Costa Rica finally changed my relation with chocolate.

By on March 15, 2011 in Trips

When I ran into the chocolate tour in Costa Rica organized by Ecole Chocolat, I didn’t really have an idea of what to get out of it. I just knew I had to go badly, and so I did.
When the tour kicked off the first day, we all got to talk a bit about our goals and ambitions for the trip.
To that I replied that I was in Costa Rica to find out what Belgian chocolate really is (pun), and secondly to stop the “platonic” part of my relation with cacao.

Costa Rica. On the Chocolate Tour
You may be enjoying the thing you like as much as you want, read books on it, do activities around it, and some more. But at a given moment you’ll get that itch that makes you go to the true source. To understand a tiny bit more what it really is that you like so much. To get a different angle. To reinterpret why you love it, and why it’s fun. Finally embracing cacao physically and mentally shaped my ambitions.
After 10 days in Costa Rica, I come back from a succesful ‘de-platonizing’ experience, and I now know what I don’t know yet. And even if I did not have any particular expectations, this trip exceeded all of them, and I will share it as much as I can with as many people.

Through some following blog posts, photo and video, let’s take you to the fruit of the gods. Thank you Ecole Chocolat for the great tour, thank you Steve Devries for being the geyser of knowledge and inspiration, and all the enthusiast people for the never ever ending talks.

And thank you cacao for being here, the food of the future. Pura Vida!

Crushing My Passion, all the way to Costa Rica!

By on February 23, 2011 in On Chocolate & Cacao, Trips

I’m crushing my passion. Steven ‘minorissues’ wrote it a year ago. Gary Vaynerchuk confirmed it (well, his book did). And some hundreds of Facebook Fans, Twitter followers and people who attended a Choqoa Tasting event continuously fuel that passion.
I think it’s been pretty great so far, but far from enough…My first blog post said something about cacao plantations; well that’s where I’m going soon! It’s time for the next level of Choqoa.

Choqoa. [photo By Corey'sWorld]
[photo by Corey'sWorld]

I’m seizing the unique opportunity to join an international program to explore cacao in Costa Rica with Ecole Chocolat. Led by one of the grand icons of fine origin cacao, Steve Devries, we will tour with a small group through different locations:

A week long adventure will take you to the historical roots of cacao growing during harvest. Not only will your chocolate making benefit from a much better understanding of cacao cultivation and processing but you will engage in spirited dialogue on the future of fine chocolate flavor.

On many occasions people ask me where I want to go with Choqoa. The answer is always that I can’t tell. Eventually it’s not me who decides. It’s where my passion leads me, or more correct: the way all of you keep responding to my passion. That’s why I keep on crushing it as hard as I can. Costa Rica will certainly give new directions and inspiration to share.
And I’m looking forward to shake hands with Gary Vaynerchuck tomorrow too on the Phare conference.

Follow Choqoa and help everybody to rediscover chocolate!

Choqoa’s home brewed cacao experience, from bean to bar

By on January 28, 2011 in On Chocolate & Cacao

What would it take me to make a home brewed chocolate ‘bar’. On a lazy Sunday afternoon I took the time to have some fun with roasted beans I had from Pralus, and some standard kitchen tools. Curiosity was at the heart of the experiment: what happens when you go through some steps of making chocolate?

Choqoa Chocolate Bar Experiment

All I had was Madagascar beans, cocoa butter, sugar, a Magimix and a hairdryer. So what follows is just for the fun, don’t take it too serious, yet!

Taking of the shell of roasted beans

From François Pralus, I had some Madagascar beans to show for my tasting events. They were already roasted by the master himself, so all I had left to do was take away the shell off the beans. But gosh, what a job! It’s even worse than pistachio nuts. The big thing here was how best to separate the thin fragile shell from the bean itself.

