https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z Thu, 07 May 2026 18:34:57 -0600 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/699/chocolate-making-classes https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/699 Richard is particularly good at explaining very complicated engineering and scientific concepts to laypeople like me, so he was excited to show off his gear and teach our friends about the complexities of the process. I love to train people and get them to buy into a process, so I was excited to make our chocolate-making relevant and interesting to our friends with such diverse interests. The challenge was on and we were pumped!
Read more about how it went! http://rootchocolate.com/2015/04/14/chocolate-making-classes/]]> Tue, 14 Apr 2015 16:54:41 -0600 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/695/visiting-manoa-chocolate-hawaii https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/695 Read more here: http://rootchocolate.com/2015/03/16/visiting-manoa-chocolate-hawaii/]]> Mon, 16 Mar 2015 17:43:10 -0600 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/692/cacao-farming-on-oahu https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/692 The first farm we visited was Kahuku Farms, on the North Shore. Dr. Nat of Madre recommended we stop by here. Kahuku provides farm tours or, as they call them, smoothie tours. We rode around on a wheeled bench, pulled by a trailer through the rows of beautiful crops in the demonstration portion of the farm and received a delicious homemade smoothie made from the ingredients we had seen just moments before. Our tour guide is married to Kylie, a fourth generation Kahuku farmer and has taken on the education part of the business. We learned a lot about the history of the farm and their attempts to share such fresh and delicious vegetables with the local population. Hawaiian food traditionally includes a lot of meat, but the Kahuku food truck serves only vegetarian foods made from their farm’s produce. Surprisingly to the farming family (but not to us Californian hippies), it’s a huge hit!
Read more about Kahuku Farms and our visits to Lonohana and Waialua Estates, here: http://rootchocolate.com/2015/03/12/cacao-farming-on-oahu/]]> Thu, 12 Mar 2015 17:16:45 -0600 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/690/learning-from-dr-nat https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/690 Read more here: http://rootchocolate.com/2015/03/09/learning-from-dr-nat/ ]]> Mon, 09 Mar 2015 17:33:08 -0600 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/687/roast-test-taste-test https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/687 First a quick note on the process… We made 4 batches of chocolate, differentiated mostly by the roast profile, but also partially by grind time (purely due to circumstance). This was the first time we had both of our Premier Wonder Grinders going at the same time, which was quite an experience. Together, they are significantly noisier than one on its own, and they have slightly different frequencies, resulting in interesting table vibrations all night.
Read more and learn about the results here: http://rootchocolate.com/2015/02/17/roast-test-taste-test/]]> Tue, 17 Feb 2015 16:22:08 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/686/behmor-roast-tests https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/686 Our current experiment is working with our Behmor 1600 Plus to figure out what exactly the temperature range is for a kilo of cocoa beans at each of its pre-programmed roast profiles. We’ve now tested three of the five programs and plotted the temperatures (in degrees Fahrenheit) at 10 second intervals for each of them. We’ve overlayed the three temperature takes with Chocolate Alchemy’s power output charts to show how that affects the temperature as well.
Read more here: http://rootchocolate.com/2015/02/11/behmor-roast-tests/]]> Wed, 11 Feb 2015 15:21:24 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/685/cocoa-bean-quality https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/685 We did some research and asked some friends, but we're always learning, so don't take this post as the be all end all of cocoa bean evaluation. The best way to learn to evaluate beans is to travel to cacao-producing countries and learn from the makers and farmers themselves.
In a nutshell, here's what we've learned so far: it takes all the senses and some background research to determine high quality cocoa beans.
Read more here: http://rootchocolate.com/2015/02/02/cocoa-bean-quality/]]> Sun, 08 Feb 2015 09:47:20 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/608/chocolate-business-models https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/608 Honestly, this is a very difficult question and we don't assume that there is an answer. This question goes much deeper than the surface question of how to start a business - it asks how we want to spend our free time, how we want to spend our working hours, how much financial risk we are willing to take on, how confident we are that our chocolate is actually any good, if chocolate bars are our ultimate product, what the future of our family looks like, and how permanent we are in our current living location.
All that said, we are trying to follow the practices of The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses, in order to keep the potential business light and flexible. Some of the recommendations in the book are difficult to apply to a brick and mortal chocolate shop, since it's mostly geared toward tech startups. However, we're doing our best!
