Chocolate has a secret life.

One where, instead of being formed into industrial bars, women combine it by hand with local herbs to make drinks. One where it is a healer, not a creator of addiction. One where it’s revered - held so sacred that it’s used in ceremony and as currency, not bought for a few pennies, wrapper discarded. One where it’s bitter, potent and intense, not sweet and sickly. And one where nobody feels guilt when they imbibe it.

There’s no-one more qualified to open the door to this world than Marcos Patchett, author of the 700-page The Secret Life of Chocolate. This book, which covers everything you could possibly want to know about cacao - including how it was ancestrally used, it’s pharmacology and it’s mythology - will completely change your view of cacao.

“There’s a lifetime’s worth of research in this book.”

Come join us as we dive into a cacao-flavoured world!

The run-down:

1:52 About the book

7:20 Why Marcos wrote the book

12:19 The effect of imbibing extracted plant compounds v. the whole plant

15:10 How cacao was originally drunk and how chocolate is eaten in the West now

20:25 The book-writing high point

26:40 Alison, Andrea and Marcos talk about their relationships with chocolate

34:00 Chocolate and disordered eating

36:58 Cacao’s medicinal effects

44:00 How chocolate’s effects are mediated by the eater’s intention

59.40 The cultural side of cacao's history

1:07:25 Self-medicating with chocolate as part of disordered eating

1.10:25 Practical steps to start eating chocolate ancestrally/authentically

“It blew my mind to realise I’ve been blocking benefits of chocolate by feeling guilt” Alison

*Due to equipment failure, this episode does not have as good audio quality as normal. But it's totally listenable and wonderful content!*

If you want to buy your own copy of the book, Marcos is offering a 20% discount. Use the code CHOC20 on the publishers website:

For those in the US: https://bit.ly/3dVRX1d

For rest of world: https://www.aeonbooks.co.uk

“The modern research suggests quite strongly that cacao is protective against heart disease and stroke and type 2 diabetes.” Marcos

Resources mentioned:

Our 6 Books We Love episode

Jonathan Ott - The Cacahuatl Eater

Susana Trilling - Seasons of my Heart

Mama Coca

“Only eating the chocolate mindfully produced a positive increase in mood” Marcos

Where to find Marcos and his work:

Marcos’ book’s website: https://thesecretlifeofchocolate.com/

Marcos’ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nocturnalherbalist/

Marcos’ herbalist website: http://nocturnalherbalist.co.uk

You Tube The Nocturnal Herbalist

Sourcing your own cacao:

“You learn so much doing it from scratch, and the quality is so much better” Alison

To source your own cacao as beans: Look for raw (i.e. not previously roasted) Criollo or Forastero beans.

Europe: Where Alison has sourced organic cacao beans:

http://macrolibrarsi.it and http://cacaopuro.com

She is currently working on European sourcing of a known single-origin bean, in home-chocolate-maker quantities. Stay connected with her if you’d like to know what she finds.

USA:

Organic arriba criollo cacao beans

Forastero Cacao

To source ready-made roasted and ground cacao ‘paste’ search for cacao liquor or cacao paste.

Marcos suggested cacao amor (UK-based), you can get a 20% discount with the code: nocturnalherbalist20

Rebekah Shaman also sells this in the UK

Blocks of organic ground cacao paste (US)

Valrhona industrially-roasted ‘couverture’ (this is the ‘base’ chocolate that many fine chocolate-makers use to make more complicated bars and small chocolates)

Other resources:

All about metates and grinding stones

Snippet of someone grinding cacao in a metate (You can also watch Marcos doing this on the cacao preparation videos on his You Tube channel (linked above))

Mexgrocer (scroll down to read a description of Mexican chocolate drinks):

Video of preparing traditional drinking chocolate in Oaxaca, Mexico

"Dark chocolate has fuelled many things in my life" Marcos

We'd love to continue the conversation. Come find us on Instagram:

Andrea is at Farm and Hearth

Alison is at Ancestral Kitchen

The podcast is at Ancestral Kitchen Podcast

Original Music, Episode Mixing and Post-Production by Robert Michael Kay

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