Chocolate Alchemy: A Bean-To-Bar Primer

Kristen Hard had her first chocolate epiphany when she was working as a private chef on a yacht in the Caribbean. At a stop in Martinique, she discovered cacao trees growing in the forest. She became obsessed with mastering all the details of the bean to bar process. In Atlanta in 2008, she opened Cacao, the first bean-to-bar chocolate maker in the Southeast. Its mission is to make chocolate bars and confections from scratch using beans sourced directly from farmers. She has been featured in Food and Wine, Bon Appetit, Town and Country, Details, Country Living, and Travel and Leisure. Cacao products are sold in its three original shops in Atlanta as well as in select Williams-Sonoma and other specialty foods stores nationwide. Sean Brock is the author of the James Beard Award-winning cookbook Heritage and the chef of Husk restaurant in Charleston and Nashville as well as McCrady's and Minero in Charleston.