Eating chocolate is one thing, making it is something quite different. Alexis, our housekeeper knows the basics of making chocolate from scratch. Her mother lives in an agricultural pueblo where cocoa grows. She brought some cocoa pods and beans to Cartagena for us. So, Irmtraud and Alexis went to work making chocolate from scratch, refining the recipe details along the way.

The process starts with the raw beans. They have to be roasted and subsequently be peeled. The peeled beans then are ground. That is the most dificult part of the procedure. Without special equipment is near impossible to grind the beans fine enough for a truly smooth finish. The resulting chocolate liquor is rather bitter. Adding powdered sugar, powdered milk, vanilla, pepper, butter, and almonds did the trick of creating a more appealing flavor. Due to the imperfect grinding with ordinary kitchen equipment, the consistency of the final "product" is rather gritty, but it does taste like chocolate.

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