The media buzz all started in September of 2017 when scientists from Callebaut in Switzerland, the world’s largest cocoa processor, announced they will begin marketing a fruity, berry-flavored ruby or pink-colored chocolate.
Despite some confusion, ruby chocolate is actually made from cacao beans which can be anything from white to green to dark brown. What makes ruby chocolate so unique is that it doesn’t have enough dairy to qualify as milk chocolate and it has more cocoa solids than white chocolate.
The most plausible explanation is that ruby chocolate is a genetically modified cocoa bean that has fruity notes (we will taste chocolate on our tours and you will get a chance to practice the tasting notes like a fine wine} with the pink color coming from powder resulting from the extraction process, and not an entirely new pink bean.
In our research, we found that ruby chocolate is made from beans grown in the Ivory Coast of Africa, Ecuador, and Brazil as is much of the world’s chocolate production today.
In early 2018, our founders purchased a Twix bar imported from the UK in order to sample the special pink chocolate. Just recently, they discovered small wafers of ruby chocolate that they purchased to sample on our tours together. Unfortunately the wafers they were able to buy in the US contain milk, so we are not able to sample it on our JP Vegan Chocolate Tour. But join us this Saturday on our Harvard Square Chocolate Tour and taste away!
Our Harvard Square Chocolate Tours run year-round. Check our Tour Calendar for details. Guests must purchase tickets in advance. We are Boston chocolate experts!
