Cacao pods are harvested. The beans whit their surrounding pulp are removed from the pods and placed in piles or bins, allowing access to microorganisms so that fermentation of the pectin-containing material can begin. The fermentation process produces several flavor precursors.
After fermentation, the beans must be quickly dried to prevent mold growth.
Processing
The dried beans are then transported to a chocolate manufacturing facility. The beans are cleaned, roasted, abnd graded. Next, the shell of each bean is removed to extract the nib. Finally, the nibs are ground and liquefied, resulting in pure chocolate in fluid form: chocolate liquor. The liquor can be further processed into two components: cocoa solids and cocoa butter.
Blending and refining
Chocolate liquor is blended with the cocoa butter in varying quantities to make different types of chocolate of couvertures. The basic blends of ingredients for the varicus types of chocolate (in order of highest quantity of cocoa liquor first). We can make thousands of different flavors according to the proportions of cocoa butter and cocoa solid (and add other flavorings).
Tempering
The final process is called tempering. The characteristic crunch and delicate glow of good chocolate is due to the crystalline structure of cocoa butter. The manipulation of these forms is the process of tempering. The primary purpose of tempering is to assure that only the best form is present. The uncontrolled crystalization of cocoa butter typically results in crystals of varying size, some or all large enough to be clearly seen whit naked eye. This causes the surface of the chocolate to appear mottled and matte, and causes the chocolate to crumble rather than snap when broken. The uniform sheen and crisp bite of properly processed chocolate are the result of sonsistently small cocoa butter crystals produced by the tempering process. The fats in cocoa butter can crystallinze in six different forms (polymorphous crystallization).
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