According to Belgian researchers, new era of boutique chocolates use special yeasts that are used to ferment cocoa during chocolate production which converts the aroma of the chocolate after the process.
Jan Steensels, a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Leuven and the Flanders Institute for Biotechnology, Belgium said that this discovery will give a whole new range of boutique chocolates to satisfy everyone's taste. This will be likened to wines, tea, and coffee.
The researchers originally looked for strains of healthy yeasts that can win over the loads of invading yeasts that flood cocoa beans during the fermentation process.
Esther Meersmen, Steensels co-post-doctoral researchers at the two institutes explained that after harvesting the beans, they are stored in large plastic containers or sometimes piled in large numbers on the ground where they are grown. They found out that there are striking differences in the smell of chocolates from those who are fermented using healthy yeasts.
This became a very important discovery for them especially they only used yeast with different varieties. The fermentation process was done exactly how it was done with the others and the recipe was not changed too. The team established breeding mixed yeasts which will combine well-being as well as give off strong flavors.
Barry Callebaut, the world's largest chocolate producer, was one of those who collaborated with the research. He was brave enough to combined two special characteristics of yeast in single mixed variety. For Steensels, he considers it as something good because for the first time, chocolate makers have a wide variety of yeast strains that are producing different flavors.
The authors of this research noted in the journal, Applied and Environmental Microbiology, that a similar situation is currently happening in the beer brewing and wine making industry. A new generation of chocolates may be rising.
