Cacao Beans = Brain Food

If you are in need of a little brain food, cacao beans are officially ranked as #2 by BrainReady.com as one of The Top 5 Brain Health Foods. Cacao beans, the foundation of chocolate and cocoa powder, are renowned for its mood enhancement, “antioxidants, flavonoids, catechins and other brain and body enhancing elements”.

As you look to chocolate for brain power, BrainReady.com recommends non-Dutched processed cocoa which removes many of the positive elements from the cocoa powder. Dutched-processed cocoa is processed with an alkalizing agent which refines the powder and decreases the cocoa’s acidity levels. Instead, look to indulge in high cacao contain chocolate bars with at least 75% cacao content, 100% organic non-alkalized chocolate products or chocolate/cocoa that is minimally processed.

Here is the complete list of The Top 5 Brain Health Foods from BrainReady.com :

1. Wild Salmon
2. Cacao Beans
3. Matcha (stone-ground Gyokuru green tea powder)
4. Acai Berries & Blueberries (tie)
5. Coffee Beans

Honoring Chocolate Legends

The chocolate industry has lost two legendary pioneers in the recent weeks due to cancer: John Steinberg and Klaus J. Jacobs. John Steinberg, physician, chocolatier and entrepreneur, co-founded of Scharffen Berger, one of the finest American chocolate manufacturers in San Francisco, California in the 1990’s. Mr. Steinberg traveled to Lyon, France to learn from the legendary chocolatiers at Bernachon and returned to America to capture the hearts and stomachs of many. Known for their small batch bean to bar approach and their ethical practices, Scharffen’s ingenuity brought immense recognition among culinary and home-based chefs for their superior quality and smooth texture.


After taking the helm of Johann Jacobs & Co. at 33 years of age, Klaus J. Jacobs transformed his great-uncle’s coffee trading firm to one of the largest chocolate and coffee manufacturers and sellers in Europe. During his reign at Johann Jacobs & Co., Mr. Jacobs acquired Swiss firm Tobler and France’s Suchard along with Holland’s Van Houten and French chocolate maker, Cacao Barry. With the addition of Cacao Barry came the creation of Barry Callebaut, one of the world’s leading producers of cocoa, chocolate and confections products.

Both Scharffen’s and Klaus’ contributions to the chocolate and cocoa industry will forever be remembered throughout the world.

In Search of Cocoa’s Genome

Recently, Mars, Inc., one of the largest privately held confections manufacturers in the US, The U.S. Department of Agriculture and IBM joined forces to map the DNA sequence of the cocoa tree.

Due to an increase in global demand, the fragile nature of the cocoa tree and the ferocious appetite of fungal diseases, such as Witches Broom and Frosty Pod Rot, weakening or eliminating various cocoa tree strains, cocoa has become the new “Gold”. Cocoa, the foundation of a $5 billion dollar chocolate industry, is currently trading on the stock exchange at a 28-year high. To quench a world-wide thirst for chocolate, a task force was formed consisting of $10 million in funding, advanced technology, scientists and agriculturalists to identify the cocoa tree’s DNA sequence to improve overall cocoa quality and create healthier crops with higher yields.

With the establishment of a research facility in Davao City, the largest city located on the Philippine island of Mindanao, and the use of a 24-hectare (59.31 acres) cocoa plantation located within the Malagos Garden Resort, the Philippines is designated ground zero for this research project. Currently ranked eighteen in global cocoa production, the Philippines is looking to increase their footing in the cocoa industry. Over the next five years, the task forces hopes to safeguard for the world’s cocoa production as well as assist in eliminating the tree’s estimated $700 million annual expenses due to fungal disease infestation.

Central American’s cacao production revitalization

The Ngobe Indian people of western Panama in Central America are returning back to their roots! For centuries, the people of Central America grew, harvested and indulged their own chocolate beverages. In the 1990’s, they moved away from growing and harvesting cacao due to poor prices and a fungus infestation. With a global upswing in chocolate consumption, the indigenous people are reviving their cacao plantations.

Like other cacao growing regions, cooperatives are being established allowing growers to secure proper prices and profits for their beans as well as manage the relationships with buyers. As more chocolate manufacturers look for fair trade products, Central America as an edge over the Ivory Coast, the largest cacao grower in the world, which has been tied to child-slave labor. The native people of Central America work their own plantations thus removing the child-slave labor stigma.

Personally, I think it is nice to see people from Belize to Panama return to an industry they perfected so long ago.

Got Cocoa!

Thomas Jefferson said, “The superiority of chocolate, both for health and nourishment, will soon give it the same preference over tea and coffee in American which it has in Spain.” Although we have yet to truly reach that point with modern day hot chocolate surpassing tea and/or coffee. However, the tide may be changing? According to the International Business Times, the demand for cocoa for a March delivery increased “3 pounds, or 0.3 percent, to 1,120 pounds ($2,187) a ton after posting 17 percent gain last year.” On the other hand, coffee delivery for “March declined $23, or 1.1 percent, to $2,024 a metric ton.”

The value of the dollar vs. the euro plays a role in this equation as well…but I really don’t understand all of that extra stuff. All I care about is… Got Cocoa!

