From Bean to Bar: Back to Where It Began
“A cacao bean does not become chocolate because someone decides it should.”
From the preface to Eldering: The Winter Brew (2027)
I think of that line every time I open a sack of beans. Chocolate asks for patience. Long before it reaches us in Philadelphia, it has passed through many hands, most of them on small farms in West Africa.
This month I want to tell you about a trip that took me back to where my family's story with cocoa began, and walk you through how a bar of Xoxoa chocolate comes to be.
My Grandfather's Cocoa
My maternal grandfather came from a long line of cocoa farmers in rural Ghana. Like many of his generation, he eventually moved the family to Accra, the capital, where he made his living as a shoemaker. I grew up in the city, far from the farms. Later I left Accra for college in the United States and settled in Philadelphia.
So cocoa runs through my family's story, even though for a long time it wasn't part of mine. I started Xoxoa in 2021 and spent the years that followed learning the craft, visiting small chocolate makers, and honing my own way of transforming cocoa beans into chocolate. What I didn't know then was how far the journey would carry me back toward Ghana.
Going Back
This summer I spent a day in the cocoa-farming communities of the region my grandfather left for Accra. I walked among the cacao trees, held ripe pods still warm from the sun, and cracked them open with the farmers who do this work every day.
For much of the day I walked the farms with Opanyin Oseiku, one of the lead farmers in the small cocoa-farming communities of Bawjiase (Bogyiase). Opanyin is a title of respect for an elder, and he wears it well. We connected immediately. We both speak Fante, my grandfather's language, and that alone made us feel like kin. Together with Peter, our partner in Ghana, we talked about cocoa and much more. As we walked the farms, Opanyin taught me about the trees, the hard work of caring for them, and the challenges the next generation will face. It felt like a first lesson in a skill my family had almost lost.
Walking behind him through the trees, I felt he was guiding me back, toward an understanding of cocoa that can only be learned on the farm.
Out there, the distance between a farm in Ghana and a chocolate bar in Philadelphia felt much shorter than it does on a map.
From Pod to Bean
Every bar starts on the farm, with work most chocolate lovers never see. Over the afternoon, other farmers joined us and shared what a lifetime of growing cocoa had taught them. What struck me most was how they know when each stage is done. There's no need for lab instruments, only the farmers' eyes and hands. The most important part of chocolate-making happens on these farms, entrusted to the farmers and to knowledge passed on through lived experience.
Harvest. Knowing when a pod is ready, and working within the short window when the harvest happens. Ripe pods are cut from the tree and opened by hand.
Ferment. The beans inside, wrapped in sweet white pulp, are heaped under banana leaves to ferment in their own heat for about a week. Opanyin showed me how to read them. Cut open a fresh bean and the inside is purple; when it is well fermented, it turns a deep brown. The heat of the pile tells them which stage the fermentation has reached. This is where chocolate flavor begins.
Dry. The fermented beans are spread on raised racks in the sun and turned by hand, again and again. Slowly their color changes from a dull brown to a shiny, almond brown, and that is how the farmers know they are dry enough to travel. The weather can change quickly, so they plan each day of drying around it.
Listening to Opanyin, I was struck by the depth of his knowledge. He holds certificates in agroforestry and pairs that training with years of reading his own trees. If there were a doctorate in cocoa science, he would sit on the board that reviews it. As he put it, “For the most part, we simply create the right conditions and let the cocoa do its own thing.”
From Bean to Bar
When the dried beans reach our kitchen, we roast them, crack them, winnow away the shells, and stone-grind the nibs in small batches, slowly, over many hours, until the chocolate is smooth. Then we temper it and mold it into bars.
Because we start with single-origin beans, each bar tastes of where it was grown. Our Ghana 70% Dark leans toward deep cocoa, toasted almond and brown sugar. Our Ecuador 55% Buttermilk is softer and brighter, with floral honey, red berry and creamy caramel.
Looking Ahead
Even a single day with the farmers changed how I think about this work. I left that afternoon with a question one of them put to me, and I am still turning it over. What will it take to keep more of chocolate's value in the communities where cocoa is grown, communities like my grandfather's? And what will it take to pass these farms on to the next generation? I'll share more here when there is something real to tell.
Knowing When to Wait
The line I began with, from the preface to Eldering: The Winter Brew, says a cacao bean does not become chocolate because someone decides it should. It turns into chocolate because someone gives it time, not because someone forces it. The same preface says that at every stage, a maker's most important skill is knowing when to leave things alone.
I heard the same wisdom from Opanyin, standing among his trees: create the right conditions, then let the cocoa do its own thing. For all his training, he put it simply. The pile decides when the fermentation is done. The sun decides when the beans are dry. His skill lies in reading the signs and having the patience to wait for them.
We try to bring that patience into our kitchen in Philadelphia. The stone grinder runs for hours, and we let it. Tempering can't be hurried either; rush it and the chocolate loses its shine and snap.
So when you open a bar of Xoxoa, I hope you'll give it the same patience. Let a piece melt slowly instead of biting straight through, and you'll taste what the farm and the time put into it. Better still, share it with someone you love. That's what it was made for.
— Ebo Nunoo, Founder, Xoxoa Bean-to-Bar Chocolatier
Photos © Xoxoa Bean-to-Bar Chocolates