I’ll never forget my first sight of Vice Chocolates’ farmer’s market booth: black and purple, more dark carnival than dark chocolate.

Now here at I-Li Chang Brice’s workshop in a corner brick building near Jack London Square, the chocolate takes on a more innocent air. That is until I-Li says, “Taste the skeleton,” her tattooed arm holding out a bag of dark brown bones.

Tucked away on the east side of Lake Merritt is a little shop that you wish you had stumbled upon on accident. It’s one of those gems you find and then can’t believe everyone you like isn’t hanging out there all the time.