The Chocolate-Making Process

To start the process of making chocolate you must first harvest the cacao pods. These pods grow all over the tree, so to get them down you must chop them down with machetes by hand. But you can't just ship the pods out as-is from the tree. You must first split them open. This reveals the cocoa bean that lies inside.

After that, you must scrape at the beans and the sweet pulp that surrounds them. From there the pods are left to ferment for approximately two to eight days in baskets. This important step helps to mellow out the flavor of the beans. If you didn't do that, they would be far too bitter to enjoy.