Why We Choose Cacao Nacional —And Why You’ll Love It
“Cacao is naturally a sustainable plant, it thrives in a biodiverse ecosystem while supporting animals in its surrounding,” Anne Zaczek, Heirloom Preservation Fund’s Executive Director.
We pride ourselves in producing craft chocolate from bean to bar made exclusively with Cacao Nacional from Ecuador. We choose to work with Cacao Nacional for the following reasons we believe are important for you to know when purchasing our chocolate.
Fine aroma cacao that is rare and unique
Cacao Nacional belongs to a very small percentage (roughly 12%) of the world’s cocoa that is considered “fine aroma.” Cacao can fall under this category when it presents a complex flavour profile, ranging from floral and fruity to nut, wood, and herbal. There are many cacao varieties, but they generally split up into three overarching types: Criollo, Trinitario and Forastero. Fine aroma cacao generally grows from Criollo and Trinitario cacao trees in Latin American countries like Mexico, Ecuador, Brazil and Venezuela. The majority is considered “bulk” cacao and generally grows from Forastero trees in Western Africa. Forastero trees are favored for their high yield and disease resistance, but their flavor profile is known for being flat and monotone. Cacao Nacional is an exception here. It’s considered a Forastero variety, but its unique beans have historically been esteemed as “pepitas de oro” (seeds of gold) for having a wide range of unique and complex flavors.
“Cacao nacional is known to be the best in flavour worldwide,” says Emily Meza-Wilson, the CEO of Mindo Chocolate Makers. “In the same batch of cacao beans we receive, we can experience a variety of flavors, like green apple, coffee, caramel, banana, vanilla. They also present a long flavour profile, so it’s not only one note and then turns off. The flavor evolution can last up to twenty minutes in your mouth.”
Today, Ecuador’s pepitas de oro are responsible for sixty five percent of the world’s total production of fine aroma cacao. What makes Cacao Nacional’s flavor so rare and unique? This is still being studied, but there is a general understanding that it’s a result of distinctive genetics, farming practices, and environmental factors that occur almost exclusively in Ecuador’s lowlands.
Heirloom: Ancient Genetics
Bottle with double effigy belonging to the Mayo-Chinchipe Marañon civilization. Traces of cacao, specifically Cacao Nacional, were found here, making them the first people in human history to ever domesticate cacao. Credit: Open Edition Books.
What makes Cacao Nacional in part so exceptional is that they are considered “Heirloom” cocoa beans. There are many definitions for this term but when the Heirloom Preservation Fund (HPF), a nonprofit focused on safeguarding fine cocoa, runs their tests to consider whether a cacao is heirloom-worthy they look at fine flavor and genetic ancestry.
Cacao Nacional’s ancestral lineage can be traced back to over 5500 years ago. Following the latest archaeological findings, the Mayo-Chinchipe Marañon civilization settled in the south of Ecuador’s upper Amazon, were the first people in ever domesticating cacao, specifically Cacao Nacional. It’s presumed that Indigenous ancestors specifically handpicked and generationally-passed down Cacao Nacional over other cacao varieties from the wild because of its fine flavor. When HPF runs their lab tests on Cacao Nacional beans, they are able to detect the genetic component that’s responsible for this unique flavor in its DNA.
Thanks to this ancestral heritage, Ecuador enjoyed global prestige for the exclusive fine flavor of its Cacao Nacional over much of the nineteenth century. The industry plummeted and collapsed however, when plagues and diseases known as Witch’s Broom and Monilla destroyed most of the country’s cacao plantations in the 1920s. To uplift the country’s cacao industry, foreign cacao varieties like Trinitario were introduced and subsequently hybridized with the few Nacional trees that survived.
A new variety was introduced in the 1970s that could resist the plague and along the way, have a higher yield. This paved the way for the rise of CCN-51 cacao, named after Ecuadorian scientist Homero Castro who succeeded at creating a clone from Nacional trees with several other cacao varieties, after his 51st attempt.
For a long time, 100 percent pure Cacao Nacional was believed to be extinct. This was until 2009, when attempts to find ancient Nacional were made by Ecuador’s National Institute of Agricultural Research (INIAP). They collected a sample of 11.000 cacao trees throughout Ecuador and found only six of them were 100 percent pure Nacional.
Efforts to rescue the ancient cacao variety have been spearheaded by Third Millenium Alliance (TMA), a conservation organization with a reserve in Ecuador’s Pacific Coast. They have succeeded at creating and planting nearly two hundred clones of ancient trees in their reserve to ensure the ongoing survival of pure Cacao Nacional.
The ancient cacao variety with 100 percent pure DNA continues to be rare, so most of today’s Cacao Nacional in Ecuador is a hybrid form with Trinitario cacao.
“We focus on Nacional not only because it produces chocolate with incredible flavour, but also because it’s at risk of extinction,” says Meza-Wilson, “we purposely encourage people to grow them, so that we can also conserve the variety.”
Small-scale Farming
Efforts to rescue Cacao Nacional not only come with saving an ancestral and flavor-rich cacao, but also with sustainability.
It is estimated that some 180 000 people in Ecuador are cacao producers, with 85 percent being small-scale farmers. Over 90 percent of farms that grow Cacao Nacional use small-scale agroforestry systems that have traditionally been passed down from one generation to another. Since Nacional requires shade to grow, they are often planted alongside banana, citrus, guava, and timber trees for shade besides other crops like corn and rice, as well as livestock.
