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This afternoon we took a chocolate workshop at ChocoMuseo in Antigua, Guatemala. ChocoMuseo offers several workshops. We chose to do their most popular one: from the Cacao Bean to the Chocolate Bar.
The workshop began with a lively lesson explaining the fermentation and drying of cacao beans, as well as the history of chocolate and its proliferation across the world.
Taking up where the history lesson left off, we took pre-fermented and dried cacao beans and roasted them for 15 minutes until blackened all over. We peeled the skins of the cacao beans (gently tapping them to help), and separated the skins from the beans they contain.
With the roasted skins we made a potent infused chocolate tea. We then used the beans to make two chocolate drinks, a traditional Mayan hot chocolate and a later Spanish adaptation.
We then learned about the process of converting cacao into chocolate, including smoothing and tempering the chocolate. We were then given pre-tempered chocolate and moulds and allowed to create our own chocolates any dress them with a wide range of toppings (everything from coffee beans to chilli powder to hundreds and thousands).
The workshop was great fun, very informative and very, very tasty.
The post Chocolate Mayan-Style at ChocoMuseo, Antigua appeared first on Calcatraz Blog.
