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As I have discussed in previous posts, a truly valid definition of the Arriba Nacional term when applied to Ecuadorian cacao, or simply the Arriba name, includes Nacional beans sourced in parts of the Province of Guayas, the Province of Los Ros and a small fraction of the Province of Bolvar. Ecuador historically produced fine flavor cacao from many other areas which were all Nacional beans but marketed under distinct names, including Bahia-from the area around Bahia de Caraquez, not to be confused with Bahia, Brazil; Balao from Southern Guayas and the coastal areas of Azuay and Caar; and Cacao Machala from the Southernmost part of the country.

Erroneously, around 2006 Ecuador's Institute of Intellectual Protection (Instituto Ecuatoriano de Propiedad Intelectual, IEPI in Spanish), which is responsible for trademarks and other intellectual property rights, published and approved an "Arriba" Protected Denomination of Origin that is restricted to (or rather, erroneously, covers all) beans of the Nacional variety. In effect, this means that any chocolate made from Nacional beans grown anywhere in Ecuador can be called Arriba-which is a major deviation from the original historical definition of the term.

"Arriba" has now come into use by chocolate manufacturers both inside and outside Ecuador, and has largely lost its significance; an ironic parallel given that the "Arriba" flavor has also become increasingly diluted, ambiguous, and unknown due to historical factors including the loss of pure Nacional trees, genetic erosion, the introduction and mixing of CCN-51 and Nacional beans, and numerous other factors. As far as I know, there is little to no enforcement of this PDO by any agency or authority.

Other factors contributing to the historical Arriba flavor profile have also been lost in the shrouds of history;one interesting example is the origin and type of the wood used for fermentation boxes, which is said to contribute to the final chocolate flavor. Anecdotally, there is supposed mention in original historical documents written in French found in Vinces, Ecuador (a.k.a. "Little Paris" during Ecuador's cacao boom in the early part of the 20th century due to the number of french inhabitants and wealth found there), that the wood comes from Ecuador's highlands-but no one has been able to determine what kind of wood was used that helped contribute to the original Arriba flavor (conversation with Cristian Melo, Sep 2011).

Renewing and restoring the original "Arriba" bean and its flavor profile to its former glory is a herculean task, and while efforts are under way, they are still only in their infancy. Unfortunately, the major players who have the power and money to push the movement forward are not doing a lot. And the minor players are more often than not opting for ambiguity over transparency, both in their marketing and sourcing, which ultimately benefits no one. I see the issue as one similar to "peak oil." Will we run out of the oil we need to develop the technologies to maintain and enhance our standard of living before those technologies are here? Will we build them while we have the oil to do so? Or will we simply conduct business as usual until the oil is almost gone, then struggle for a solution? It's the same with the Arriba Nacional flavor profile, as well as the Nacional variety of cacao in Ecuador. Will it disappear before adequate efforts are made to save it, or will industry, government, and the private sector act now, before it's too late, to keep Arriba Nacional and Nacional beans on the map?

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Recently, I had a terrible experience using Chocoa brand chocolate for mold shells. Although, it the taste is similar to Cacao Barry, it didn't crystalize properly (even after several tests).

I noticed Chocoley has a couveture chocolate, but I'm not familiar with it? Does anyone have experience with their line of chocolates?

Hello!!!!

I am a chocolate lover, and i have recently started to consider opening an chocolate shop wih a friend.

I am an artist and at the same time I have been running a family shopping mall.

I want ti change career and have been thinking about the chocolate business.

My friend is a documentalist.

We have been investigating but appart from the love of chocolate i do not know anything about the business.

Any advice>??one of my main concerns is to know if knowing how to make chocolates is a must in order to open the store. Do I need to depend on a chef??any advice welcome.

Many thanks,

Maria Teresa from Venezuela

As President of Project Hope and Fairness, I spent 3 weeks in Ghana and Cameroon this summer and distributed tools to 8 villages using money raised by the NGO. To read about my adventures, please visit www.sweetearthchocolates.blogspot.com .

