One of Belgium’s top chocolatiers is celebrating a “triple whammy.”
Centho, a family business based in Flanders, has taken the wraps off three brand new additions to its renowned range of homemade praline chocolates.
One aim is to target the all-important upcoming Christmas market.
Gault&Millau recognised the company’s distinctive approach by naming Centho Chocolatier of the Year for Flanders in 2025 and the hope is the new collection will also “go down a treat.”
Among the latest to come off the production line is a Christmas Box (priced €30), which is a festive triangular box containing 20 chocolates and is specially designed for the Christmas season.
There is also a Star Box (€42),comprising 32 chocolates in an eye-catching star-shaped box that brings packaging and chocolates together in one festive gift.
The Gift Box, priced €60, has 56 chocolates and is the largest selection in the festive collection.
Christmas would not be Christmas without an advent calendar and the new collection also includes a 2026 calendar (€45), containing 25 chocolates to help you count down the days until the big day on 25 December.
The Centho Festive Dessert, at €9, is perhaps the most unexpected addition to this year’s collection. With this, the company applies its philosophy of layering to an individual dessert made with several layers of mousse using single-origin chocolate.
The question is the same one that inspires its chocolates: how can different flavours and textures enhance one another without losing their individual character?
For Centho, the festive season therefore means more than merely repackaging familiar chocolates.
The festive collection brings together several aspects of the house: gifting, product development, travel, ingredients, texture and the careful layering of flavour.
As well as the Christmas chocolates, also new is the company’s Japan Collection (€25) which comprises 16 chocolates and is described as “one of the most personal collections of this festive season.”
It aims to combine “typical” Belgian and Japanese flavours in a single gift box.
This was inspired by the Centho owners’ many journeys to Japan and the 16 chocolates “bring home to Belgium” an international relationship built over more than a decade.
Meanwhile, a third addition is the Signature Nut Collection (€28), which contains 16 chocolates and aims to celebrate the distinctive flavours of different nuts.
The selection reflects Centho’s focus on pure ingredients and provenance. Nuts are chosen not simply as fillings, but for their own individual aromatic character.
The new collections were unveiled at a press briefing on Thursday (22 October). One aim is to ensure the company remains ahead of the curve in what is, in Belgium with its rich and famous chocolate heritage, a particularly competitive market.
Centho itself, is, in the truest sense, a family story.
In 2000, Geert Decoster and Els Vander Elst founded their own chocolate business.
Their first chocolates were made in the cellar of their home in Tervuren.
Even the name reflected what mattered from the very beginning: Centho combines the names of their children, Centa and Thomas.
Geert had already built a strong culinary foundation. After studying at Elishout in Brussels, he deepened his knowledge of chocolate, including through training in France.
What fascinated him most was how small technical adjustments could profoundly influence flavour and texture.
Meanwhile, Els developed the other side of the business: the shop, presentation, packaging and brand experience.
What began as a small family chocolate business gradually developed into a company with a modern workshop in Kampenhout, its own Belgian boutiques and a remarkable international presence.
Today, Thomas Decoster, their son, is helping write the next chapter. He has known Centho since birth, quite literally, but has also come to understand every aspect of the business professionally: its products, production, shops, trade fairs, exports and international customers.
Father and son increasingly visit clients and overseas markets together, building the future of the house side by side.
Geert contributes decades of technical expertise, experience and an almost endless curiosity about flavour. Thomas,meantime, is helping shape Centho’s next stage of growth, its new markets and retail development, and the way a Belgian family business can remain relevant internationally.
Indeed, one of the most remarkable chapters in Centho’s story unfolds thousands of kilometres from Belgium …. in the land of the Rising Sun.
Japan has become one of the house’s most important international markets. What began with a handful of sales locations during Japan’s chocolate season has grown over the years into a presence at dozens of locations, including major department stores. The company exported an estimated eight tons of pralines to Japan during the Valentine Day period alone last year.
Since 2024, Centho has also had two permanent boutiques in Tokyo.
That success is no coincidence.
Japanese consumers pay close attention to detail, presentation, texture and the way a product is constructed. This resonates strongly with Centho’s own philosophy.
Geert says, “A chocolate is often not simply eaten in one bite. It is examined, cut open or tasted over several bites.”
“That makes Centho’s distinct flavour layers and textures particularly rewarding to discover.”
For Geert and Thomas, Japan has also become far more than an export market. Their many trips, encounters with customers and local teams, and affinity with Japanese precision are an increasingly important source of inspiration.
Centho, which is based in Kampenhout, near Mechelen, also represented Belgian chocolate expertise at Expo 2025 in Osaka. In 2026, this longstanding connection takes tangible form in the new Centho Japan Collection: 16 chocolates inspired by the house’s travels to Japan.
More than 25 years after Geert and Els made their first chocolates, Centho has grown from a small chocolate business into a Belgian family house with an international presence, producing about 35 tons of pralines every year.
Thomas says the business deliberately works with single-origin chocolate, made from cocoa grown in one specific region.
“Each origin has its own character and flavour profile, shaped by terroir, climate and processing.At Centho, chocolate is far more than a shell around a filling. It is an ingredient in its own right, selected with the entire creation in mind,” he says.
The same care goes into the filling. Wherever possible, ingredients are selected in their purest, least processed form, with close attention to quality and provenance. Piedmont hazelnuts are one example, “not because origin is a story in itself, but because the difference should ultimately be something you can taste,” Thomas adds.
Today, Centho, having built a reputation as a premier chocolate maker, has its own workshop in Kampenhout and shops in Duisburg/Tervuren, Kampenhout and Brussels.
A new boutique in La Hulpe, due open in the Spring, is extending the brand’s presence in French-speaking Belgium.
As it has for many years, Japan remains an important international market, while Thomas takes on an increasingly significant role in leading the family business.
The UK is also an important, year-round, market for the company, with exports annually totalling about 8 tons. The company targets high-end businesses, including top restaurants and luxury hotels, such as the Ritz in London. It has also, in the past, supplied the famous Ascot horse event.
Other key markets include Austria and Germany and, to a lesser extent, France.
The fundamental philosophy, however, remains remarkably consistent.
“Centho,” said Geert, “does not seek to pack as many ingredients as possible into a chocolate.
“We seek to understand what each ingredient contributes and how to let it shine. From the origin of the cocoa and the choice of a hazelnut to the thickness of the chocolate shell, the softness of a caramel or the order in which flavours emerge.”
- Photo credit: Centho
