Post by cacao on Jul 25, 2006 18:36:34 GMT -5
I am a Peace Corps volunteer living in the Amazon of Ecuador. I thought it would be interesting to harvest some cacao and experiment in chocolate making, well it was easier said than done. I believe I let the pepas ferment too long as some mold formed. As far as the drying and roasting goes the seed casing wedged under my thumb nail and a sore neck from being bent over the seeds for hours indicates to me that the seeds weren´t sufficiently dry. I read nothing before I started this endeavor...anyway I broke the seeds into smaller pieces and popped them in a pot, assuming they would melt. They did not. So the next batch of seeds I put in a blender and this worked out better. Added coco butter, milk and sugar. The end result some what tasted like chocolate but it was terribly bitter when you bit into a piece of ¨nib¨(I think the site calls it) which the other ingredients had not penetrated. So I´ve been talking with the women´s group in my community and they have interest in the value added process of turning their cacao beans into chocolate. I checked out the ingredients of chocolate bars and saw that Lecithin seemed to be a reoccuring staple...I went to a farmacy and bought some but it came in a dark liquid form (nothing like picture examples I saw on the internet). Here´s my inquiry- you think it´s safe? As far as a finer grind for next time the women suggested using their corn grinder...we´ll see. The proper equipment isn´t exactly available down here, just trying to make do with what we have. My thought is to dip bananas (something else there´s a lot of down here) in our homemade chocolate that way if the flavor isn´t the best at least the banana will offset it a bit. Don´t have much time on line but would appreciate feedback. Thanks for letting me share.