I spent 10 days in Cameroon, talking to people in government and industry about building a cocoa study center near the town of Ebalowa, the capital of South Cameroon. See the blog for details. Or contact me at: tom@projecthopeandfairness.org

Tom Neuhaus

Abstract

Cacao (Theobroma cacao L.) is an important economic crop in the Bolivian Amazon. Bolivian farmers both cultivate cacao, and extract fruits from wild stands in the Beni River region and in valleys of the Andes foothills. The germplasm group traditionally used is presently referred to as Cacao Nacional Boliviano (CNB). Using DNA fingerprinting technology based on microsatellite markers, we genotyped 164 Bolivian cacao acces- sions, including both cultivated and wild CNB accessions sampled from the Amazonian regions of La Paz and Beni, and compared their SSR profiles with 78 reference Forastero accessions from Amazo- nian cacao populations, including germplasm from the Ucayali region of Peru.

Authors:Dapeng Zhang Windson July Mart nez Elizabeth S. Johnson Eduardo Somarriba Wilberth Phillips-Mora Carlos Astorga Sue Mischke Lyndel W. Meinhardt

Download the full PDF from the World Cocoa Foundation web site.

In a related announcement, the wild beans of the Beni were analyzed and determined to be another distinct population in Bolivia.

RITTER SPORT, a large German company manufacturing industrial and cheap chocolate for gas stations and supermarkets, is attacking fine chocolate makers like DOMORI, ROVIRA, MAGLIO, CONSTANT, KESSON'S and many others because of the square shape of our bars... they claim that they are the only ones in the world that can make square chocolate bars...How laughable is this! Should there be any risk of confusion, we would be the ones that would have to fear any damage for our brands. I mean, besides the fact that there is absolutely nothing leading to confusion in the design of the packaging or anywhere else, we are not even competitors, we are not in the same league... RITTER is a large multinational company with lots of money to pay for the marketing of their mass market product (and for their lawyers) and we are artisans making high end chocolate for gourmets. But this again shows the reality of the chocolate market in general where 70% of the market is owned by 5 large multinational companies... So let's fight the dirty tricks of such greedy multinational like RITTER SPORT that are trying to kill the creativity and passion of small artisan chocolatiers!

Here is a short list of the brands having square chocolate bars in their portfolio: KESSON'S, BALAGUER, BERGER, BOISSIER, CLEMENT, DOMORI, Laurent GERBAUD, HUSSEL, Luento Santoro, MAGLIO, MLAR Choklad, MARCOLINI, MarieBelle, MAZET, MEISTERWERK, MELT, Franois PRALUS, ROVIRA, TCHO, VIVANI, WILLIE'S Cacao...

KESSON'S shall keep the shape of its chocolate bars as it is and we will of course keep our aficionados posted with the latest development of the case.

I have had customers asking me for cacao nibs and roasted and raw cacao beans but have been reluctant to stock these items due to salmonella or other pathogen risk. After seeing cacao beans being fermented and dried in numerous countries I question the safety of these products. Dirt, bugs, drying on asphalt roads etc..I question from all but the most sophisticated winnowing operations to remove the husk. Am I overreacting to the risk ? Does the roasting process kill these pathogens? Is anyone using ultra -violet technology to sterilize the nibs? One request came from a home beer brewer. Would the alcohol distilling process render the nibs safe? Appreciate the feedback..

Hi! I am Madel, a Fulbright Scholar currently working with Dr. Skip Bittenbender on a research on cacao at the UH . Right now we're listing the cacao growers, propagators, Chocolatiers/artisan with a hope that we can meet sometime to discuss on the cacao industry in Hawaii and aim to have a wonderful Hawaii Cacao industry in the future.

Will you care to email me your name, Farm/bussiness location, home address, email address. Please state the no. of cacao trees you have; the products you sell or produce.

Hope to hear from you ASAP. Mahalo and God bless you all!

Garden Island Chocolate invites you to visit our new fan page on facebook, you can see us making Kauai chocolate and Kauai Acai, and all the other fascinating agricultural endeavors like dehydrating bananas, planting cacao trees, harvesting cacao pods, harvesting citrus, miracle berries, etc... fan page