What does raw cocoa mean?

I recently was in a discussion with someone about the benefits of raw cocoa beans.  She produced a bag of nibs and asked me to taste it.  The first thing I noticed was the smell of an acidic quality signaling poor processing; the second was that the nibs were not a light white or purple but a light brown coloring. They also had a chocolate flavor, not great and they were bitter, but the chocolate flavor was there. Having eaten cacao beans straight from the pod, I knew these were not raw, and hence the confusion for people who are taken in by companies claiming to have raw beans or paste.
Raw beans are astringent.  They are very astringent. There is no chocolate flavor and the saliva is ripped out of your mouth, leaving it dry and uncomfortable.  Some people may experience this astringency more or less than myself, but it is different from the bitter quality that happens after it has been fermented.
Fermentation is a process of heat, and heat destroys pathogens and much of the antioxidants in any raw product. Fermentation also creates the chocolate flavor we recognize and enjoy.  (I remember when Odwalla used to sell unpasteurized apple juice claiming that raw was better for you. Unfortunately, a few people ended up dying from salmonella poisoning from drinking their raw apple juice.  Odwalla is lucky to still be in business, but then again, they no longer sell raw apple juice.)  Cacao beans start fermenting almost immediately after being picked off the tree, creating an environment that begins the degradation of the bacteria, pathogens and antioxidants of the raw bean. The same antioxidants that so many people believe will ward off cancer, aging and even delay death.  I won't challenge the ideas of the healing power of antioxidants,  but I will challenge the marketing of "raw beans".  Even a little heat changes a product from raw to not raw.  Parboiling before canning is a good example of eliminating those pesky bacterias that can make a person seriously ill but the parboiling process also begins killing the more fragile and desirable mineral and vitamins. Even a little fermentation of the cacao bean, under 111 degrees Fahrenheit, starts changing the beans taste and level of antioxidants available for people to benefit from when they ingest the cocoa.  I believe that unless a cacao company is putting all their pods into a refrigerated container immediately after the pod is removed from the tree and keep it under controlled cool settings all the way to the grocery shelf, that they can not, and should not, call it raw.  The expensive of doing this would make it nearly impossible for most small farmers who grow cacao trees to create this product.  I am not saying there isn't a company who is doing it with this much intergrity; I am only saying I highly doubt it and have yet to find a company who does this. 
Personally, I would enjoy chocolate in nib or candy form, for its taste and leave it to your local farmer for the fruits and vegetables that you can purchase in your city for the health benefits of antioxidants.

A signature.

Today is a perfect day to make chocolate and that is what I just finished doing, the completion of chocolate tiles, cooling and getting ready for the next step of wrapping.

As I contend with many different factors while creating these chocolate tiles, I am aware that I have a signature in my chocolate.  Painters and weavers, carpenters and architects, and all those who create for a living, have a signature.  I recently read of a newly found painting assumed to be painted by Leonardo da Vinci's very hand, without his pupils,  now under scrutiny by those who know his signature, to prove or disprove the paintings creator.  My chocolate flavor profile and the tiles themselves have my signature stamped all over them.  For the record, I make no claim of being a master painter or even a master chocolate maker.  I still have much to learn.

I make my chocolate by hand, and the imperfections tend to be repeatable.  In fact, I am not sure that I can make something completely perfect, like a machine can, and, if one day I hire someone to do some of this process of chocolate making, how that will affect my signature and is this good or bad?  I do try new methods and, even as I explore a new way of creating the tiles, I make certain style decisions that identify me as the maker.

In the end, I have product that does not last long, as does a da Vinci painting, so my signature is fleeting, but a brief moment of recognition is worth all the work I put into making chocolate.

While eating a piece of chocolate...

 Another thank you to Becky Sands for the pictures.

I contemplate the enormous amount of human effort it takes to create it .  At Catie, the process of planting the trees requires  back breaking work, a lot of common sense and attention to detail, during which the farmer must constantly attend and defend the tree and pod from the many pests, diseases, and fungus that seem to attack all cacao trees.

Then one must pick the fruits of one's labor.  The men who work at Finmac were very patient with us, giving us the opportunity to experience the skillful work of cutting off the pods, from the middle and upper parts of the tree, using the knives attached to long poles. It was tricky to cut the pod without damage to the limb, allow it to drop to the ground, and then pierce it with the small curved knife on the reverse side of the long pod cutting tool. We all  attempted to gracefully transport the pod through the air into the very large backpack and, once the backpack was full, tip all of the pods into the bucket.   

The men of Finmac  removed the good fruit (and often the bad fruit was cut down and buried later on that day) of an entire tree in the same amount of time it took us to cut down one pod; and they even dumped the pods into the buckets above .

