Chocolate and Sweets · Piedra de Plata valley, Manabí
To'ak Chocolate
Rare heirloom Nacional cacao, crafted and aged like fine wine in Ecuador.
- Founded
- 2013
- Founded by
- Jerry Toth, Carl Schweizer, Dennise Valencia
- Based in
- Piedra de Plata valley, Manabí
Making it since
2013
Their story
To'ak began on a rainforest preserve in Ecuador's Manabí province, where Jerry Toth had been working on conservation through his nonprofit, Third Millennium Alliance. In the hills above the bamboo house he and his partners lived in, they found old, half-forgotten groves of heirloom Nacional cacao trees.
In 2013 Toth, Carl Schweizer and Dennise Valencia set out to change how people think about dark chocolate, treating it with the same attention usually given to wine or whisky. Their first bars were made entirely by hand, without electricity.
Today the company still designs, makes and packages everything in Ecuador, working with cacao from the Piedra de Plata valley and releasing small vintage and aged editions.
How it's made
To'ak works tree to bar with Ancient Nacional cacao from the Piedra de Plata valley, so each harvest tastes of its year's weather and soil. The earliest batches were roasted in an iron pot over a wood fire, peeled by hand and ground in a hand mill. Signature Editions are aged in casks, and Reserve Editions are released as aged vintages.
Why we carry them
We think of To'ak as chocolate for slow tasting, the kind you share a square at a time with friends. It is a rare chance to taste an heirloom cacao in its own setting.
Find more makers like this in Provisions Club, our curated subscription.
Explore Provisions Club