How TBIF's Dark Chocolate Is Made: Cacao and Jaggery

Chocolate-making starts with cacao beans, which go through several steps — fermenting, drying, roasting, and grinding — before becoming the chocolate found on shelves. Here's how that process works, and how jaggery fits in as a sweetener.

From Bean to Chocolate

Cacao pods are harvested and the beans inside are fermented for several days, which develops flavour, then dried, roasted, and ground into a thick paste called cacao liquor — the base for chocolate.

Single-Origin Sourcing

“Single origin” refers to cacao sourced from one specific growing region rather than a blend of beans from multiple sources, which can give a more distinct, traceable flavour profile.

Sweetening with Jaggery

Rather than refined sugar, this chocolate is sweetened with jaggery, an unrefined sweetener made from boiled-down sugarcane juice, which brings its own caramel-like flavour into the finished chocolate.

Handmade, Small-Batch Production

Small-batch chocolate-making allows more manual control over each stage of the process compared to large-scale industrial production.

FAQs

Q1. What does “single origin” mean for chocolate?

It means the cacao beans come from one specific growing region, rather than being blended from multiple sources.

Q2. Why is jaggery used instead of refined sugar in this chocolate?

Jaggery is an unrefined sweetener made from sugarcane juice, and it brings its own caramel-like flavour to the finished chocolate.

Q3. What happens to cacao beans before they become chocolate?

They're fermented, dried, roasted, and ground into a paste (cacao liquor), which forms the base of chocolate production.