How our chocolate began

Back in 2006, I took a break from corporate viticulture in Australia to volunteer a year in the Solomon Islands; teaching english and agriculture in a college on Malaita. It was a fork in the road, slower simpler pace, wonderful people, tropical climate, fascinating agriculture... and cocoa.

A few years later an opportunity to live and work in a Pacific Island culture came as part of a contract managing a large comercial cocoa plantation in Vanuatu. It was absolutely my cup-of-tea, so I said goodbye to my lovely partner once again for a life-changing year living there full time, and another year travelling back and forth from Australia.

After returning to Australia in 2012 the seed had well and truly been sown and making chocolate from this extroadinary tree crop I had experienced was something we had to explore.

We started small. Piecing together small scale chocolate making equipment, some self-engineered, Spencer Cocoa kicked-off making chocolate in 2013.

I made connections with local growers after finishing up the Contract in Vanuatu and, once we started Spencer Cocoa, have been buying from them directly ever since.

It's been a journey together with the families in Vanuatu as we have honed our chocolate making process, and, working with them, in their small plantations to lift quality. You can't make great chocolate without excellent cocoa.

GROWERS WE BUY FROM

I stayed in touch with a few of the growers I'd met whilst working in Malekula and have been buying their cocoa ever since. The families grow, harvest, ferment and dry the beans from their cocoa plantations and prepare our cocoa ready for shipping to Australia.

Great care is taken in the growing and fermentation of cocoa. You can't make good chocolate from bad cocoa. Over the years we have supported and worked with our growers to ensure the cocoa is processed to maximise quality and eliminate faults that can arise during the fermentation and drying process.

Over my time living and working in the Solomons and in Vanuatu, I've grown to treasure the Islander culture and have developed close relationships with the families we buy from. Each time I arrive in Vanuatu and take a deep breath of the warm, humid, smoke-tainted air, I feel a sense of 'home'.

We are proud of our chocolate – of its direct trade origins and simple ingredients that allow the quality of the cocoa to shine through.

Luke Spencer - chocolate maker, agronomist