Chocolate: a blind tasting of some of the world’s best
With representatives of Kallari, an Ecuadorian fair-trade producer
Sunday, November 21, 5 p.m.
McNally Smith College of Music café

Kallari Chocolate produces what is often considered to be the world’s finest chocolate. The beans, of the rare Cacao Nacional variety, are grown by Quichwa indians in Ecuador’s Amazon basin. It is organic and fair trade. Cacao Nacional is a Slow Food Presidium, an endangered food whose growers are given support by Slow Food’s Foundation for Biodiversity. Learn more about the Cacao Nacional Presidium here >>

Before the co-op’s existence, growers sold beans to European exporters and earned around one tenth of what they do now. The co-op grows the plants and produces, packages and markets the chocolate bars. A flavor benefit is that the beans are processes soon after picking. Cacao beans that are exported have a greater chance to degrade before being made into chocolate. An environmental benefit is that the endangered Cacao Nacional plants are increasing in number and rainforest is being preserved.

Our speakers were a grower and a chocolatier. They guided participants through a blind tasting during which each type of Kallari chocolate (70, 75 and 85 percent) was compared with three other chocolates. The consensus was that all three Kallari varieties were the winners.