What happens when you add real cacao to coffee?

Quillabamba2019 — how I found it

I found it by accident.

In 2019 I left California with no real plan and ended up in the high jungle of Peru. That’s where I met my wife. She’s Quechua, from a small mountain town.

The first time she made cacao for me, she didn’t make hot chocolate. She took a kitchen cleaver to a rough block, knocked a piece off, and dropped it into what I was already drinking.

I’ll be honest, I didn’t expect much. I watched the coffee turn from brown-black into something deeper and rounder, and I could smell chocolate before I tasted anything. Then I took a sip… and the sharp edge I’d always just put up with had softened. Not covered up. Not sweetened over. Just rounded off.

I’ve had it that way most mornings since.

La Convenciónthe cacao itself

We lived in Quillabamba for a while, and after we married we moved to Cusco. That’s when my friend Alex, whose family has been in La Convención for generations, pointed me to this cacao. It’s called Chuncho, the old native cacao of that valley.

Chuncho has small pods, low yields, and a flavor commodity cacao doesn’t reproduce. Commodity varieties replaced it almost everywhere because they’re easier to farm. Chuncho survived in La Convención mostly because the valley is hard to get to.

I tested a sample against others in hot water. Most took four or five minutes and stayed grainy. This one melted.

Cuscohow we label and ship it

So we started. After a customer-service shift, I’d ride a bus for an hour and a half to pick up cacao sent up from the jungle. We had labels printed locally, and my wife cut each one and put it on by hand.

We still do it that way. My wife and I do this in the evenings and on weekends, with help from her family.

We make about two hundred bars at a time, labeled by hand in the evenings. When a batch runs out, the next one ships once it comes up from Cusco, which takes a week or two.

The labwhat we can and can’t tell you

We also sent samples to third-party labs in Cusco and Lima. Cacao draws from its soil, and depending on where it’s grown, that can include heavy metals. It’s a real, documented issue that most brands would rather not bring up. Nobody required us to test. We did it because “trust us, it’s clean” isn’t an answer.

A few honest things

• It isn’t sweet. There’s no added sugar in it at all. If you’re expecting a candy bar, this isn’t that.
• You can’t taste it before you buy it. I can’t hand you a sample through a screen.
• Not every batch is lab tested. The numbers on this page are from our most recent test.

So I’ll take the risk instead of asking you to. Not for you? 30-day satisfaction guarantee: send back what’s left and we’ll refund you once it arrives back with us. Damaged or wrong order? Tell us within 7 days and we make it right, no return needed. Just call or email me.

Try it this week. If it isn’t for you, you’re out nothing.

My phone number and email are printed on the back of every bar. There’s no support desk. If you call, you’re talking to me. One man read the whole letter, then called me and ordered six packs.

What we’re buildingand where you’d come in

We’re at the very beginning of this. It’s a family business in Cusco — my wife and me, with help from her family — about two hundred bars at a time, labeled on a couch.

What I hope for is simple. That this grows enough to support our family here, and to make sure the people who grow it in La Convención are paid well for it. I can’t promise you where it ends up. I can tell you who is doing the work, and what we’re trying to build.

If you order now, you’re one of the first people in on it. Thanks for giving us a shot.

Austin New Incan Empire · Cusco, Peru