About Us
The Candy and Chocolate Co is a family owned business with three generations of our family and close family friends working together. Our family opened our first ice cream parlor and candy store in the 1920’s in Chehalis, Washington, over five generations ago. Since then our family has owned many well renowned and/or historic restaurants, ice cream, and candy stores. In 2015 Mama Cheryle (now Grandma) had the idea to take some of the old recipes with vintage equipment and create an old fashioned candy store. Her son Erick got behind the idea because of his passion for vintage equipment and history. This led to years of searching the country for the rarest equipment to ensure our family’s passion of making old world candies with simple ingredients. After eight long years of hard work and building deep friendships with some of the best candy makers in the world, including our partner Tandy Peterson, we opened in 2023.
Tandy Peterson, Is the the founder of the award winning Bean to Bar chocolate brand, Embers Chocolate and co-owner of its parent company The Candy and Chocolate Company. Tandy grew up in Pinedale, Wyoming, a town so small it is reminiscent of a Norman Rockwell painting. She went to culinary school in Arizona and became the chef at prestigious restaurants including Binkley’s and Mowry and Cotton at The Phoenician. In the summer of 2016 Tandy completed an internship at Asador Etxebarri, one of the top-rated restaurants in the world. Here she met the beautiful and mysterious Cacao Bean. She learned about roasting cacao over an open fire, cracking it by hand, and grounding it into the finest Chocolate.In January of 2021, she started a Bean to Bar chocolate with the intention of bringing chocolate back to its roots; wanting to create intriguing well balanced flavors that are respectful to the cacao and its origins. Over the years, Embers has won several national awards for our Dark, Milk, and White Chocolates. Tandy’s friendship with Erick Harrell began years before the partnership with a joint affection for candy and chocolate. Together we are working hard to provide our customers with a confection experience of the finest candy and chocolate in the world.