Cacao

A PCV who lives just outside of El Seibo is developing a Chocolate Tour or Tour de Cacao.  We had the opportunity to test our her tour yesterday and it was amazing!  We started our morning at the Bloque de Cacao, which is an association of cacao farmers.  The farmers deliver their cacao to this fermentation and packaging center where the product is laid out to ferment in these greenhouses, or artificially dried in tumblers.  After being dried and sorted, the cacao is packaged in large sacks and is ready to be shipped.  I heard some of their chocolate is sold to Cadbury!

From the Bloque de Cacao, we took a big flat bed truck to a cacao farm outside of the city.  The volunteer lives right across the road from a field full of cacao and banana trees.  We saw the whole process from sprouting seeds, planting, and a mature tree (3 years old).  They cut open a pod with a machete, naturally, and you can suck on the seeds.  It was like a slimy sweet tart.  I didn't like the texture, but some people loved it.

After seeing the trees, we pounded dried and toasted cacao beans into a paste and then form it into balls.  These balls are then dry for two day.  Once dry, they grate it and make a mixture with hot water or milk and sugar.  It made delicious hot chocolate.

I was pretty tired and hungry by now.  We traveled up to the site where we'd eat lunch.  It was incredible.  There was various thatched huts, a gift shop and hammocks!  Before eating a delicious lunch we tried chocolate wine!  It was surprisingly good.

When we finished our whirlwind tour, Laura, Sarah, and I gave a presentation in a marginalized neighborhood about gender discrimination.  It was interesting to talk to this group of women and men about gender and how difficult it is for many of these single mother's to provide for their families.  I look forward to working with a women's group in my site and helping them in some way, though literacy classes, charlas on health or teaching new skills.