Behind the Brand: Omnom Offers Innovative "Bean-to-Bar" Chocolate With an Artistic Touch

Omnom is a line of award-winning small batch, bean-to-bar chocolate from Iceland. [Photo courtesy of Omnom]

From the colorful packaging with beautiful animal designs to the innovative and unique flavors, it’s hard not to notice Omnom, which is Iceland’s first and only bean-to-bar chocolate maker that produces award-winning, small-batch, “bean-to-bar” chocolate using the finest cacao beans sourced from around the world.

Founded in 2013, Omnom was created by two friends in Reykjavík, Iceland. Kjartan Gíslason is a professional chef whose natural love for pastries and desserts led him into the world of chocolate-making, while Óskar Þórðarson is an entrepreneur who has founded multiple companies and taken over existing businesses and restructured them. Together, the duo has established a wildly successful line of chocolate that not only tastes good, but also does good.

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“We run the factory solely on geothermal energy, making Omnom a leading bean-to-bar chocolate brand using renewable energy,” say Gíslason and Þórðarson. “We pride ourselves on transparency, traceability, and sustainability, which is why we publish a transparency report on our website that anyone can access. We’re coming out with a new one soon. We buy ingredients directly from farmers to help assess the social, environmental, and economic impact of our purchases.”

Unlike traditional chocolate bars, Omnom’s chocolate comes in unique geometrical shards instead of squares, and the beautiful packaging is inspired by fantastical creatures, surrealism, pop art, and contemporary Nordic architectural design. Due to Iceland’s unique ecosystem, which is rich in volcanic soil, marshes, ashes, and endemic plants, Omnom creatively incorporates the highest-quality ingredients that they purchase direct from farmers.

“When buying chocolate, people should consider the story behind the beans the chocolate maker is using; where are they getting them from?” say Gíslason and Þórðarson. “It’s important that chocolate makers do their best to relay that story to their customers so they can make an educated purchase. Bean-to-bar chocolate makers are very dedicated to having close relationships with their farmers and co-ops to support sustainability of the farms and the future of fine-flavor chocolate.”

We chatted with Gíslason and Þórðarson, who discussed the unique concept behind their award-winning chocolate line, the brand’s Icelandic heritage, their best-selling flavor, and more.

When was Omnom founded?

In 2013, we set up a small production lab inside a converted gas station in Reykjavík and Omnom was born. Since then, we’ve outgrown the gas station and now have a full-size facility, but it’s wild to think that this all started as a quest to figure out how to make chocolate. 

What’s the meaning behind the name?

The funny thing is, “Omnom” was always meant to be a working title or a placeholder name for the business. It sounded childish and funny, and captured the youthful approach we had at the time for the project. After we received our first mock-up design of the logo, it looked phenomenal and beautifully symmetric—so we stuck with it!

What inspired the creation of Omnom?

Óskar had just come back from New York with a bag full of chocolate bars he had gotten there and we were sampling them together at his house one evening. It was one of those moments where we locked eyes and didn't really need to say anything, but wow—this was something we needed to get our hands on and see if we could replicate.

We became curious as to how chocolate was made so we joined the bean-to-bar movement and began making chocolate from scratch, first producing single-origin bars and soon experimenting with flavors and textures that could be achieved in small-scale batches. 

Omnom’s founders, Kjartan Gíslason and Óskar Þórðarson. [Photo by Baldur Kristjansson]

Tell us more about your chocolate and what makes it special.

We offer premium single-origin chocolate, Iceland-inspired bars, seasonal flavors, and Krunch (our chocolate-covered malt balls). We love creating unique flavor combinations and sometimes we’re inspired by other bakery treats. For example, our Sea Salted Toffee Bar was the result of craving a caramelized white chocolate. We love caramel and have worked on this perfect caramel flavor for years, but to make the perfect caramel chocolate can be tricky and it has taken us years to achieve this flavor. We start off by baking the milk (yes, you read right!). We bake the milk until it darkens in color and caramelizes. The aroma reminds us of dulce de leche. To perfect the chocolate, we sprinkle sea salt from Saltverk on top and voila—the perfect creamy caramel chocolate was born!

Our dark, single-origin chocolate bars are Madagascar 66%, Tanzania 70%, Nicaragua 73%, and Peru 100%. Origin matters, especially in terms of flavor profile for dark chocolate. There are a lot of small farms and co-op farms around the world growing and fermenting fine-flavor cocoa beans. Fine-flavor cocoa beans have a lot more complexity in the flavor profile and, in the hands of a good chocolate maker, will make the best premium chocolate.

