by Mark Christian | Dec 29, 2012 | The Crush Pad Editorials
At 3,500 feet Fortunato’s sits up a gem amidst the emerald canyon setting below to perfectly reflect the gentlemen farmer who bestowed his name to it. In his mid-50s, humble, generous & gallant, Sir Fortunato welcomes visitors & sets the table as if a...
by Mark Christian | Dec 29, 2012 | The Crush Pad Editorials
Buoyed by what he heard, Pearson dug into the chemistry of it all, the myriad compounds that comprise cocoa beans – not quite a sextillion, just 800+ & counting. High enough to baffle food science flavorists & thwart their desires to synthesize an artificial...
by Mark Christian | Dec 28, 2012 | The Crush Pad Editorials
Tensions spilled into the streets today with roadblocks set up by an indigenous group led by Alberto Pizango Chota. The reason for the barricades is to protest new decrees that would allow oil & mining companies to enter the territory without their consent or even...
by Mark Christian | Dec 28, 2012 | The Crush Pad Editorials
Now it was onward to transform cocoa nuts into chocolate bars. Chocolate at its most fundamental science level explains an emulsion of cocoa mass in cocoa butter, & suspension of both in sugar. Simple stuff, no? Ha… cry a river. Who better than De Vries to...
by Mark Christian | Dec 27, 2012 | The Crush Pad Editorials
In no time they met a person who makes it his business to meet everyone & know everything about life in the canyon. Every community has one of these individuals, someone who opens doors few suspect even exist. If Dan Pearson represents the deal-making,...
by Mark Christian | Dec 27, 2012 | The Crush Pad Editorials
At the speed of life his sons followed in their dad’s footsteps, & beyond, trailing him to South America… & marrying Peruvian women. Hot-blooded Americans brothers hooking up with Latina chicas. After checking out the country on a Spanish language...
by Mark Christian | Dec 27, 2012 | The Crush Pad Editorials
In 2008, Pearson spirited some coarsely fermented beans out of Peru & brought them back to California. Everyday before this gym rat works out, he’d pop a couple in his mouth as a sort of natural PED (Performance Enhancing Drug). More than a food, less than a drug,...
by Mark Christian | Dec 26, 2012 | The Crush Pad Editorials
Dan Pearson grew up in the Midwest, far from any cacaó trees. His backyard had a few Dutch elms & some lawn grass. Now an investment banker living in San Diego where cement painted green takes the place of sod, he puts together deals & falls in love with the...
by Mark Christian | Dec 26, 2012 | The Crush Pad Editorials
That’s just a taste of the official science. The informal reality is ever more convoluted. Other than Criollo, cacáo is generally promiscuous, with so much cross-pollination, hybridization, mutation, & recombination that it’s rare & increasingly difficult to...
by Mark Christian | Dec 24, 2012 | The Crush Pad Editorials
Prospects are so frightening & staggering that Big Candy has no clue what they’re really chasing other than to desperately keep the current system of huge yields & cheap candy going – their definition of ‘sustainability’. They might only have to venture as far...
