Mānoa Chocolate Opens a Coffee Roaster and Café

Photo: Robbie Dingeman

Walking into Mānoa Chocolate’s cacao-scented store always gives me a Willy Wonka vibe, with the staff offering free tastes of homegrown chocolate. Now, there’s a new reason to go: A just-expanded café serves coffee drinks just a few feet from where the beans are roasted.

Why owner Dylan Butterbaugh opened a coffee bar becomes clear when you look at the craft chocolate side of the menu. Freshly roasted coffee and locally made chocolate come together in mocha riffs including salted caramel, coconut and honey cinnamon (all $8). You can order these hot or iced, with whole milk or oat or almond. The syrups come from Pono Potions. And for chocolate purists, the first two beverages on the menu are hot chocolate and chocolate milk ($8).

Cortado at Mānoa Chocolate Café. Photo: Robbie Dingeman

Chocolate Cortado? Yes, please. Expertly pulling shots at the copper-colored Slayer espresso machine is often veteran roaster Danny McCall. He pours bits of Mānoa milk chocolate into a small glass, lets the hot espresso melt the chocolate, then adds freshly steamed milk to create a small but surprisingly intense drink.

Iced mocha. Photo: Robbie Dingeman

There are also single-origin pour overs from Maui and Kona ($10), a flat white that reminds me of New Zealand ($7), traditional espresso drinks, hot or iced, ($7) and a refreshing twist on chai tea, with chocolate, in a latte or on its own.

SEE ALSO: New Hala Tree Café in Waikīkī Brings World-Class Pastries and 100% Kona Coffee

Mānoa Chocolate is the creation of Butterbaugh, who started the business back in 2010 with a hand-cranked refiner at his family home. Two years later, he opened a store and factory in Kailua and expanded it in stages. Now, there’s a larger dedicated factory on Kapa‘a Quarry Road, a farm in Waialua, a retail shop in Waikīkī and the heart of the operation, the shop/café/roaster/wine-tasting experience in central Kailua.

Founder Dylan Butterbaugh and at right, the new coffee bar. Photo: Robbie Dingeman

Butterbaugh says he’s dreamed of going from bean to bar to beverage, noting that Mayans and Aztecs began drinking chocolate centuries before it became a popular food. “The parallels between bean-to-bar chocolate and artisan coffee are impossible to ignore—from farming and supply-chain ethics to single-origin obsession, roasting philosophy and the pursuit of flavor itself,” he says.

As he has with cacao, Butterbaugh sources coffee beans from local farms as well as coffee-growing regions across the globe. The team roasts small batches and sells the single-origin beans and blends in 7-ounce bags. Blends ($12–$14) include Kailua Sunrise, with hints of lychee and hazelnut, and the darker Island Time, which leans into caramel and macadamia nuts. Maui beans come from Kā‘anapali ($26) and Kona beans from Pakolu Farms in Hōlualoa ($40).

Café open daily 7 a.m. to 4 p.m., 333 Uluniu St., Kailua, (808) 263-6292, manoachocolate.com, @manoachocolate

Robbie Dingeman is a longtime Hawai‘i writer and editor.