A single mum has revealed her hyper-realistic chocolate designs, which includes 'human' hearts, brains and even fingers – and the gory treats are not for the faint-hearted.

Sarah Hardy, 52, is a food artist chocolatier, based in Suffolk, who first became intrigued by body-inspired creations while in art school.

Since then, she has built a steady following on Instagram with 18,800 fans frequently creeped out by her unique designs, which also include slime-y lifelike snails, insects, a raw turkey and bird skulls.

One particularly horrifying photo shows the mum chopping into a 'heart', with the post getting nearly 4,000 views from users, with one person comparing it to "Hannibal Lecter".

"This is so Hannibal Lecter. Now pass me the Chianti," they wrote.

"Heartbreaking," added someone else, with a crying laughing emoji.

Sarah, who is originally a sculptor, started making edible work in 2021 and now runs her very own edible museum with departments including anatomy, palaeontology and zoology.

Sarah gets mixed reviews online and she loves to hear what the public thinks.

"The things I make inspire love or disgust, rather than anything in-between," she told NeedToKnow.online.

"I have been accused of inciting cannibalism, told I should be ashamed of myself and have constantly told my work is disgusting.

"I’ve always been into quirky things.

"After graduating from art school I was a sculptor, making wax work figures for historical museums to earn my living.

"When I was 20 I was inserting eyebrows into wax hair clips to look like eyebrows but on the sides of your head.

"The idea [for the museum] was to make crazy pieces of food art available to a wider audience."

While some social media users might be horrified, others are fascinated.

On a post showing a 'juicy' heart that appears to be covered in blood, one user wrote: "Definitely yuck but cool that someone aka you is so talented to make it!"

"Cool, I love it, but for me it's normal as I'm a cheffe de cuisine, you're work is great," wrote another person, adding a heart smiling emoji. [sic]

"I’m a lab tech, cancer research. With a definite sweet tooth but seriously, everything you make looks too good to ‘destroy/devour’ works of art!" wrote someone else, adding various emojis.

Sarah said: "[In contrast to those who are disgusted] the people who love it write heartfelt emails telling how it was the only thing they could have ever proposed to their partner with, or that their children have kept them and couldn't bring themselves to eat it!

"Odd, quirky people need stuff that suits them and I’m happy to cater for those wonderful, interesting people!"

The artist's favourite design to make? Human hearts.

She said: The human heart is probably my all-time favourite chocolate.

"I love the way it plays on a traditional confectionery heart and it’s so fleshy yet solid."

To make her treats, Sarah begins by creating sculptures herself.

Each one can take hours or even months, depending on how intricate the details are.

She said: "Painting the beetles is the most time-consuming chocolate job, they have hand-painted delicate legs.

"Creating a new design can take weeks to months but there are a lot of stages to getting the first chocolate – from research to sculpting and various casting and mould making processes and then you start to make the chocolate.

"I don’t buy moulds, I make them all myself and it’s an exact process so yes, it can take weeks to get the first ones.

"After creating the moulds, the casting in chocolate is done by hand and we use different types of chocolate inside the one mould to get visual effects.

"Following that we paint them with cocoa butter colours and that uses various hand and brush techniques, depending on the design.

"We might roll, rub, splatter, spray or brush to get what we are after.

"Then they are packed and labelled by hand too."

ENDS

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