Meet the maker
Cacaoken
About Cacaoken
With such an incredible culture of food, patisserie, desserts and strong respect for artisan tradition, it may come as little surprise that Japan has embraced bean-to-bar chocolate. Cacaoken was founded by the Nakano family – husband-and-wife-duo Toshimi and Fumiko, and their daughter Yukari. Cacaoken is governed by three founding principles: Origin, Beauty & Health, Farm To Table. The ‘Beauty & Health’ principle is less self-explanatory that the ‘Origin’ and ‘Farm to Table’ principles – cacao was drunk by aristocrats, with chocolate being melted in hot water. They believed that it would act as a cure to a whole raft of ailments, such as soothing the stomach and acting as a spiritual stabilizer. At Cacaoken’s cacao laboratory, the team is collaborating with university professors who specialize in nutrition to study the nutrition of cacao and its effect on health and beauty.
Cacaoken translates to ‘cacao laboratory’ in Japanese, and the company crafts all its chocolate bars in its laboratory in Fukuoka. Cacaoken also sells in Japanese coffee shops, and via a caravan that Nakano-san drives around Japan (in which she and her mother, demonstrate how small batch chocolate is crafted). On top of this, Toshimi, Fumiko, and Yukari also have a farm and a research lab in Vietnam. Here, Cacaoken grows cacao and experiments with bean fermentation. Cacaoken also embraces its Japanese culture of enjoying not only the look and taste of its desserts, but also enjoying their names. Names, along with taste, touch and smell, play a significant role in the sensory experience. A few translated examples of Cacaoken’s bar name include: Hazy Moon, A Song of Ice and Brine, and Valley of Red Clay.
How they became makers…
The first little chocolate seed was planted in Fumiko, Toshimi, and Yukari’s heads over a decade ago in 2012, when they read a Japanese magazine article about an American bean-to-bar craft chocolate maker. Fumiko and Toshimi had managed an industrial candy company before, so the world of craft chocolate piqued their interest – when they finally got a taste of bean-to-bar chocolate, Fumiko and Toshimi immediately knew it was their calling. From their experience of tasting candy and chocolate, the pair knew that the distinctive flavours and complexity of craft chocolate was something truly special. Despite the fact that Yukari, their daughter, took a little more convincing, she soon became the spokesperson of the company at most of the chocolate shows hosted around Japan, as she was the only one who spoke fluent English.
Cacaoken’s Sourcing
Many of those who purport to make chocolate do not source the cacao themselves – for Cacaoken, this was simply not an option. The family believe that it is impossible to call yourself a true bean-to-bar chocolate maker if you do not understand the challenges faced by those at origin, and the conditions in which the cacao is grown. In their quest to understand the cacao beans, Toshimi, Fumiko and Yukari sought to learn as much as they could about fermentation. The search for their ideal taste drives this curiosity and their passion for conducting research on every stage of production from cacao fruit to chocolate bar. All of Cacaoken’s bars all use these Vietnamese cacao beans (sometimes blended with Ghanaian cacao).
In addition to the above, Cacaoken is very much aware that the farmers who grow their cacao live a tough life. Even though chocolate remains popular globally, there is no guarantee that this popularity will filer through to those at origin. Many farmers around the world are not seeing an increase in their income and an improvement in their livelihood will improve. With this in mind, it is perhaps understandable that many have to make the decision to convert their cacao plantations to farms for more profitable crops. Therefore, at the Cacao Research Laboratories, the team is working with cocoa farmers in Vietnam to help to find ways to make it possible to produce high-quality cocoa in more efficient ways. Cacaoken is committed to buying cocoa beans at a price that matches the quality of the beans and helping to improve the lives of the farmers that grown them.
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