harvesting & fermenting cacao in Adjuntas, Puerto Rico

this was originally published on April 13, 2021

i spent a week on Sandra's Farm in Adjuntas, Puerto Rico. This is mostly a coffee and orange farm, but they have a strong cacao presence too- making delicious chocolate covered coffee beans and turmeric black pepper chocolate. Israel and Sandra - who own the farm- are absolutely inspiring. Israel is Puerto Rican Cuban, looks exactly like my dad (like we even have the same nose which i love), is 83 yrs old, and climbed a tree in front of me. honestly my jaw dropped. i hope to move like him when im 83. (disclosure i can barely climb a tree at 33). Sandra Farms, like most farms in PR, was devastated by hurricane maria. (sidebar. the word hurricane derives from the Taíno word huracan; storm.) most farms lost 80% of their crop and for the farms that work with trees, it's an even slower process coming back since tree's take a longer time to establish themselves and some more time before they mature into production mode.

my cacao cracking view

Israel taught me how to harvest cacao- you must saw/clip as close to the cacao pod as possible because the tree can keep producing fruit on the same branch. i not only harvested on his farm, but a few others. his crops were devastated and we went to other local farms to buy their cacao pods. cacao pods go for around 25 cents. harvesting cacao is not easy. i was covered in biting ants, it was dirty, hot, and hard (esp if the tree was taller than 7ft). thats step one.

step two is the fermentation of the cacao. the smell of the cacao fermentation space was a mixture of sweetness and decomposition. it wasn't off putting by any means, but a smell i won't forget. there were four of us cracking open cacao pods. you can't use a knife because you don't want to injure the cacao beans. as you continue to crack them open, you use your hands to scoop out the slimy (but v tasty) beans, so it gets harder to crack open the pods because your hands are now slimy. (i could barely move my arms the next day.) you cant dump all the beans into the fermentation box, you want the beans evenly layered and disconnected from the connective tissue/spine. this was a messy job. but also fun- the view overlooked a cloud rainforest and sucking on the pulpy beans (and yes spitting it out into the fermentation bin hehe) as it gets harder to crack open the pods due to the slime is a delicious treat. like it tastes so good. def understand why cacao is considered the food of the gods.

the spine of the cacao

what i call cacao hands- juicy fingers dirty palms

once we got all the pulp covered beans into the fermentation box we clipped a few banana leafs and laid them on top, finishing with a burlap sack top layer. the beans are covered to make sure the temperature rises to about 110 degrees F for fermentation. let the pulp and beans sit for 24 hours, rotate the beans so the ones on the bottom are now on top. the fermentation can take anywhere between 3-7 days, the pulp or mucilage will melt away, and then comes the roasting stage. sadly i didn't get to participate in the roasting stage. guess i'll have to go back :)

cacao beans in the fermentation box

the empty pods