Joshua Needleman, creator and chocolatier of Chocolate Springs Café, has been fascinated with chocolate all of his life. Joshua is a native of Lebanon Springs, New York. He first entered the culinary field at age sixteen and graduated from the Culinary Institute of America in 1994. Joshua began to refine his skills at the Wheatleigh Hotel in Lenox, Massachusetts and then relocated to France to explore another culture and learn directly from the French culinary traditions.
Joshua returned to the United States to work again at the Wheatleigh Hotel as well as at Canyon Ranch in the Berkshires and finally as pastry chef at the Cranwell Resort and Spa. He then serendipitously had the great fortune to be offered a job at La Maison du Chocolat in New York City. His travels and passion also took him to Japan.
With the desire to fuse European tradition, Japanese aesthetics, and his own local roots, Joshua returned home to the Berkshires to open Chocolate Springs Café in Lenox, MA in September of 2003.