Palos Blancos

Bolivia

The Palos Blancos bar uses certified-organic beans from Palos Blancos in the Alto Beni region of Bolivia. The flavor of this bar is earthy and creamy, and about midway through, tastes just like a brownie. There are some very subtle fruit flavors as well. Despite having a robust chocolate flavor, there is virtually no bitterness, and only a slight amount of astringency in the finish.

Story

“The Alto Beni Cacao Company is committed to revolutionizing the Bolivian cacao industry. We do this by sustainably increasing production levels of high-quality varietals of Bolivian cacao, introducing industry-leading quality control and management techniques to Bolivia for the first time, and by directly connecting cacao producing communities in the Alto Beni region to chocolate makers and other global buyers of specialty cacao.

Alto Beni Cacao Company is a partnership between Industrias Valverde S.A. (Invalsa) a Bolivian exporter of specialty coffee and other commodities, and Taza Chocolate, a leading craft chocolatemaker based in Somerville, MA.

Our partnership began in 2010 when Taza Chocolate Founder and Managing Director Alex Whitmore first visited Invalsa Executive Vice President Jorge Valverde in Bolivia to investigate the promising, though un-developed, industry in what is still regarded as an 'exotic' origin for cacao. With Invalsa acting as the Bolivian exporter, the first purchase of 2.6 tons of cacao from the Centro Integral Agroecological de Alto Beni (CIAAB), a cooperative of ~500 smallholder growers of cacao in the Palos Blancos region, was shipped in September 2010.”