About Our Cacao Origins
The states of Tabasco and Chiapas comprise 99% of Mexican cacao production, accounting for 27,000 tons across all of Mexico. While production has fallen sharply and steadily in recent decades, Mexico still produces almost 3 times more cacao than all Central American countries combined. However, as Mexico produces only 1/3 of the cacao that the country consumes, its chocolate industry continues to rely on imports.
This fact and the lack of fermentation tradition explains why Mexico is so rare to find as an origin of bean-to-bar chocolate around the world. Out of a production of 27,000 tons, less than 120 tons are exported each year, and just a small fraction is fine cacao.
Tabasco
Tabasco is the most important cacao growing region in Mexico, and has remained as one of the most important cacao producing centers in all of the Americas. It is home to the Olmec people, the “Mother Civilization” of Mesoamerica that not only built the first cities and pyramids–and coined the word “kakawa”–but also the first to turn cacao into chocolate over 3,000 years ago.
The Tabasqueño origin started as a single-estate bean, meaning it was produced from a single grower. The cacao is grown in an agroforestry system interspersed with other plants (such as tropical flowers, timber trees, citrus, pepper or mangos), and with no watering infrastructure, it relies 100% on rainfall.
The traditional Mexican post-harvest process is not fermentation, but “lavado” (washed cacao), which implies either washing the beans right away after breaking the pods or partially fermenting them for two or three days to remove the mucilage (cacao pulp) with less labor.
Tabasco cacao pods, also known as forastero, are smaller, rounder and have a smoother skin. You’ll also find pods that, due to crossbreeding, look like a mix between the forastero and the more commonly known criollos (or “native”), resulting in a varietal called trinitario. When ripe, the pods can be very colorful.
The forastero’s flavor profile is more complex than it might seem, being dark and equally sweet and bitter. Although different roasting profiles and conching (bean refinement) times will end up in different flavors, common profiles include blackberry, a hint of slightly pungent pepper, a tang of lime, molasses or the sweetness of a date, and toasted pecans.
Chiapas
The Chiapanecan origin comes from Soconusco, a very old cacao growing region where cross-pollination has brought up a very distinctive genetic mix. Cacao has been continuously grown here for the last 4,000 years (estimated to be about 1900 BC) when the first sedentary civilization in Mesoamerica, the Mokayas, domesticated cacao. This diversity makes fermentation very hard to master. However, unlike other places where cacao hybrids have been planted at a large scale, Soconusco has kept its heirloom cacao safe.
Chiapanecan cacao pods are harvested and fermented by a cooperative named Rayén founded in 2016. They are devoted to the rescue of the heirloom varieties of local cacao under threat by the introduction of highly productive and pest-resistant “clones”. In effort to maintain the varieties, they research those already present in their farms (which can be over a hundred years old) and then propagate the best among them. Consistency among single-origin farmers offsets genetic diversity because they know exactly which lots to ferment together.
Although the differentiation between forastero, trinitario and criollo isn’t clearcut and somewhat artificial, it can be regarded as a tendency. Rayén's cacao genetics could be described as a mixture of criollos and trinitarios (or “trinitarios acriollados” as they’re called). Though there are dozens of different colors and pod shape combinations, the shape of the pods have the typical corrugated skin and "lizard" tail. The beans inside the pods are predominantly white and pink when fresh, however when roasted and with the husk removed, you might end up with a vibrant color palette.
In terms of flavor profile, you’ll find nutty notes of cashew, almond and peanut butter; tangy, fruity notes of dried cherry and currants; and a heightened impression of natural sweetness, such as from caramelized bananas and dates.