Something to note,

the next time I travel to a country that grows cacao, I will pay attention to where the equator lies in relation to the country I am visiting, since this effects the triglycerides in the bean itself.  This is important to know since it is the fats, the triglycerides, that determine how hard the chocolate will be when tempered and gives the chocolatier a better idea of the highest and lowest heat ranges needed to create their best product.  Knowing this little piece of knowledge would have helped me tremendously as I began making chocolate with the beans I had brought back from Finmac, and saved me a lot of time and trouble and a few choice words, that are best left unwritten.  Once I did my homework and learned that Costa Rica is very close to the equator (all of three minutes), I was able to adjust my recipes and create some lovely chocolate.  Viva Costa Rica! Pura Vida Costa Rica.



(A big thank you to Becky Sands who provided me with this picture.  As always, all words. pictures and content may not be used unless you have permission from me)

Watching plants grow.

The jungle grows quickly, and the life and death cycle makes for a lot of debris on the jungle floor.  Leaf Cutter ants were abundant and you could see them carrying large pieces of leaves or flowers, some of which were removed directly from the tree and plants around us, taking them to wherever their home lay.  Where there is death, rot and decay, there is also life. An abundant amount of life. I saw more butterflies in Costa Rica than during my entire life to date, including a large blue butterfly that seemed to follow us throughout a nature walk;  chattering monkeys, one who, at first, looked as if he were smiling but, we learned, was demonstrating a sign of aggression; we noted the tourists he chased down the path, all  running at a very fast pace. The birds of prey and birds of a less aggressive nature came together in a large cloud of wings, catching the heat and circling, soaring so high that they were dots in the sky;  way too many dogs (many running in packs and clearly hungry) and bugs.  The big bugs, while scary looking, were not that difficult for me to deal with.  But it was the mosquitoes.  Deet saved the day, and the night, but there was an anxiety that I could not shake off during my entire trip of being bitten by a disease infected mosquito.  It so happened that we were in the one area of Costa Rica, the Limon region, that Dengue Fever caused a number deaths from the year before, as well as a record number of malaria infections in the same year.   
What caught me off guard was how loud the jungle is, all day and all night, reminding me of Manhattan, New York, which, like the jungle, never sleeps. This is one time I wish I had had my video camera just to tape the sound, just the sound, because the cacophony of the jungle has a musical quality that takes time to hear.

A funny thing happened on the way to Finmac.

Finmac is surrounded by banana fields; fields that are owned by a large well known corporation here in the US. Two problems with banana and pineapple fields, one is the deforestation of the jungle and the other is  heavy use of pesticides.  The banana fields surrounding Finmac are not organic and many different types of chemicals are used to prevent a myriad of issues that bananas are prone towards.  The bananas are covered, while on the tree, with large blue bags that are lined with a pesticide - this pesticide deteriorates quickly once the bag is removed - as well as crop dusting; this is done with special planes that spray the fields.  As we drove down a long narrow dirt road to our destination, a plane was dusting the banana fields with pesticide(s) while at the same time, many people and animals were working in the fields or walking along the road. The crop duster was releasing pesticide while flying directly over them which included the bus we were traveling in; you could see the droplets on the windows and sides of the bus.  We were shocked.  When we arrived at the Finmac, we were told that this was normal practice and, while the corporation verbally does not want them to do this, it is done and there is no reprisal from the corporation.

I wondered how a cacao farm that is certified organic can be surrounded by this indiscriminate dusting and still be certified.  Hugh, Finmac's owner, had a brilliant solution that took into account the beauty of the jungle; plant trees that will grow very tall, very quickly around his entire farm.  This forced the dust croppers to pull up very sharply when they reached the edge of Finmac's property.  This sharp pulling up of the dust cropper meant the pilot had to stop dusting and, combined with a buffer of land that allows for pesticide drift, the remaining cacao trees are not affected by this spraying. While this saves Finmac's organic certification, I wonder what the long term affects this has on people and animals.  I have been unable to eat a banana, and it has been nearly three months since my trip in Costa Rica. 

This shows the deforestation of the forest to plant pineapple plants. I am not convinced that this is necessary as the cacao and coffee farms are proving. 

The second day of our class...

began with a long drive to Finmac, a cacao farm owned by Hugo Hemelink.  He is dedicated to organic farming and the men and women who work for him seem to like and respect him very much.

If you look closely, near the middle of the picture above, you will see a sloth.  One man showed us his scars that were on his arms from the bites of these beautiful and slow creatures.While they are slow, they are quick to protect themselves if they feel endangered. 

