Try our new Ecuador single estate hot chocolate flakes
The perfect winter warmer and oh so comforting, hot chocolate is the ultimate hot drink (we may be a little biased!). But when you drink a hot chocolate, do you know what is in it and where the chocolate is from?
At Chococo, we are passionate about single origin hot chocolates. Flaked by us in our Dorset kitchen, our hot chocolates are all made from fine chocolates produced using sustainable, ethically sourced cocoa and nothing else - no powders, added sugars or weird ingredients.
We are also passionate about supporting companies making making chocolate from cocoa bean in their country of origin where possible. Making chocolate at source is known as Raisetrade as making a value added product at source using local skilled labour & local ingredients (cane sugar as well as the cocoa beans), significantly raises the value of the trade for that country vs exporting a commodity product (dried cocoa beans), which is the old trade model if you like.
We already offer 70% Madagascar hot chocolate flakes, which won a 2 star Gold in the 2021 Great Taste Awards, made with chocolate produced by Raisetrade producer Chocolaterie Robert in Madagascar from fine cocoa beans grown the Sambirano region, a 45% milk chocolate made with flakes of our bespoke house milk chocolate made with 100% sustainably sourced cocoa from the Sur del Lago region of Venezuela (which is also supporting the Cocoa Horizons foundation) and an 80% single origin hot dark chocolate flakes made from cocoa beans grown in the Bundibugyo region of Uganda.
This year, we are very excited to take our Raisetrade single origin hot chocolate a step further - SINGLE ESTATE!
Our NEW single estate hot chocolate is a result of our first Direct Trade partnership with a wonderful small family chocolate maker in Ecuador called Martinetti Cocoa.
Our 72% single estate dark chocolate is made exclusively for us by Jonathan Martinetti & his team at Martinetti Cocoa who are making chocolate in their country of origin, in the heart of the cocoa-growing region of Los Rios, in Ecuador. Martinetti Cocoa buys the single origin heritage arriba cocoa beans to make our chocolate at a premium price from one cocoa farm with whom they have built a long term partnership - Hacienda Zoilita.
As well as their 100% sugar-free chocolate which we have been flaking for hot chocolate since 2021 (& which also won a Gold Great Taste Award in 2021), this new 72% chocolate has flavour notes of raisin, earth and hints of mellow coffee. Martinetti process the beans to make a fine chocolate couverture that is bespoke to us, before directly shipping it to us in Dorset - no middlemen and complete transparency! It was very exciting for us to open the container in Dorset which had been loaded at the Martinetti factory in Quevado several weeks before!
To celebrate our new single estate hot chocolate flakes we are offering 10% off the normal price through February, so you can try these pure chocolate flakes for just £9! The perfect and most sustainable way to warm up this winter.
By the way, in case you are wondering, as dark chocolate is naturally vegan-friendly, these 72% flakes as well as our 70%, 80% & 100% flakes will all make a vegan-friendly hot chocolate if you make your drink with any plant milk. Happy days indeed!