Kallari, released at Whole Foods in October, is the world’s first widely-available chocolate bar made and marketed by actual cacao farmers. It also might be the best chocolate I’ve tasted, and I’m a big chocolate fan. It’s produced with a rare, highly-celebrated bean grown in the Ecuadorian Amazon by 850 enterprising Quichua families who receive 100 percent of the profits. It probably doesn’t hurt that they got a little bit of help from Robert Steinberg, the founder of Berkeley’s renowned Scharffen Berger chocolate. If you’re looking for a holiday gift, Kallari’s 75% cacao bar might be a good bet. In these depressing times, you’ll get to talk about how it was made by farmers who until recently couldn’t even afford to ship their beans from the jungle to Quito but who now run the show–true role models for us children of the recession. And then you can suggest opening it right away so you can snap off a big chocolatey chunk for yourself.