In our opinion, single-origin chocolate is a far better indicator of the quality and social impact the chocolate has on the farming societies. Chocolate from the same region will typically have a distinctive flavor profile. For example, the cocoa beans we use from Bertil Åkesson’s farm in Madagascar have an intense fruitiness. Having tasted chocolate from other producers using the same bean, we’ll taste a similar flavor profile but with a different and surprising twist, since bean-to-bar chocolate-making is just another level within the chocolate-crafting experience. We encourage everybody to try it out for themselves!  

At Omnom, we’re serious about chocolate and we like to have fun. That’s why we play around with different inclusions and ingredients to create unique flavors. For example, with our Black n’ Burnt Barley Bar, some of our friends from local Icelandic breweries were visiting the factory and they left our team one of their ingredients: a toasted barley, almost burnt. The minute we added this to an experimental white chocolate and malt bar, we had a “Eureka!” moment and never looked back. It has a rich toasty flavor of malt and barley, reminiscent of burnt toast with hints of coffee.

With our Coffee + Milk Bar, we always wanted to make a chocolate bar using coffee beans instead of cocoa beans. This special bar is made with Brazilian coffee beans from Reykjavik Roasters and Icelandic milk. Each bar contains as much caffeine as a shot of espresso. Like a creamy cappuccino in a chocolate form, this bar has flavors of hazelnut, raisin, and peanut butter with background notes of buttery popcorn and waffles.

Our newest bar, SuperChocoBerryBarleyNibblyNuttylicious, was born when the pandemic hit. We had to shut almost everything down and we were in the test lab kitchen experimenting and this amazing “breakfast bar” or “our take on trail mix” was born. For this bar, we used 70% cocoa beans from Tanzania because the beans are naturally sweet and fruity with hints of stone fruit and bananas, which is perfect for this particular bar.

To give it an extra flair, we sprinkled our roasted almonds bathed in Westfjords sea water on top, along with our popped barley from the East Coast of Iceland. To give it that extra crispiness, we also sprinkled some cocoa nibs on top. And for the icing on the cake, we added cranberries into the mix to give it an extra sweet and soft tart flavor. So a burst of flavor with a big name to match seemed like the perfect bar for this crazy time we are going through!

Omnom’s beautiful packaging reflects its Nordic heritage and the chocolate bars are cut into geometric shards instead of squares. [Photo courtesy of Omnom]

What’s your most popular flavor?

Our Caramel Bar is by far our bestselling bar. It’s made with cocoa beans from Nicaragua, Icelandic milk, and sprinkled with chocolate-covered caramel pieces on top. It’s creamy and delicious, and the packaging helps too! This bar is very special to us. We are proud supporters of the LGBTQ+ community and official sponsors of Reykjavik Pride. This bar is inspired by the bright colors and beauty of Pride. It was originally only supposed to be a limited release, but it quickly became very popular so we kept it in our portfolio. In Iceland, our Lakkrís + Sea Salt Bar is the best seller. Icelandic people love licorice!

What’s your favorite flavor?

Kjartan: Wow, it's kind of hard to pick one—it really does depend on my mood! Sea Salted Almonds is always a favorite snack bar of mine. At the moment, we are in holiday production so our Milk & Cookies bar is coming fresh off the belt and I always eat at least one per day until I’m fed up with it. Dark Milk of Tanzania 65% is still my all-time favorite, it’s just a perfect blend between dark chocolate and milk chocolate.

Óskar: Milk of Nicaragua because it’s simply amazing! It was awarded “Best in Competition” and the overall winner in the category for Plain/Origin milk bar at the International Chocolate Awards in 2018.

Where are your chocolates sold?

Omnom is currently available in select U.S. retailers, through our website, and on Amazon. 

What’s next for the brand?

We still have a lot of ideas that we want to get out there. We are launching a new concept of an ice cream dessert shop in Iceland and are really excited for that. Hopefully we can travel more next year to the origin places where we source our beans, and strengthen our relationship with farmers and growers. But ultimately, we’re creating a company that can be sustainable for the future.

For more information and to purchase, visit omnomchocolate.com and follow them on Instagram: @omnomchocolate

Kamala Kirk is a University of Southern California graduate and has been an editor/writer for more than a decade. She has written for E! Online, Total Beauty, TravelAge West, Malibu Times Magazine, and many more. She resides in Los Angeles and is a proud pug mom. Follow her on Instagram: @kamalakirk