At Finmac, we see an incredibly well managed farm, and the intense use of human labor.  Like most fruits and vegetables grown in this country,  it is often on the sturdy backs of men or mules that food, and here cacao, is carried.  In the picture below, this man is doing the pulling of this train of beans. Because Finmac is a certified organic farm, the use of mules and their byproduct is not worth the expense or spread of disease,  so it is men that harvest, clear and transport these beans to the building where the beans will be fermented, the next important process of creating chocolate flavor. 

More pictures from Catie.

These pictures were also taken at Catie.  Wilbert Phillips, who is head of Cacao Genetic Improvement, shows us the general process of identifying trees that are resistant to disease and still produce a bean with good flavor.   We learn different ways to graft the trees, how to plant from seed, the direct impact of soil on the plant and of good management of the trees, and if that isn't a lot of information to digest, we also get an  overview of the diseases that affect cacao around the world.  We are shown a true criollo tree, and the frames (top picture) that house the different types of cacao for research.
If you decide to visit Costa Rica it is worth the time and effort to tour Catie's Tropical Plants Tour.   Our tour guide, a lovely, vibrant young woman, was interesting and filled with loads of information of the many tropical plants.  

A flowering cocoa tree...

came as a huge surprise, especially seeing the flowers, not on the end of newly grown branches but directly on the trunk of the tree.  Some flowers looked like orchids, as the one in this picture,  and some were little sprays of tiny flowers. So the chocolates, truffles and candies we eat, start out in an array of visual beauty and end in an array of delectable flavors.  How wonderful is that?

The itinerary said to meet in the lobby...

at 6:30am sharp.  I awoke at 6:31am.  In fifteen minutes, I was out the door, forgetting my map of Costa Rica and my chocolates that I brought to share with the group. The group was nearly finished with breakfast, so to finish mine, I ate at break neck speed and then we were on the bus and driving towards the Caribbean side of the country, to spend the next five days exploring Costa Rica's cocao farms.

(Please keep in mind that everything I post, is mine for my use only, and if you wish to use it, please ask me)


This picture was taken at CATIE, at the cocao development center, and one of the first cocao trees I have ever seen. Cocoa pods grow directly on the trunk or base of the tree and we saw many trees that have ripe pods, unripe pods, flowers buds and diseased pods all coexisting on the same tree.  This configuration does  not allow for machine harvesting, but forces the harvesting to be done by hand using long poles with a sharp knife on the end of it and the harvested pods are carried in a basket on a strong and sturdy back.
The beautiful color of these pods in this picture show they are ripe, and the color of a ripened pod depends on the type of cocao tree. Note how close these pods are to the ground. This shows careful management of the tree since when a tree is allowed to grow to its normal height, the pods that are high up in the tree are difficult to cut down, especially without damaging the tree.  In the jungle, a damaged tree can quickly succumb to disease.

I arrive at the airport

in San Jose, Costa Rica, shaken but in one piece, and I am warmly greeted by our family friend Edgar V, with his daughter, AnaLara.  We drive in heavy rain and wind to their beautiful home in San Ramon,  where I will stay for a few days before my class starts and get a chance to adjust to the time change.
The next day we visit the town of Sarchi, and take a tour of a nearby coffee plantation.  This was extremely helpful in my understanding of how Costa Rica is striving towards sustainable coffee and cocao farming practices; practices that will keep its one natural resource, the jungle, alive and well, keeping its tourist industry booming with adventure and beauty seekers coming from around the world, and thereby its economy flowing.
I was also treated to the best meal I was to have in Costa Rica.  Edgar took me to his mother's home, to join his family and friends to celebratre his grandmother's 91st birthday.  His mother and father once owned restaurants and the food she prepared was plentiful as it was delicious. I ate many plates of food, each filled with new and unique dishes. The food, the numerous family and friends who flowed in and out of this home left me exhausted but happy, and it gave me my first glimpse into the hospitality of the people of Costa Rica.

Finally...

The one thing I didn't really consider before starting this blog, is the need to have a computer with you at all times so that I could, well, write.  Since my last entry, I have completed my final volunteer position as Co-Chair for Science Fair for my kids', very large, elementary school, and returned from Paris.  Paris was a trip I took with a wonderful friend, to celebrate a big birthday year,  that was only supposed to be seven days long.  As luck would have it, volcanic ash allowed us to stay an extra seven days, perfect days, giving me plenty of time to walk, explore and taste the food and chocolate of Paris.  Chocolate is very expensive for the American traveler at this time, but most shops sold small lovely tiles for a quick, wonderful private tasting on the streets of Paris.  A lot of shops were closed but I will return to them on another trip, and hopefully soon.
Now, my next entry will continue talking about my chocolate class in Costa Rica. I have never eaten more chocolate in a day, everyday, as I did during that five day class.  It took a lot of will power to go back to small amounts of chocolate once I returned to my normal life.  If only chocolate could satisfy more of the vegetable food groups nutrients.

