Willy Wonka would love this laboratory that checks the quality of chocolate

"Simonis places a morsel on his tongue and then breathes in through his mouth and out through his nose to heighten his perception of the chocolate's aroma and taste. A look of reverence comes over him. "My god," he whispers. "Each time I taste this, I'm always amazed. You have a boost of acidity. This burst of fresh flavors." Simonis detects a fruitiness and a hint of cardamom and nutmeg."

"When he does the same thing with a bit of chocolate produced from cacao harvested on a Peruvian farm, he describes a flavor of raisins that gives way to a nuttiness. "It's extremely creamy," Simonis says. Every cacao is different. "Cacao has an incredible amount of genetic variety," says Simonis. But for a long time, there wasn't a standard way of comparing the dizzying array of beans produced on farms across the tropics."

"This is unlike wine with its sommeliers or coffee with its Q graders people who taste and systematically compare and rate those products using an internationally agreed-upon rubric. But there were those in the chocolate biz who wanted to raise the bar. And so, in 2009, the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT, a sustainable agriculture nonprofit headquartered in Rome, started a program called Cacao of Excellence."

"And they asked Simonis a chocolate scientist who now serves as program manager to help them develop a standardized way of preparing and evaluating cacao. "It's been revised, it's been adapted, it"

A chocolate scientist slices cacao beans and evaluates their aroma and flavor to characterize quality. He tastes chocolate from cacao grown in Hawaii by breaking the bar, unwrapping it, sampling it, and breathing in and out through his mouth and nose to intensify aroma perception. He identifies specific flavor notes such as acidity, fruitiness, and hints of cardamom and nutmeg. He compares this with chocolate from Peruvian cacao, describing raisin-like flavors followed by nuttiness and a creamy texture. Cacao’s genetic diversity makes each bean distinct, and a lack of standardized comparison methods previously limited systematic evaluation. A program called Cacao of Excellence was created to develop and refine a standardized preparation and assessment approach.

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