Chocolate

We did a chocolate tour today, which started with a look around how chocolate is made in Costa Rica and then we made our own chocolate bars.

Me in the shop before we set off
James in the chocolate shop
There are many different types of cacao fruit
Tree with two different kinds of cacao fruit
Megan smashing open a cacao fruit
Eating the fruit

Megan says “it’s a bit weird and Mum says it was” slimy and I didn’t taste any of the things the guy said we might taste”. The guy said we might be able to taste citrus fruits or lychee or almonds or lemongrass.

Mum and Jam with our cacao fruit that we were given

(We didn’t know what to do with it afterwards as they just gave it to us and the process for making chocolate is so long).

Wasp-like insect
The inside of a fermented and dried nib vs a fresh one
Pineapples
Cacao tree flower
Demonstration of nibs being dried and fermented
James holding the melted and tempered chocolate
Megan deciding her flavours
My hands
Mum adding her chocolate flavours of ginger and cranberry
Our four bars of chocolate
The tasters and hot chocolate we were given

After the chocolate tour we went to the bakery to get some lunch where we met two little kittens.

Kitten at the bakery

Then we did some washing, packing and swam in the dark whilst it was raining (this meant it was cold so we didn’t stay in very long).