Truth behind "ruby" chocolate

Truth behind "ruby" chocolate

It's no secret that any pink chocolate is the coloured white. However, technologists from the Swiss company Barry Callebaut claim to have discovered a new type of chocolate, which has a ruby colour and contains only cocoa beans. According to them, the secret lies in a unique type of cocoa, which initially has a fruity taste. For its production, neither flavours nor dyes are used.

Traditionally, chocolate is made from dried, fermented and roasted cocoa beans. Thousands of years ago, the ancient Maya and Aztecs prepared the bitter, frothy drink xocolātl in this way. It was only in the 19th century that they learned to get cocoa butter and powder from hard cocoa, in the process of mixing which hard chocolate bars were obtained. During the presentation of the Ruby ​​Chocolate, Peter Boone said that Barry Callebaut employees have spent several years searching for the unique "ruby" cocoa beans that grow in Ecuador and Brazil. Despite this, many representatives of the industry are confident that the Swiss use the most common cocoa beans, and the secret of the pink colour lies in the very process of processing the raw materials. Usually, peeled and dried cocoa beans are fermented for 4-8 days and then fried. It is thanks to the combination of these processes that the beans acquire their unique chocolate aroma and taste.

Industry insiders suggest that the Swiss company uses beans that have been fermented for no longer than 3 days in their production, as a result they have a pinkish tint. This would explain the unusual taste of ruby ​​chocolate. It contains berry sourness and the usual taste of cocoa is not felt at all. Most likely, the ruby ​​colour appears due to the alkalization of the cocoa beans, which also slightly softens the taste. Pink cocoa powder is obtained by neutralisation with petroleum ether.

It is up to each person to believe in the discovery of a new variety of cocoa beans or not, but having studied in detail the process of making chocolate, you begin to involuntarily tend to mistrust.