The Queen of Swiss Chocolate
For Géraldine Mueller-Maras, it's all a matter of taste: a taste for the finer things, a taste for travel and a taste for pushing the limits. And she needed all these qualities and more to be crowned Swiss Chocolate Master in 2015 and the highest-ranking woman at the 2015 World Chocolate Masters in Paris.
The theme of the competition, 'inspiration from nature' seems to have struck a chord with Géraldine, originally from Flims in the canton of Graubünden, who spent many years travelling the world before becoming director of the Ateliers du Chocolat at Maison Cailler.
Taste: it's in the genes
Géraldine inherited her passion for fine chocolate from her family of pâtissiers and chefs. And it is a passion she explored through her extensive travels. After completing an apprenticeship as a pastry chef-confectioner in Chur, Géraldine went backpacking to discover the world. She spent a year in London working with Swiss chef Anton Mosimann and then eight years in Sydney, where she met her future husband and acquired Australian citizenship. She then spent some time in Thailand before finally returning to Switzerland.
Exploring new taste horizons
Géraldine is very attached to her Swiss roots but also draws on diverse influences: ‘I've always found travelling an enriching experience and I enjoy mixing up recipes by adding local ingredients.’ She brought this art of fusion back with her when she returned from her travels in 2012... together with her husband who shares her love of good food. She settled in Neuchâtel, where she loves to swim in the lake, and started working at Cailler.
Returning to her roots and chocolate
Géraldine says that returning to Switzerland, to its traditions and to chocolate has brought out her patriotic side. Now head chocolatier at Cailler's Ateliers du Chocolat, she is delighted to rediscover what makes Swiss chocolate so special and what gives it its outstanding reputation: ‘Local ingredients, such as milk and sugar, in a country that invented milk chocolate and the technique of conching – all of this results in fine, high-quality chocolate. But when it comes to taste, that's obviously subjective. You have to eat different kinds of chocolate and compare!’ This is what visitors to Maison Cailler's Atelier du Chocolat delight in doing: ‘I've never seen a customer unhappy about eating a piece of chocolate. Chocolate stimulates endorphines, or happy hormones. It quite simply puts a smile on your face! In Swiss German we say someone who has a 'schoggi job' (chocolate job) has the perfect job. Visiting our ateliers makes people happy.’
To make it to the top you need plenty of passion, nerves of steel...
In 2015, Géraldine was winner of the Swiss Chocolate Masters and later the same year became the highest-ranked woman at the World Chocolate Masters in Paris. ‘The winner was a Frenchman who did an outstanding job,’ she explains with humility. ‘As the highest-ranking woman in the competition, people thought of me as the female winner. It took creativity, endurance, nerves of steel, and above all passion to achieve that.’ Competing in competitions like these is a challenge that requires you to be able to follow a set theme in a flexible yet inspired way: ‘François-Louis Cailler (the founder of Maison Cailler) must have been looking down on me and guiding me in the right direction! And what I'm most proud of is having had this wonderful experience with the support of my husband, family and colleagues from Cailler.’ To rise to this challenge, Géraldine simply stayed true to her passion for Swiss traditions.
...boldness and pride in local traditions
At the Swiss Chocolate Masters, Géraldine only used ingredients from the Gruyère region of Switzerland: bricelets (wafer-type biscuits), double cream, Bénichon mustard and cuchaule (sweet bread flavoured with saffron). But at the World Chocolate Masters, each country has to present their creations to a jury. ‘The range is vast, which makes it difficult. So I stuck to what I think I do best and limited myself. I'm Swiss, I was representing Switzerland so I did something Swiss. That's why I chose to make praline made from hay flowers. I knew that not everyone would like it, but I wanted to showcase Swiss flavours and do something a bit different from the others. I went to the extremes: a salt-vanilla apricot purée and hay flower ganache. Some liked it, some didn't.’ Géraldine doesn't get the chance to experiment like this every day. In the Ateliers du Chocolat at Maison Cailler, she, together with her two chocolatier colleagues, offers guests various experiences that provide a fun insight into the work of a chocolatier. For Easter, for example, visitors can learn to make chocolate bunnies. Competitions allow her to combine this expertise with her limitless creativity, as shown by the showpiece lifesize female silhouette, which made her a star in Paris in 2015. In the atelier and in competitions, this passionate chocolatier will continue to melt hearts with her sweet surprises for many years to come!
