03/07/2026
🌿🇩🇴Taíno Kún Áwata — Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic
⛰️🌴 🦎 Hidden behind the mountains in Puerto Plata, Chicho tends a single-estate treasure that offers the perfect micro-climate to grow cacao: Kún Áwata — “The Three Steps” in Taíno language, or Tres Pasos in Spanish. Kún Áwata is named for the three river crossings that once led to this hidden corner of the island. In this farm exceptional genetics, fertile tropical soils, and generations of dedication create a cacao of remarkable elegance.
🧬🌱Exceptional old genetics — Criollo, Contamana, Curaray, Iquitos — meet rich volcanic soils and generations of know-how. The pods are picked at peak ripeness, pre-drained and fermented for 7 days in traditional wooden boxes, then slowly sun-dried — every step protecting the beans’ aromatic complexity and sense of place.
It’s Chicho’s, .cacao and care through every stage — from conserving exceptional old genetics to a carefully controlled harvest and adapted post-harvest protocol — that gives these beans their distinct personality
💎 The result? A cacao bean with real character: delicate floral notes fof violet and geranium 🌸, bright cranberry , silky vanilla, rounding off into something creamy & indulgent, almost like an Irish cream liqueur 🥃
🇫🇷🍫 Fourteen makers, one mystery bean.
During summer camp, fourteen French chocolate makers were handed the very same Kún Áwata beans — no origin, no story, just one instruction: craft the best possible dark chocolate at 75%. Fourteen bars came back, fourteen completely different interpretations of the same bean 📖🍫
🩷 Aurélien and his team from prepared every step carefully. They connected directly with Chicho to understand his reality, his production system, context and history. During the Summer Camp all other makers discovered the identity of the bean .
Kún Áwata is more than a cacao — it’s a landscape, a family, a heritage. And it’s waiting for the next chocolate maker to interprete these beans and share its story.
❣️⁉️ Curious to discover Unique Dominican Flavours? Reach out to discover our 7 single farm range each with its unique identity 🍫!
