????一塊售價將近300美元的巧克力應該怎么吃呢？對于傳說中的To’ak巧克力來說，該公司聯合創始人杰瑞·托特表示，應該搭配上好的威士忌、干邑白蘭地或朗姆酒。他極力推薦的是派比·范溫克威士忌、法拉賓XO、或劍魚號21年特藏陳年朗姆酒。

????杰瑞·托特原本是一名華爾街投資銀行家，后來轉行成為一名巧克力大亨兼環保人士，這似乎是一條不可能出現的職業發展軌跡，不過托特本人卻表示，他并沒有白白浪費他在康奈爾大學(Cornell University)獲得的經濟學學位。

????托特此前在一個熱帶雨林保護組織工作時，曾經在厄瓜多爾馬納比省的普拉塔河谷待過一陣子。再往前追溯，托特還曾在華爾街奮斗過一段日子，不過很快他發現那不是自己喜歡的生活方式。于是他啟程前往南美的厄瓜多爾，在那里遇到了他后來的女朋友，她幫助托特在厄瓜多爾成立了一個熱帶雨林保護組織。托特回憶道：“我們在厄瓜多爾沿海建立了1000英畝雨林保護區，然后與當地農民一道退耕還林，種植適合在蔭地生長的可可樹。”

????托特和他的女友也開始在自己的試驗田里種植可可樹，后來他們發現這里的老可可樹長得很快。“我們開始收割可可豆，然后進行發酵、脫水、烘烤，生產自己的巧克力，很快我們意識到，這種巧克力與我們之前吃過的所謂‘巧克力’相比，完全就像來自另一個星球。后來我們才發現，這個省的可可豆歷來被視為全世界最寶貴的品種。這就好像一個釀酒師一覺醒來，別人告訴他原來他這輩子一直住在勃艮第的金丘一樣。”

????當托特和他的朋友卡爾·施威策開始尋找最適合制作巧克力的可可豆時，他們特地留意了這些可可豆生長的土壤和氣候。可可豆的風味會隨著種植地的不同而產生差異，就好像不同產地的葡萄會釀出不同口味的紅酒一樣。

????不過托特當時并不知道，厄瓜多爾曾經爆發過一場名叫“叢枝病”的病害，將本地的原生可可樹種摧毀殆盡。目前厄瓜多爾境內的大多數可可樹，都是與外來樹種雜交的。厄瓜多爾的原生樹種只在少數地區零星散布，而且它們一般都位于該國的偏遠地區，其中有些最珍貴的原生樹種分布在該國最著名的阿銳巴可可樹種植區。

????托特和施威策動身去尋找理想的產區，最終他們把將目光投向多勒河和巴巴奧約河流域。他們得到一位當地朋友的幫助，他叫塞爾維奧·帕查德，既是馬納比地區第四代可可樹種植者，也是該地區的農業專家。帕查德經常在該地區進行探索，這種經歷使他能夠找到那些遠離公路的偏僻山谷。

????最終，他們深入到一片丘陵地帶，那里還存活著極少數原生的阿銳巴可可樹，其中有些樹已經生長了100多年了。他們終于找到了自己需要的樹種。

????How does one enjoy a nearly $300 bar of chocolate? In the case of To’ak Chocolate, one pairs it with a really good glass of whiskey, cognac or rum, says co-founder Jerry Toth, who recommends a Pappy Van Winkle, Frapin XO or El Dorado 21 year as options.

????The former Wall Street investment banker turned environmental conservationist-chocolatier had an unlikely career trajectory, but Toth says he’s putting his economics degree from Cornell to good use.

????While working at rainforest conservation organization Toth found himself in the valley of Piedra de Plata in the Ecuadorian province of Manabí. He left Wall Street after realizing pretty quickly that wasn’t the lifestyle for him. He relocated to South America where he met a woman from Ecuador who would become his girlfriend and soon help him launch a rainforest conservation organization in her home country. “We developed a 1,000 acre forest preserve in coastal Ecuador and started working with nearby farmers to reforest their cattle pastures with shade-grown cacao trees,” says Toth.

????Toth and his girlfriend also started growing cacao trees on their own experimental agroforestry plot, where they found groves of old cacao trees growing wild. “We started to harvest the fruit and ferment, dry and roast the beans and make our own chocolate, and immediately we recognized that this chocolate was in a different universe from anything else we had ever tasted that bore the name ‘chocolate,’” Toth says. “Only later did we find out that the cacao beans in this province of Ecuador have historically been considered the most prized variety in the world. It was like a wine maker one day waking up and someone telling him that he’s been living in the C?te d’Or, Burgundy his whole life.”

????When Toth and his friend Carl Schweizer set out to find the best cacao beans to create their chocolate bar, they paid particular attention to the soil and climate in which the beans were grown. The flavor characteristics of cacao vary by location—think of it as similar to the characteristics of the different grape varieties used to produce wine.

????What Toth didn’t know was that an outbreak of “Witch’s Broom” disease all but decimated the source of Ecuador’s national treasure: the heirloom cacao tree. Most of the trees currently growing in the country are hybrids, bred with foreign varieties of cacao. Only scattered remnants of heirloom cacao trees are left, and those are usually found in remote pockets of the country, with the most cherished among them residing in the famous Arriba cacao growing region.

????Toth and Schweizer set out to find the ideal appellation, which turned their attention upriver, toward the watersheds of the Daule and Babahoyo Rivers. They enlisted the help of a local friend, ServioPachard, a fourth generation Manabi cacao grower. His great-grandfather was one of the first men to settle the hinterlands of Managi, and Pachard’s own explorations of the region as an agroforestry specialist provided him access to isolated valleys beyond the reach of roads

????The expedition led them deep into the low-lying mountains where only a handful of Nacional Arriba cacao trees remained, some of which are more than 100 years of age. They found their source.