Willie's Cacao Raisin & Hazelnut 100%

About the bar This 100% inclusions bar from Willie’s Cacao is remarkably smooth and approachable. There’s very little astringency, and the hazelnuts and raisins add a lovely nutty sweetness. A great option for those who like low-sugar chocolate bars, but don’t like the intensity of typical 100% chocolate.

About the maker You may remember Willie Harcourt-Cooze as the larger-than-life character behind Channel 4’s “Willie’s Wonky Chocolate Factory” back in 2008. The series followed Willie from his cacao farm in Venezuela through his roller coaster ride setting up his bean-to-bar chocolate factory in Devon. Willie is a true pioneer of the artisan chocolate movement in the UK, and the first of the modern independent bean-to-bar makers.

His passion is to open people’s eyes to real chocolate. By this he means chocolate that really brings alive the flavour characteristics of the great single-estate beans that he uses. The recipe is simple – cacao, natural cocoa butter and raw cane sugar – no vanilla and no soya lecithin, nothing that can get in the way of the flavour of the beans.

The beans The beans for this bar are grown and cultivated at the Norandino cooperative in Peru. The Norandino cooperative was established to help smallholder families move towards sustainable and diverse cacao-agroforestry systems. Established in 2005, they now have 4,961 members and counting, in a shared mission to adapt chocolate production to help combat climate change.

This region produces a rare variety of cacao bean, Piura Blanco, which has been meticulously selected and replanted over the past decades, pushing this special strain of cacao away from near-extinction. The Piura Cacao belongs to the ‘Nacional’ cacao genetic group, considered to be one of the oldest cacao varieties on the planet, cultivated and consumed in the region where the Peruvian and Ecuadorian boarders meet for over 5,000 years.,About the bar This 100% inclusions bar from Willie’s Cacao is remarkably smooth and approachable.