Bolivia - Wild Harvest Three Tribes 2024 Direct Trade

Origin:  Bolivia

Region: Wild Harvest

Crop: 2024

Type: Heirloom Baures (Iténez), Tacana (Rio Beni) and Moxetenes Alto Beni.

Certs: Direct Trade

Flavor Notes:

Here we go with another mighty giant.  These wild collected beans beans are tiny and pack an incredible chocolate punch.  Why?  The average cocoa bean is 90-110 beans/100 grams.  These average 145-155 beans/100 grams.  What comes with that small size is a distinct density and concentration of flavor. 

The aroma bold chocolate and sweet, rich dried brown fruits.  Just the smell had my mouth watering. 

There is no mistaking the punch of chocolate as soon as you take a bite. I associate that strong and bold presence  with most wild harvested beans, regardless of origin.  There is a really nice soft tang that I almost hesitate to call acidity .  In the roast there was browned butter wafting off and it comes through just a little in the flavor.  It is coupled with a light brown sugar clarity and dried cherry.  Oh, and more chocolate.  It puts me in mind of a gooey, dense fudge cake. 

Once you start to savor the chocolate and roll it around in your mouth you will note a moderate backbone of bitterness and a virtually perfectly balanced astringency. The bitterness puts me in mind of certain coffees and where it doesn't really taste like coffee, it kind of has the synergy of a mocha.

The finish is long and has layers of cherry jam and some undefinable darkness that I almost want to call earthiness but not really. 

 PRODUCER / COLLECTORS: This is a on site combination of three different collection points, hence Three Tribes.  They are all in and around the Tranquilidad Natural Forest Estate of around 600 hectares is owned by Volker Lehmann and his family, as private enterprise. In over 15 years Volker Lehmann increased the Wild Harvest activities all over the Beni department on areas of the size of Germany, involving hundreds of mainly indigenous families and dozens of organizations.  In this lot neighboring collection areas of the villages of Huacaraje and Baures.  All cacao is fermented and sun dried at Tranquilidad fermentation and drying facility.

HARVEST & PEOPLE:

Harvest time in Tranquilidad is once a year between mid December to mid February. It could vary regarding the appearance of the rainy season starting in October and ending around end of May. The amount to harvest per tree varies also from year to year. In general the amount per tree is small as well as the pods and the beans, which are half the size of cultivated cacaos varieties. The cacao trees grow tall in its natural habitat and can reach 8 – 10 meters. People harvest the lower trunk by hand and use long sticks with a wire sling to get to the fruits in the upper parts. Sometimes they climb into the tree when there are many fruits, or they get eaten by monkeys and birds.

The people like to come early in the morning, when mosquitoes are still less active, to collect in small groups or by family and make piles of pods. After 2-3 hours they sit at the piles and open the pods placing the fresh beans in bags. Once full the bags hang on poles to collect the dripping juice that people love to drink right there and to sell some in the villages. After that, between noon and early afternoon, they bring the bags by foot or on bikes to the harvest center, where they  are weighed and payed directly by weight and quality. The price is generally agreed at the start of the harvest and varies if there are more or less to pick. People are free to sell to the best offer or take home.

The beans go then straight into special designed wooden fermentation boxes. The post harvest protocol was developed in 2003 and is mainly adapted to the size of the beans including slow sun drying.

The first thing you should do is read my Ask the Alchemist 239 where I discuss roasting smaller beans. 

Drum Roasting

The drum roasting profile I used for the evaluation sample was 14:30/16:55/20:45 @ 256 F.  After that, you can treat this bean pretty aggressively as there is tons of chocolate and fruit.  That means 0/8/6  F/min is just fine.  You want to pay attention to the aroma and reduce the speed of the roast (the slope) if you smell it trying to be acrid.  You will also stop the roast a little sooner than you might normally since the bean is smaller.  EOR 252-258 F seems to work well where a normal sized bean of this character would be 258-264 F. Likewise, you don't need a full 5 minutes in the Finishing phase.  This one was just shy of 4 minutes and there would be no harm making it shorter.

Behmor Roaster

Roast 2 lb and use P1 on the one pound setting, for 19-20 minutes or until you hear a pop or two.  Then take it longer.  2-3 minutes.  It is virtually impossible to over roast in the Behmor with 2 lb in there.  If you are using the current model with Manual control, turning down the power to P4 (75% power) when it starts to become aromatic (or smells sharp) is a nice way to keep the EOR tempering in check. This is all of course if you don't have a thermocouple in the beans (Modifying your Behmor) If you have that you can follow the profiles above.

Oven Roasting

You will need an IR thermometer.  Roast 2 lb of beans.  Preheat your over to 325 F.  Put the cocoa beans in a single layer on a baking sheet and into the oven. Stir the beans at 5 minutes and check the temperature.  Continue roasting until the surface temperature reads 205-215 F (it may well vary across the beans).  At that point, turn your oven down 15-20 F above your target EOR, in this case 255 + ~20 = 275 and continue to roast, stirring every 5 minutes until approximately 255-260 F.  Again, there will be variation but the beauty of this method is having turned the oven down it is difficult to over roast.  The important part here is to get good momentum going in a hot oven and then basically coasting to finish.  You may not get much chocolate or brownie aroma with this one.