Brentford's chocolatier
Bianca Marton is living the dream. She makes the most fantastic chocolate creations.
It took a while for her to work out what her dream was. She came to west London from Hungary in the late '90s. Her first career at Gloxo Smith Kline led to a second as a business coach, but she realised she wasn't practising what she preached. She wasn't doing what she really wanted to do.
She had gone to university in East Berlin. The city and the university were grey and bleak and not like home, so to cheer herself up she used to bunk off lessons, (especially political economics) and make cakes. She baked like her mother had taught her when she was little and the smells of the mouth-watering Hungarian recipes attracted a stream of friends to her door; one in particular was Tibor, who she subsequently married.
A partnership made in heaven
It was when Tibor booked a handmade chocolate making course for their daughter as a present in 2011 that the penny dropped. What she really, really wanted to do was to make chocolates.
She started in her kitchen at home. The reviews were fantastic, especially for the diary free ones she made for her brother and his family who are dairy intolerant. The chocolates sold very well at Camden, Richmond and Brentford markets and after three years Bianca needed to expand.
Fortunately making chocolates makes you very popular with your friends and neighbours. Writer and broadcaster Jeremy Nicholas liked her sea-salted caramels so much, he decided to make her a Dragon's Den style offer. He bought a share of the business allowing Bianca to open a chocolate shop in Brentford, where she now makes all the chocolates on the premises.
Jeremy, a renowned after-dinner speaker, gives talks on chocolate making. Tibor, chief chocolate taster, takes his work very seriously and Bianca is living her dream of making people happy by creating gorgeous artisan chocolates. If you fancy yourself as a budding chocolatier, Bianca now also runs classes where she teaches the art of making vegan chocolate, flavourings and ingredients. So if you are tempted pop into Bianca Marton Chocolates in Brentford.
