Local couple works on a sweet retirement plan

By Miriam Ostermann, Associate Editor

Nyle Earl doesn’t have a sweet tooth. He prefers baking bread.
But when he graduated top of his class as a journeyman baker at the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology (SAIT) in 1998, a nudge from his instructor had him take on a job with famed chocolatier Bernard Callebaut. This move eventually gave rise to his own business – Chews Confections.
Earl spent just over eight years working in the basement of the Calgary chocolate aficionado before switching gears and working in the construction industry for more than a decade. It wasn’t until their only child moved to the United States, and Nyle and his wife Lynne fell victim to the empty nest syndrome, that Lynne often found her husband experimenting and creating delicious works of art in the kitchen. Unable to keep up with his production output, and many boxes gifted to friends and family later, Chews Confections was born.
“I was bored and started making stuff and there was only two of us here eating all the chocolates and marshmallows,” Nyle said. “I’ve never been a sweets guy; I taste it because I need to and there are some chocolates I like, but I’m more of a bread guy. But my wife does (like chocolate); there are several chocolates that disappear on a regular basis.”
The couple create all the products of their downtown (First Avenue) Strathmore-based candy store in their own kitchen, and from June to October are full steam ahead, attending two to three markets a week with a few others thrown in throughout the rest of the year.
With much positive feedback the couple continue to be overwhelmed every year with how well their products are being received.
Spread across the table, Chews Confections displays homemade goodies such as marshmallows, chocolates, truffles, sponge toffee, candied ginger, caramel sauce and the company’s specialty – caramels. The duo said the caramel is unique because Nyle uses a rare traditional method, called the burnt sugar method, to create his caramel.
While he spends a minimum of three nights a week leaving chocolate trails in the kitchen, Lynne utilizes her skills as a former chef and kitchen manager, and her office experience to make sure the business is stocked and running efficiently. Although she lets her husband handle the treats, she does suggest a flavour combination or new candy from time to time.
“He’d come home from the woodworking bored and wanted to challenge himself and said, ‘I think I’m going to make this,’ and I thought, well, I can’t say no you can’t make more chocolate honey because I’d get kicked out of the women’s club,” Lynne joked. “It’s a good fit. He can just be brilliant and I can make sure we have stuff.”
Calgary born-and-raised Nyle met Lynne in the early 1990s. Now nearly 30 years later, the couple hopes to one day find a house to open up a brick-and-mortar candy store on a lower level and live above.
“That would be lovely,” Lynne said. “Our senior-life dream, as we get well into our middle age, would be to have somewhere where the lower level is the shop with the candy store. We don’t need a great big yard or any of that stuff anymore, we just want to have that chance.”