kitchen, a longstanding family business with locations around the metro area.

What makes the restaurant unique is “the green chile, the New Mexico-style red chile, the tamale avors, just the avors in general of just old grandma recipe — the beans, the rice, everything’s grandma’s recipes,” said Jose Bishop, owner of the Westminster and Northglenn locations.

e restaurant grew out of an e ort to sell tamales door to door in 1980, and the rst Tamale Kitchen opened in Lakewood in 1981, according to its website.

Its Northglenn location at 104th Avenue and Huron Street stays open around the clock on the weekends, running from 5 a.m. Friday through 10 p.m. Sunday.

e business has expanded to eight locations, stretching from Adams County all the way to Highlands Ranch, and some are franchises run by people outside the family, Bishop said.

Familiar places see challenges

Alvarado noted that after the COVID-19 pandemic shook up the