Mission & Vision

Chocolate isn’t just an indulgence, it’s a way of life.

Over the milenia (5 of them to be exact!), Cacao has been many things to many civilisations across time and space. It has been appreciated as medicine and as currency, been an indulgence for the rich and later also for the masses, a status symbol, a way to celebrate and bring joy, a classic symbolic gift and a way to bridge cultures and peoples. Cacao is connection, and chocolate helps create community.

One of these incredible communities that I’ve been fortunate enough to participate in, is that of the Craft Chocolate Movement. That’s right, it’s not just an industry, it’s a movement! Craft chocolate makers started out just wanting to experiment and make better chocolate, with their own hands, with tiny machines and fewer ingredients, no chemicals. Most started in their basements, garages or kitchens. But what they discovered along the way was that not only could they produce incredibly delicious chocolate with far more complex flavors and health benefits than the industrialised junk they’d had since childhood, this chocolate supports an entire chain of people from exporters to farmers to children and communities in cacao growing regions. It also helps support protecting biodiversity and enriching the soil instead of stripping it. Before ‘sustainability’ was a fashionable buzz word, these artisans understood the value of creating partnerships and nurturing the land.

Little by little, this growing movement of small and medium sized chocolate makers and niche supply chains has been chipping away at the long-established systems of exploitation and big-business practices, established in the 1600s by European colonialism and cemented by the Industrial Revolution. Ancient genetic strains of cacao are thriving again, farmers are re-learning how to nurture the Earth with agroforestry practices that enrich the soil and allow an immense variety of flavorful, nutrient rich cacao fruit to grow all along the equatorial band. Some of the world’s best chocolate is being grown in places like Taiwan and Thailand as well as in its native Amazonia, Peru, Mexico and Venezuela.
However, most people are shockingly unaware of cacao’s history and possibilities, and how our current industrialized cacao growing system is terrible for the planet, terrible for the people who grow it and terrible for their health. They certainly don’t know the complexity and potential of fine flavor cacao, and how tasting it can be as wild and exciting as tasting wine or single origin specialty coffees. Most people don’t even know that chocolate comes from a fruit! How crazy is that…

Rencontre Cacao was born out of a desire, a burning need to bring this amazing world of fine flavor cacao and craft chocolate to the general consumer, and connect them to the hands that make it.

At its heart, Rencontre Cacao is a chocolate education center whose goal is to reach as many people as possible and ‘convert’ them to the Craft Chocolate way, through whichever experience speaks to them the best. Once you’ve tasted the most incredible chocolate chip cookie ever because it’s got your favorite Chanthanburi Thai chocolate in the chips, taken a hands on class to learn how to make your own chocolate directly from the beans, listened to an impassioned presentation and chocolate tasting session led by an award-winning maker herself, watched a documentary about farming conditions in Ghana, or just perused some chocolate history books while sipping that perfect 75% Chuncho hot chocolate, you will truly start to understand how much better incredible craft chocolate is, and why it’s so important to support it. We want you to get excited about spending a little more for much better chocolate, because it’s worth it. For everyone.

We just want you to enjoy better chocolate from better cacao.

Better for the farmers, better for the planet, and better for you.