{"id":96993,"date":"2025-12-22T11:20:24","date_gmt":"2025-12-22T11:20:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/96993\/"},"modified":"2025-12-22T11:20:24","modified_gmt":"2025-12-22T11:20:24","slug":"award-winning-pastry-chef-sells-confections-teaches-at-chocolatl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/96993\/","title":{"rendered":"Award-winning pastry chef sells confections, teaches at Chocolatl"},"content":{"rendered":"

Before Alessia Benavides sold her first bonbon at Chocolatl<\/a>, she taught classes in a back-of-the-house kitchen.<\/p>\n

She taught one group of students how to make conchas, a second how to bake sourdough bread.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Why teach?<\/p>\n

To run a successful business in Stone Oak, Benavides had to sell more than chocolate. Rent is expensive. Utilities are costly. So she turned her kitchen into a classroom. And then she began selling chocolates \u2014 two weeks before Valentine\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust from the chocolates alone,\u201d Benavides said, \u201cwe wouldn\u2019t survive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Benavides is a rare chocolatier in San Antonio. She bakes and teaches out of the same shop, where 90-minute to 2-hour classes range <\/a>from $32 for cookie decorating to $75 for sourdough bread making. She sells confections in house, at local markets and online.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Pastry Chef Alessia Benavides removes fresh baked conches from her oven in preparation to sell at the Pearl\u2019s night market later that evening on Dec. 10. Credit: Amber Esparza \/ San Antonio Report<\/p>\n

Credentials?<\/p>\n

A shelf across from the Chocolatl pastry case holds multiple awards. One is from the Texas Culinary Association, which named her Pastry Chef of the Year for 2024. Another is from CultureMap San Antonio, which named her Tastemaker\u2019s Pastry Chef of the Year<\/a> for 2025.<\/p>\n

\u201cHer gleaming bonbons must be seen in person to get the full effect,\u201d CultureMap wrote<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Tastemaker award prompted the following post on her Facebook page: \u201cThis achievement reflects not only my passion for pastry arts but also the hard work and dedication that goes into creating exquisite desserts,\u201d Benavides wrote. \u201cI am incredibly grateful for the support of my team, mentors, and everyone who has been part of my culinary journey.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

That journey began in Mexico, where Benavides learned to bake from her grandmother. She received formal training and a bachelor\u2019s degree in culinary arts from Universidad Regiomontana in Monterrey. She moved to Texas in 2010 and earned a bakery and pastry certification from Le Cordon Bleu in Austin.<\/p>\n

Benavides worked in a hotel restaurant before moving to San Antonio to teach at the Art Institute from 2012 until it closed in 2023. Her students learned well. She hired one of them, Giselle Ramos, as Chocolatl\u2019s assistant pastry chef.<\/p>\n

\"\"Chocolotl bon bons come in a variety of flavors and colors like mango margarita, s\u2019mores, blueberry pie, key lime pie, strawberry cheesecake and more. They\u2019re available at the shop located at 18720 Stone Oak Parkway, Suite 105. Credit: Amber Esparza \/ San Antonio Report<\/p>\n

\u201cShe taught me almost everything about baking at the Art Institute,\u201d Ramos said. \u201cShe taught me how to do everything pretty and make it saleable. And here (at Chocolatl), she taught me how to make bonbons, how to paint them, how to fill them and how to make the fillings. And she taught me how to make conchas.\u201d<\/p>\n

The COVID-19 pandemic prompted a pivot. As businesses shuttered, Benavides began to focus on the art of chocolate-making. To improve her craft, she earned chocolatier certification from the Melissa Coppel Chocolate and Confectionery School<\/a> in Las Vegas.<\/p>\n

From there, she crafted her own recipes, experimented with formulations and flavors and sold chocolates at pop-ups and farmers markets. In January, she opened Chocolatl.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Benavides uses Valrhona chocolate, a renowned French luxury manufacturer considered the Rolls Royce of chocolates, in her bonbons. The confections are created in a mold and decorated by hand. Though often consumed whole, they are not meant to be eaten that way.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re supposed to bite into it so you can see the layers of the bonbons,\u201d Benavides said. \u201cMost of our bonbons have two or three layers. We have a blueberry pie that has four. There\u2019s art on the outside and also on the inside.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Chocolotl Assistant Pastry Chef Giselle Ramos shows a customer their bon bons after selecting and packing their order on Dec. 10. Credit: Amber Esparza \/ San Antonio Report<\/p>\n

The four layers of the blueberry bonbon: blueberry p\u00e2te de fruit, marshmallow, lemon curd ganache and graham cracker crunch with freeze dried blueberries.<\/p>\n

Chocolatl features more than 30 regular, seasonal and truffle flavors, from pistachio and peppermint to Mexican chocolate and guava cheesecake.<\/p>\n

Benavides also sells artisan bars, drag\u00e9es and an assortment of pastries, among them: Dubai chocolate chip cookies, Dubai conchas, Dubai brownies and fruit tarts.<\/p>\n

For those with dietary restrictions, Benavides offers confections with sugar-free ingredients.<\/p>\n

Working at Chocolatl, Ramos says, is more than sweet pleasure. It\u2019s a form of therapy.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI served 21 years in the Army,\u201d she said. \u201cI have PTSD. A doctor told me it would be good if I were to do therapy. For me, it\u2019s very therapeutic to work here. I drive in from Marbach Road. It takes me 30 minutes to get here. But it\u2019s worth the drive. I love it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Before Alessia Benavides sold her first bonbon at Chocolatl, she taught classes in a back-of-the-house kitchen. She taught…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":96994,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[44792,44793,44794,44795,44796,4703,82,44797,84,83,44798,92,93,94],"class_list":{"0":"post-96993","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-antonio","8":"tag-alessia-benavides","9":"tag-bonbons","10":"tag-chocolatl","11":"tag-culturemap-san-antonio","12":"tag-le-cordon-bleu","13":"tag-pastry-chef","14":"tag-san-antonio","15":"tag-san-antonio-chocolate","16":"tag-san-antonio-headlines","17":"tag-san-antonio-news","18":"tag-texas-culinary-association","19":"tag-top-story","20":"tag-typefeature","21":"tag-wc-750-1000"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96993","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=96993"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/96993\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/96994"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=96993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=96993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=96993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}