Grenada Chocolate Company

The Grenada Chocolate Company is a cooperative in Grenada making organic dark chocolate from bean to bar as well as growing the cocoa in Grenada (tree-to-bar).

History

The Grenada Chocolate Company Ltd. was established in 1999 with the idea of creating an Organic Cocoa Farmers' and Chocolate-Makers' Cooperative. Its founding partners were Mott Green, Doug Browne and Edmond Brown. Two of the three founders live on the island and work cooperatively with a handful of workers, all locals. It produces high quality Organic dark chocolate in Grenada with its own cocoa beans. These are certified according to the USDA-NOP final rule by [http://www.ceres-cert.com/ CERES (Certfier of Environmental Standards) GmbH] and certified according to regulation EEC 2092/91 by CERES Gmbh. The factory is nestled in lush cocoa groves in Grenada's pristine rainforest.

Cultivation

Grenada dark chocolate reflects the complex flavor of Grenada's fine-flavored organic cocoa beans, processed in small batches [ [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/centralamericaandcaribbean/grenada/article734906.ece Telegraph article mention of "Small batches on antique machinery"] ] Grenada grows almost entirely Trinitario cocoa with a few Forasteros and has one of the strongest, richest cocoas in the world partially due to the super-rich volcanic soil here and the hot sun. Producing chocolate where the cocoa grows allows the Grenada Chocolate Company to do their own fermenting, which is unique in the chocolate industry and which permits the creation of the finest, most complex taste from the beans. Use of their own (relatively low-pressure cocoa butter press) extracted cocoa butter enables extra richness and chocolaty flavor that has been recognised with a Silver Award from [http://www.academyofchocolate.org.uk/ The Academy of Chocolate] [ [http://www.academyofchocolate.org.uk/academy/awards/2008.html Academy of Chocolate] ] .

Manufacture

The Grenada Chocolate Company has over 150 acres of organic cocoa farms in its cooperative and operate its own cocoa fermentry, located one mile from their small factory. This allows all activities involved in the production of our chocolate, from the planting and growing of the cocoa trees to the fermenting of the fresh cocoa beans to the processing of chocolate, to be local. The Grenada Chocolate Company grow their cocoa totally naturally without the use of any chemical pesticides, herbicides or fertilizers.

Products

*Organic chocolate bars
*SweetyPodsTM, organic chocolate pieces in the shape of cocoa pods
*Smilo cocoa powder (only available locally)

Ingredients

The Grenada Chocolate Company sugar is a fine organic raw sugar produced and milled by an organic growers' cooperative in Paraguy. Whole organic vanilla beans grown biodynamically in Costa Rica provide their "dash" of vanilla; organic soy lecithin is used as emulsifier in extremely small amounts. As the ingredients are so pure and simple, all chocolate is guaranteed to be free of any nuts, fruit or dairy, even in trace amounts.

Context

The Grenada Chocolate Company are one of the only small-scale chocolate-makers producing fine chocolate where the cocoa grows. Because small batch chocolate-making is very rare, they had to create their own processing methods, designing their own machines and refurbishing antique equipment to meet the requirements of their unique situation. Most of their machines are based in design on those of the early 1900's, a time when quality had precedence over quantity in chocolate-making. In an effort to care about our environment, they employ solar-electric energy to 25% power their machinery. [ [http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/feb2008/bw2008028_343441.htm BusinessWeek article "Making the World Better Through Chocolate"] ]

Objectives

The stated aims of the cooperative company is to revolutionize the cocoa-chocolate system that typically keeps cocoa production separate from chocolate-making and therefore takes advantage of cocoa farmers. The Grenada Chocolate Company claim that the cocoa farmers should benefit as much as the chocolate-makers [ [http://icnewcastle.icnetwork.co.uk/0900travel/0200holidayreveiws/tm_headline=the-laid-back-caribbean-island-of-grenada&method=full&objectid=19718474&siteid=50081-name_page.html A co-operative system is in place which ensures that the workers, from the farmer to the chocolate maker, are paid the same.] ] .

Fair Trade

According to one of the founders, it's more than procrastination that's kept them from filing the paperwork: Fair-trade chocolate companies still, almost exclusively, process the value-added product in the first world with raw materials they import from the equatorial belt where cocoa grows. In that way, even the fair-trade system perpetuates a cycle the founders of the Grenada Chocolate Co. are determined to break. "They're buying cocoa from the south part of the world to bring it to the north part of the world," Green said. "But what we're doing can effectively make sure that the people doing the work are actually part of the process." [ [http://www.salon.com/mwt/food/eat_drink/2007/06/12/grenada/index1.html Salon article] ]

References

Notes

Article based on [http://www.grenadachocolate.com/about.html] and licensed under the GFDL.

External Links

[http://www.grenadachocolate.com Grenada Chocolate Company]