As a side effect, these areas become homes to local species of amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals. This sustainable farming method, following scientific research, has proven to nurture soil life, restore habitats, improve air and water quality, absorb carbon, and conserve biodiversity.
But given Cacao Nacional’s low yield and its vulnerability to plagues like Witch’s Broom and Monilla, many farmers have flocked to cultivating CCN-51 cacao. It grows well in direct sun, is more disease resistant, and yields three to four times more than Nacional. Since the commercial chocolate industry doesn’t pay significantly more for Cacao Nacional beans, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that CCN-51 cacao now takes up nearly 90 percent of total cacao production in Ecuador.
“Cacao is naturally a sustainable plant, it thrives in a biodiverse ecosystem while supporting animals in its surrounding,” Anne Zaczek, Heirloom Preservation Fund’s Executive Director, tells us. “But you make it a non-sustainable crop when you implement a CCN-51 variety that grows in monoculture farms.”
As CCN-51 gains more popularity–it now takes up 75 percent of cultivated land surface–there is serious concern over its environmental impact given its reliance on monoculture farming and the use of synthetic fertilizers as well as pesticides.
One recent study focused on the environmental impact of agrochemicals used in the cultivation of CCN-51 in Ecuador’s Pacific Coast shows serious water contamination, soil degradation, air pollution, and a decrease in local fauna.
Anne Zaczek points at what is happening in countries like Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana, which are responsible for 70 percent of global cacao production. There nearly 40 percent and 14 percent of original forest has been lost respectively since the early 2000s as a result of industrial cacao farming that promotes monoculture. This has been linked to dire consequences like biodiversity loss, local and global climate impacts, as well as endangering food security and livelihoods. Both of these countries currently struggle with a severe drought crisis that has put the global chocolate supply in peril and has heightened pressure on Latin American countries to produce more cacao.
“If you plant only CCN-51 type cacao, what you see happening now in West Africa is what eventually will happen in South America too,” Zaczek says. “We are now in crisis mode, it’s a rollercoaster. That’s why we emphasise on the role consumers have on sustainability. I see more people are paying attention and are becoming conscious consumers. There’s an opportunity there for the fine chocolate industry to take advantage of, so that greenwashing doesn’t happen.”
Post Harvest Practices
Besides the serious negative environmental impact of growing CCN-51, what sets Cacao Nacional apart is flavor. A huge factor in assuring flavor complexity is what happens after harvesting the cacao.
“I would say 50 percent of what influences flavor is genetics, they are the core component in what the flavor possibility is, and Cacao Nacional has optimal flavor possibility,” says Zaczek. “If the genetics show what is possible, the second part of the process requires the information and know-how to meet that possibility, including the chocolate maker’s capacity to turn it into good chocolate,” she adds.
“That’s why chocolate made with CCN-51 can taste good, not because of genetics, but because of the post-harvest process that compensates for the lack of genetics.”
The first step in harnessing the potential of refined flavor in the post-harvest practices is fermentation.
Post-Harvest practices are key to optimizing the flavor potential that is present in Cacao Nacional. Step one: fermentation.
When harvested, cacao beans are wrapped with a white, sweet and fruity pulp. This pulp is in part responsible for inducing the fermentation process. “It works like anything you ferment,” says Emily Meza-Wilson, “think sourdough bread for instance. You have a lot of bacteria in there that affects flavor. When you play around with temperatures, this could make your chocolate more creamy or more fruity.”
Once the beans are cast in a large wooden container, microorganisms start to decay the fruit pulp. This leads to the formation of organic acids and causes a temperature increase that assures the death of the embryo. The chocolate flavor begins here as the bitterness and astringency of cacao goes down.
“Compounds inside cacao beans prior to fermentation contain bitter and astringent compounds,” says Meza-Wilson. “In the fermentation process, these are reduced significantly by the chemical reactions during fermentation which allows for the expression of a wide array of complex flavors.”
The fermentation process can generally take four to five days. But this can vary. “You can’t use one standard process with cacao because every step can take more or less time depending on the batch,” says the CEO of Mindo Chocolate Makers. “It can depend on size, so if the beans are larger it will take more time, but it can also depend on other factors like temperature and humidity.”
Once properly fermented, the beans are sun-dried in raised beds for as long as two weeks, depending on the weather. This step helps to preserve the fermentation flavors and is essential to prevent mold and bacteria growth, making it safe for storage and further processing.
Step 2: Sun drying in covered lifted-beds to avoid any contamination.
Mindo Chocolate Makers focuses on direct trade in order to ensure not only that the fermentation process is done correctly, but also that the cacao beans aren’t dried on the side of the road, or using machinery. This can contaminate cacao beans with lead from gasoline, or infuse the flavor with gas when heated up with machines, according to Meza-Wilson.
“Cacao isn’t meant for a conveyor belt factory style system,“ says Meza-Wilson, “It’s all about the care and time you put into every step.”
Sol Miranda is a writer based in Quito, Ecuador. Their work has also appeared in Al Jazeera, Remezcla, TeleSur English, Open Democracy, and others. You can reach them at b.solmirandx@gmail.com