Breaking them gave me too much waste though for this home experiment. I quickly understood why we invented machines for this, ha! I experimented with a hairdryer to blow out the shell pieces, but with a force to weak. The dust cleaner to suck instead of blow (something I learned from the Mast Brothers’ home equipment), but that was to strong though and sucked almost half of my materials! Then I tried outdoors to blow from underneath myself through a sieve. Luckily neighbors were out to miss this foolish looking scene. Hehe…

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The Salon du Chocolat 2010, a first report from Paris.

By on October 30, 2010 in Interviews & Video, On Chocolate & Cacao, Trips

What a hectic day it was this time at Salon du Chocolat. Was it the crowd, the number of exhibitors, or the fact that I wanted to do so many things in so little time? For all the things I could not do, however I got many very inspiring talks in return. And eventually that is the main reason for me to return to Paris every year.

What didn’t happen were the many video interviews I planned. Many chocolate people were subject to loaded schedules and the talks I did have left little window for an extra video. So I ended up with only three. And I didn’t shot a single photo. Gosh. Didn’t talk with Stéphane Bonnat, talked but didn’t interview Diego Badaro, and well some other things.
The good news though, I was really glad to run into Clay Gordon again, my inspiring chocophile from the US. Also Bertil Akesson was running a booth for the first time and I finally met a charming Santiago from Pacari. Also nice shaking hands with London’s most talked chocolatier Paul A. Young and Kate Johns, the director of The UK Chocolate Week, and an inevitable warm talk with Valérie from Pralus. It was a great surprise as well to see the Rizek family, the Dominican Republic cacao producer.

Salon du Chocolat 2010

My two most inspiring moments were meeting Duane Dove and Chloé Doutre-Rousell. Duane devoted 7 years of his life to revive a true cacao plantation in Tobago, beautiful story. And now he releases his chocolate with the help of François Pralus. And yes I do have a short video with him.
The second encounter with Chloé was the longest talk of the day, but we needed 100 times more time. Her experience, attitude and now the El Ceibo project fired up talks and thoughts on our shared passion. Must be continued. Video, check.

On the chocolate side, it was crowded and the discoveries came from rather unexpected moments. It was not by queuing booths but through sharing passion that those discoveries happened. Tasting the Rizek family chocolate was exciting, trying the ‘El Ceibo Heritage’ was unique, and getting a non commercial sample from a rare Brazil Forastero variety was truly … rediscovering chocolate!

After all an unexpectedly very interesting Salon du Chocolate 2010. And for next year, I do need business cards. Taking a time now to reflect on many things, and do the video edits. More in detail of all of the above soon, for there is of course much more to tell!

Getting ready for the 2010 “Salon du Chocolat” in Paris!

By on October 18, 2010 in Interviews & Video, Trips

It’s that time of the year again: at the and of this month I’m visiting again the Salon du Chocolat in Paris! It will be the third time now, and so far every year has been an important boost for Choqoa, thanks to the enthusiasm of a growing fanbase!
Also this year I’m looking forward to it a lot for several reasons. Not only will we dive again into a fascinating chocolate universe, share passionate stories, but also  meetup again with both new people and others I met last year.
I’m eager to experience how AMMA’s chocolate bar evolved from a test series to a true product range. Rumours about some new origin bars from a great French chocolatier may come true, and after having read her book, we’ll also meet Chloe Doutre-Roussel in real life. We will be loaded with our videocamera and I hope to bring back some inspiring interview moments as well!

Pre-order the new Salon du Chocolat Selection!

Above all, this is what is getting me excited the most. Just like every year Choqoa will put together a new, special selection with bars discovered at the Salon du Chocolat. It’s what thrives Choqoa: sharing great cacao, and have you rediscover chocolate. And every year so far it was a unique surprise. This year I’m already establishing contacts for a fantastic edition… It’ looks to be an exclusive and limited again.

For a smooth followup I have setup a special order page to make pre-ordering as easy as possible for you. So reserve your Salon 2010 Selection by Choqoa now!
Thank you for spreading the news, and stay in close touch!