Organic Goodness: Chocolate & Kava

Aloha!

I recently discovered an interesting candy maker, specifically a chocolatier – someone whose professional focus is making handmade, specialty chocolate; Would that make me a “Kavatier” then? Hehe!

What caught my eye about this particular chocolatier from Idaho (a state located in the northern Rocky Mountain region of the mainland), is that she developed a chocolate made with kava – in Idaho of all places!

This chocolatier was inspired to make kava chocolate by a client who owned a kava hut in Hawaii that commissioned her to brew up an original recipe of kava-flavored chocolate. Her customer sent her the kava, then she started her experiment by tempering the chocolate, slowly and methodically mixing in natural oils and coconut by hand, and then she did the same with the kava.

She discussed her process of developing new chocolate flavors or formulations, and how challenging it was to balance out the taste of the bitter kava, using various natural ingredients. This kava experiment inspired her to develop an organic line of chocolate, where she started mixing flavors together to see what they’d end up like. I love this imaginative approach to one’s work.

When asked what it takes to be a chocolatier, she answered with one word: “patience.” Patience is also required in growing our kava, since on our farm we only use organic farming methods that may not be as fast as the more “modern” methods of farming. However, we here on the farm believe that taking the extra time to protect our natural resources by using all-natural fertilizer and other natural, “old-fashioned”  farming methods does not strip the soil of its nutrients, like other, mass-producing types of farming do.

Just as chocolate is not as easy to work with as one would think, the same goes for kava. The tempering process with chocolate aligns its crystals. They heat it, then cool it, then heat it up again. With growing kava, we constantly rotate our crops, ensuring that the roots never degrade in quality from over-farming the soil. Some parts of our farm may sit dormant for years in order to regenerate the earth, prepping it for the prime conditions needed for our organic kava kava to grow at its optimum.

Did you know that we here at Kona Kava Farm sell our own line of organic vegan chocolate? Not only is our chocolate healthy and vegan, it’s the best tasting chocolate I have ever eaten. Our completely organic, vegan chocolate is made exclusively with dark chocolate cacao beans, naturally dehydrated cane juice, soy lecithin, and is enhanced with the all-natural dietary supplement stevia, a non-caloric herb native to Paraguay which has been used as a flavor enhancer in sweet treats for centuries.

Our chocolate is formed just like chocolate chips, so it can be used in recipes, blended with kava drinks, or eaten right out of the bag. So delicious, I have to keep an eye on our stock so that my employees don’t eat us out of our entire inventory!!!

There is no doubt that chocolate does indeed have healing properties. Scientific studies have proven that chocolate contains antioxidants such as polyphenols, which have been shown to protect against heart disease, and that it contains four times the amount of catechins (a polyphenol) as tea. Chocolate also contains caffeine, theobromine, phenylethylamine, magnesium and anandamides (fatty-acid type substances).

You should check out our organic vegan chocolate at our very own chocolate shop within our online store or find out much more about vegan chocolate by visiting our sister site at Vegan Chocolate dot com!

I’m inspired to contact this chocolatier from Idaho to see if possibly we can together develop a line of organic kava chocolate. Mmmmmm…stay tuned!!!

Aloha no!
Makaira

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