Costa Rica - March 7, 2010

Arrived by plane to San Jose, Costa Rica in the late evening of March 7, 2010, in tandem with a large storm (I say tandem because it felt similar to being in the stoker position of a bike, a position that leaves you without much control), becoming the scariest landing I have ever experienced.   With one wing pointing down towards the runway as the plane was buffeted by winds, there was a moment of uncertainty whether we would be able to land without breaking up into tiny pieces on the runway, when the plane quickly righted and bounced along until we came to a near stop and then to taxi mode.  You could hear everyone let out their breath at the same time, as all of the passengers realized that the plane was in one piece. 

 

Luckily, my chocolate was in one piece in the bin above my head.

I was met by friends at the airport, a couple of days before my class started the following Monday.  Their hospitality was wonderful and on a whim, they took me to a coffee plantation tour that was delightful.  From that tour I heard about how farms of all types in Costa Rica are working towards organic procedures, sustainability of the produce and the jungle, and keeping waste from entering their water systems.  Costa Rica is only beginning to understand that, although their country does not have minerals or precious gems, their jungle is a national treasure and should be protected for a variety of reasons.  It was a head start on my education of the cocao farms and cocoa beans.

Tempering chaos.

Tempering is used in creating steel, glass making and chocolate candies.  It is fascinating to realize just how much energy (heat) is required to temper these materials.  I believe it is one of the laws of thermodynamics that says it takes a lot of energy to turn chaos into an organized calmness.  Basically, forcing certain forms of crystals in molten chocolate, to line up in a nice neat line.  Of course, this is a simplified version since I don't really understand the math of thermodynamics, but I understand the gist of it and as a cook, I am always working within the confines of the four laws.  What I find even more fascinating is that, once chocolate (or glass or steel) is tempered, it is never still, giving up its latent heat while becoming hardened and glossy,  but once that heat is gone it begins moving back towards chaos.  So gaze quickly at that glossy piece of chocolate and enjoy it right away.  Chaos is the norm and getting the chance to eat a near perfect tempered piece of chocolate is somewhat fleeting.

The time it takes to temper.

Tempering chocolate is similar to riding a bicycle; once you learn how you never forget.  Even the most experienced chocolatiers make mistakes, especially when it is close to a meal and for reasons unclear, the chocolate is not tempering properly and you have been waiting for an hour for it to work its magic. So everyone walks away and returns thirty minutes later to find the chocolate is now overtempered, a thickened, hardened mass that defies gravity, climbing up and out of the machine like the blob. The clean up is terrible.  The lesson well learned; never walk away from the task at hand.  And as important, you have learned the other lesson; get back on the bike and start again, because you still have chocolate to temper and candy to create.

The chocolate journey as a cook...

I am trained as a cook, in the french style to be exact.  My personal cooking style is one of perseverance, in other words,  I choose a cuisine and learn it.  I read, cook, read and cook and ask lots questions of other friends who know that cuisine or even ask the chef at a restaurant that may be of help.  Only once have I had to throw out the results and order pizza.
When I began learning how to temper chocolate, it was with an online class.  This class is designed by Pam Williams of Ecole Chocolat in Canada and, because it was online, allowed me to learn the tempering and candy making process while being a full time mom to three children and allowing my husband to travel for business as needed.  As a trained cook, I know the difference between good and great is practice.  Although, to be honest, I had some experience in tempering and making chocolate bon bons in my professional life in restaurant and catering, it was many, many years ago and my memory of it was scant.  Through the online class, I pushed myself to hand temper over and over again, and after the twenty-fifth time over a one week period, felt that I consistently produced a near perfect temper.

Master Chocolate program with Ecole Chocolat.

Next week I fly to Costa Rica to learn first hand about the growing, harvesting and fermenting of the cocoa bean.  The class is led by Steve De Vries, a well known chocolate maker, and Julio Fernadez, a local Costa Rican maker.  The class will be take place near San Jose, Costa Rica and in a five day span, we will walk through a few cocao farms, nestled in the jungles where cocao trees naturally grow.  
On a personal note, purchasing beans that are organic and not produced by slave labor is important, not only to me, but to many of  my customers as well.
Hopefully, I will be able to upload photos and write short posts during my class.

First chocolate post.

As a micro-batch chocolate maker, I explore the creation of making chocolate from bean to bar.  As a chocolate maker,  I roast, grind/refine and conch the cocoa bean. As a chocolate blender, I taste chocolates,  blending the chocolates of other fine chocolate makers with the couverture of Cocoa Danyle.  Every box is filled with my unique and exclusive chocolate, a tasting of milk and dark couvertures, that explores a full flavor profile of the chocolate tasting experience.