Let's take a look at the different business model options for starting a bean-to-bar chocolate business (at least to our knowledge in California):
http://rootchocolate.com/2015/01/29/chocolate-business-models/]]> Thu, 29 Jan 2015 16:40:11 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/606/root-chocolate-visiting-letterpress-chocolate-in-la https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/606 We could smell that amazing brownie-like scent as we walked up the stairs to their apartment and as soon as they opened the door, the whirling of multiple Premier Wonder Grinders provided a pleasant white noise background. As usual, they were in the middle of making chocolate!
Read more here... http://rootchocolate.com/2015/01/26/visiting-letterpress-chocolate/]]> Mon, 26 Jan 2015 14:31:20 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/604/guelaguetza https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/604 One of the other ways we incorporated chocolate into our trip was by visiting local phenomenon, Guelaguetza Restaurante. This is the most authentically Oaxacan spot I’ve experienced since spending a summer in Oaxaca, Mexico itself. They serve tlayudas, mole, and mezcal, among other southern Mexican delicacies.
Learn more here: http://rootchocolate.com/2015/01/22/guelaguetza-in-la/]]> Thu, 22 Jan 2015 14:49:59 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/600/root-chocolate-roasting-cocoa-beans-with-the-behmor-1600-plus https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/600 This is the most technologically advanced piece of equipment we own for chocolate. And it comes with TWO instruction manuals, both of which Ive read cover to cover multiple times and referred to throughout our first roast.
Learn more about how it's done here:
http://rootchocolate.com/2014/12/15/roasting-with-the-behmor-1600-plus/]]> Mon, 15 Dec 2014 17:00:44 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/599/root-chocolate-thanksgiving-chocolate-tasting https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/599 We tasted 13 chocolate bars (avoiding any flavored chocolate) and surprisingly, there were no truly clear winners. We are amazed by the variation of tastes and preferences among us!
Learn more about our verdicts here:
http://rootchocolate.com/2014/12/11/thanksgiving_chocolate_tasting/]]> Thu, 11 Dec 2014 17:40:48 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/598/root-chocolate-marketing-or-education https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/598 Youmay laugh and say that people who refrain from eating delicacies like spicy Pho, caviar, or kimchi have unsophisticated palettes. Wemust not know or understand the intricacies of such delicious foods.Richard maysay thatmy Vietnamese food is bland and that Im not gaining the full experience of these cuisines.
I would respond that I like what I like. My taste buds have their own preferences and theres not too much I can do about that. Im not being stubborn on purpose; Im sure you can identify withme in having a particular taste for something that may be considered unpopular.
So, what does this have to do with chocolate?
http://rootchocolate.com/2014/12/07/marketing-or-education/]]> Mon, 08 Dec 2014 15:42:34 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/596/root-chocolate-to-cocoa-butter-or-not-to-cocoa-butter https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/596 Sat, 06 Dec 2014 20:34:51 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/595/root-chocolate-matching-the-roast https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/595 Thu, 04 Dec 2014 16:16:57 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/594/root-chocolate-sorting-cocoa-beans https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/594 Mon, 01 Dec 2014 16:25:23 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/592/root-chocolate-making-chocolate-friends https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/592 Wed, 26 Nov 2014 16:31:42 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/589/root-chocolate-a-chocolate-shortage https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/589 Mon, 24 Nov 2014 16:28:34 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/588/root-chocolate-chocolate-factory https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/588 Tue, 18 Nov 2014 17:18:45 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/587/root-chocolate-chocolate-certifications-and-labels https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/587
I'm not going to claim that one certification is better than another or that any one of these means your chocolate is sustainably produced and sourced, but let's go into what each of them mean.

Learn more here: http://rootchocolate.wordpress.com/2014/11/10/chocolate_labels_1/]]> Thu, 13 Nov 2014 22:48:19 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/586/root-chocolate-venezuelan-batch-bloom-challenge https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/586 Fri, 07 Nov 2014 10:23:00 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/585/root-chocolate-new-ingredients https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/585 Mon, 03 Nov 2014 17:42:00 -0700 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/584/healthy-halloween-with-root-chocolate https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/584 Fri, 31 Oct 2014 16:45:05 -0600 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/581/root-chocolate-85 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/581 Mon, 20 Oct 2014 19:00:58 -0600 https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/577/root-chocolate-where-do-cacao-farmers-come-in https://forums.thechocolatelife.com/landen-z/blog/577 Thu, 09 Oct 2014 16:26:28 -0600