Cocoa Nibs

Cocoa nibs are the stage before chocolate: roasted cacao beans, cracked and winnowed to remove the husk, left as small, crunchy pieces with a bitter, deeply chocolatey flavour and none of the added sugar a bar carries. Gabriel Chocolate makes these from the same beans that go into its bar range, so a bag of nibs is a way to taste the raw material behind the chocolate.

They are made bean to bar at the company's factory in Metricup, Western Australia, where cacao arrives raw from origins including Peru, Ghana, Madagascar and Ecuador before it is sorted, roasted and ground. The maker suggests using the nibs in recipes as a stand-in for chopped nuts or chocolate chips.

Scatter them over yoghurt or ice-cream, fold them through banana bread, or add a small handful to a batch of biscuits for a bit of crunch.

Good to know

• Roasted, winnowed cacao nibs
• Sold in bags, including a 100g size
• Made from the same beans used in the bar range
• Made at Gabriel Chocolate's factory in Metricup, Western Australia