GROWING CHOCOLATE

GROWING CHOCOLATE

Chocolate is made from seeds harvested from the tree Theobroma Cacao which are produced in a pod which takes about 6 months to grow from flowering to ripe pods for harvesting.Since most pods are harvested before fully ripe, it is not known exactly what ripe pods are or how long it takes to mature. As is well known in horticulture, generally fruit when it reaches full maturity will fall off the branch or stem when fully ripe at its ‘peak’ flavor profile. The fruit generally releases from the tree at the juncture of the stem with the fruit or at the juncture of the stem with the branch .Why should cocoa be different from all other fruits? Note historically pods are cut off the tree through a stem which is about as big as ones little finger at the tip. The pods are then split open and piled in a heap , covered with banana leaves and fermented for four to eight days to have the flavor precursors to develop which the inside of the bean transforms from a magenta/purple color to a dark brown color(like chocolate). The beans are then dried and shipped to consuming countries for further processing.

What if the pods were allowed to fully ripen?(note in the country of Venezuela cocoa pods are usually harvested when near fully ripe hence certain beans like from Lake Maracaibo can actually be eaten without further processing and as one former manufacturer –namely Bud Blumenthal(deceased)use to say the best use for Maracaibo beans is to rub the skin off the bean and then crunch it up and sprinkle over vanilla ice cream. I have eaten this bean and yes it is most delectable and with no roasting the flavor is really there – WHY?) Is it possible that if the pods were to fully ripen the crude process of fermentation and drying could be omitted since in most Aztec history there is little mention of the fermenting procedure before making chocolatl drink.

Perhaps if the pod were allowed to stay on the tree until fully ripe the beans would be naturally fermented and could be processed straightaway without much roasting if any
into a cocoa mass/chocolate liquor which could be blended with different growths/varieties. The writer has some chocolate liquor processed(circa 1950 by The
Blommer Chocolate Company) from only Venezuelan beans with nothing added and is
a flavor which is most delectable,hence the question – Do beans need to be roasted?

Perhaps beans with a light roast to loosen the skin could be ground at origin saving shipping cost of the skin/shell and moisture which was studied to no end by Forest Mars,Sr. in the second half of the twentieth century. The waste material – pod and shell
could then be ground and re-used on the cocoa farm as natural fertilizer for future growth.
It is known that the waste material has many nutrients and has been tested as animal feed
up to fifty percent with corn/maize for ruminants.

Is it then possible that straight chocolate liquor could be used directly as a food (similar
to what has been the case in the country of Colombia for centuries) being fully natural which modern day consumers seem to be craving for with only additions of natural flavors like cinnamon , vanilla, pepper, covering for fruits and nuts. Reported tests in
the 21st century suggest more nutrition benefits exist in chocolate when processing is
limited.Perhaps also the medicinal benefits would also be enhanced as a cancer control
as well as beneficial to the heart. This all seems to define ‘chocolate’ as the ‘food of the Gods”, which was attributed as lore in Cocoa History .


HORTICULTURE OF COCOA

Why are pruning shears used in nearly all domesticated fruit crops – apples/oranges/grapes,etcetera and not used or hardly known in the agriculture of Cacao?
In a small farm in Brasil in the late twentieth century a Swiss farmer/plant breeder had a
small plot for cocoa trees and kept the trees pruned to no higher than he could reach –
about 2 to 2 ½ meters. Interestingly these trees always seemed to be loaded with pods,
despite relative yields in surrounding areas. The trees were planted about two meters apart and were easy to harvest as fruit was easily reached. It is guesstimated that yields per acre on plantings which are kept pruned could be at least ten-fold that of most producing areas in the world. Since world production increased more than six fold in the last half of the twentieth century with no special efforts in horticultural practices,
“pruning shears” would seem a good investment. Agricultural development in
” theobroma cacao “ either in improved yields or improved varieties for flavor,yield, or
disease resistance seems to be sorely lacking other than some known research in
Trinidad before WWII. Most research has been directed to various types of disease control.

Some research has shown when tree seedlings are planted properly the tree yields fruit in the third year for the ever-bearing Theobroma Cacao tree given proper moisture (estimated to need five to nine inches of rainfall per month with sunshine during the day)
and nutrients (could come from the unused pods/shell ground and spread under the growing trees).

Note the pod material should be shredded and re-used as fertilizer in the grove of cocoa trees rather than allowed to rot near the grove causing black pod to develop and lose crop yields. Also the shell/skin of the seed could be ground and replaced as a mulch/fertilizer.
Replacing this pod/bean material would basically return most of the mineral ingredients
back to the soil.

At some point, research should be undertaken to develop higher yield/better flavor varieties as well as disease resistance. Little basic research has been done other than at the Trinidad research facility prior to WWII.