Expensive Cocoa Beans

Chocoholics beware! The price of cocoa beans and milk has gone up substantially, therefore so has the price of our hot chocolates and chocolate bars. One of the big boys, Hershey’s lead the price increase race on wholesale prices on their chocolate products and other companies have followed suit. This is the second price increase in a year which means customers will be paying much more for chocolate products. Hershey chocolate doesn’t have a high enough cocoa content for me (except for their Special Dark Chocolate and Cacao Reserve; but other companies already have my loyalty) . However, they own Scharffen Berger and Dagoba Organic chocolates. Both make are absolutely wonderful cocoa powder, hot chocolates and baking chocolates. The two companies were acquired a few years back and are being folded into the “Hershey” way.

Although I am going to age myself, I remember when candy bars were 25 cents! You can probably get something from McDonald’s $1 menu for the same price of a candy bar is now. At least you can justify that cocoa is good for you and that is why you MUST have a candy bar. But everyone knows you have to buy the dark chocolate to receive the true benefits of cocoa.

I personally was a little shocked that the increase was so swift. I went to purchase inventory of a very popular hot chocolate and it went up by $15.00 a case and the selling price by $3.00. Geez!

Cacao Can Save the World!

On the way into work pass Monday, I caught a portion of the NPR segment on cacao farming in Brazil called “How Chocolate Can Save the World” by Joanne Silberner.

Well I knew cacao can save the world in heart, body and soul. However, numerous people and now environmentalists are highlighting the benefits of growing the cacao tree in parts of Brazil that previous gave up on growing the tree.

Take a listen to “How Chocolate Can Save the World”

SerendipiTea ChocolaTea Sorbet

Now that I’ve recovered from a crashed hard drive and my recent work related travel, I am back on the blog! My frozen dessert rampage continues… This time I was busy creating a sorbet and granite with cocoa infused teas.

Sorbets are basically a frozen mixture of flavored ice usually enhanced with a fruit puree and sugar. A lot lighter than ice cream, sorbets are really great for those that are lactose intolerant since water is usually used vs. milk

After brewing up 3–½ cups of H20 with 3 tablespoons of serendipiTea’s ChocolaTea made with Chocolate, Vanilla, Rooibos and Black Tea, I added 1-½ cups of Demerara Sugar and ½ cup of cocoa nibs from Scharffen Berger. With the Ice Cream/Sorbet maker ready to go, I added the water mixture to the machine and hit the on button. Please make sure you let the tea get room temperature!!! What should have been an evening event turned into two days because I was too impatience to let the tea cool.

Twenty five minutes later, I had a yummy dessert. I must warn those not familiar with cocoa nibs they test nothing like chocolate chips (which is what they look like in the picture). These are definitely not sweet….they have a nutty robust flavor and are very crunchy. A cocoa nib is a roasted cacao bean separated from it’s shell and husk.

Normally, I am not a fan of cocoa nibs. But the contract of sweet and a little bitter was nice.

Making Chocolate Gelato

Inspired by an article I pulled out of Traditional Home called “Sassy Sorbet”, I decided to make some cocoa infused frozen desserts. My first attempt at a tasty frozen treat was to use my remaining white chocolate square with berries from Dylan’s Candy Bar. I grab my Trader Joe’s Organic Cocoa Powder made with criollo and trinitario cacao beans from Peru from the pantry along with the white chocolate, caster sugar and salt. Ohhh! This should be good!

I was off to the race. I used a recipe from the internet as a guide, but I added my own spin to the recipe. So, here is what I came up with…Chocolate Surprise Sorbet by Cocoa Connoisseur:

Ingredients:
1 ¼ c Caster Sugar (fine sugar)
3 1/3 c Water, Room Temperature
¼ c White Chocolate with Berries (from Dylan’s Candy Bar or something similar)
1 c Cocoa Powder
2 tsp Vanilla
Pinch Salt

Preparation:
Whisk together the Caster Sugar and Water in a bowl until sugar is dissolved. Add the Cocoa Powder, Vanilla and Salt to the sugar/water mixture until smooth.

Chop the White Chocolate with Berries into small pieces. Add the chopped White Chocolate chunks. Blend completely.

Pour the mixture into your ice cream maker’s freezer bowl. Follow your machine’s instruction book to start and operate the unit.


Personally, this stuff was delicious! My husband loved it so much he kept eating it. Then, the next day I come home from work and the sorbet is all gone!! What in the world…the man was claiming I was making him “fat” with these desserts.

If you ask me, that is a personal problem and he must have lost his mind throwing out a good batch of chocolate sorbet (I didn’t event get a picture of it yet). But in actuality, he was addicted and kept eating it. They say, “the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach”. Well, I definitely won that battle!

Oh, back to the cacao beans. Both criollo and trinitario beans are grown in tropical regions within the latitudes of 20° South and 20° North of the equator. The temperature must consistently be between 70° to 77° F for the beans to flourish. Only about 1% of criollo and 14% of the trinitario are used to make chocolate. Both beans are quite flavorful, but unfortunately, they are not used in most of the chocolate we eat today (especially here in the USA). As for criollo beans, most of the beans produced are a criollo/trinitario hybrid with 2% to 5% cacao producing trees available. So, if you’re a label readier, look for criollo and trinitario for the best beans!