TOM'S REPORT, TRIP TO COTE D'IVOIRE 2023, JUNE 16 -- Pezoan, Making bars and chocolate, Demonstration of products

Friday, June 16

Today was to be our day with Pezoan.  We had breakfast and then drove the 2 km from the hotel to the village.  

We walked to the PH&F building and entered the rice hulling room.

 

Yesterday, I paid Servando for chocolate, which paid for the demonstration ingredients, and for the upcoming production days.  They made bars (ginger, pineapple, coconut, peanut) as well as small solid chocolates.

Filling the silicone molds for the individual chocolates.  This is Fallone, David’s daughter.  Next to her is Prisca, who has done such a fabulous job contacting potential customers.

 

On right, filling the silicone molds.

 

They were also candying pineapple, ginger, and roasting coconut to put in the bars.  Left, toasted coconut bits. Right, candied ginger.

 

A few years ago, Servando had the walls painted very attractively.

Our hero, the cocoa pod.  The larger refrigerator was purchased by one of the two California rotaries that we worked with.  Also, the room was lightly air-conditioned, thanks to another Rotary donation.

Right, my personal hero, the intrepid Tintin, who was always doing the right thing—in all 25 French comic books.  He not only served as a mentor for me, but I read those comic books (in French) throughout my youth to retain my knowledge of the language from 1962 until I moved back to France in 1970 and then worked in four restaurants.

 

I went in the chocolate cooling room.  

Here (right) is a mold that I just bought them with three 100-g bars—so they can test the market.

 

They made some of the individual chocolate disks that they sell. They bought this silicone mold themselves.

 

Left, they were also making peanut butter for the peanut fudge bars.

 

Right, Servando modified the label I had made so that the foil is not exposed.  They were having problems with the sun heating up the exposed foil ends.

 

Left and below:  Candying the pineapple.

 

They started to make the fudge-filled bars.  

Servando enlisted the help of Peggie Bates.

 

Servando shows how to empty out the mold in order to form the outer shell. 

 

Scraping the mold before vibrating it—to make the mold less messy on top and on the edges.

 

Vibrating the mold to knock out air bubbles so the shell has no holes.

 

Then they turn the mold over and vibrate the chocolate back out of it to make a thin shell.

 

Right, chilling the mold to set the shell.

 

Dusting the counter with cocoa powder so they can roll the fudge out.

Right, filling the shells with fudge.

 

Pushing bits of candied fruit (ginger, pineapple, or coconut) into the fudge.

 

Right, peanut-filled fudge bars.  Shell, fudge, peanut butter, peanuts.  This offers a lovely contrast of crunchy and creamy.

 

Then the bars are sealed with chocolate and set in the cold room. 

 

Filled bars setting up in the cold room.

Peggie says, “The fudge bar is a nice product—maybe one that could be developed on a larger scale with the help of CCC and TechnoServe.”

 

Below, while they were filling molds and I was photographing them, Peggie got started with Monty’s wonderful Excel files. 

Peggie says, “Servando’s group has a Secretary and treasurer and have some receipt forms and recipe cost forms. I went through production sheet 1 with them and explained batch numbers. The forms they had downloaded do not work on their computer so I said we would figure it out and send them forms that are compatible with their Dell/Microsoft computer. Jean Joel can help with this.

 

At the end of our visit w Servando he gathered Tom and I with his crew and told us he felt he had been forgotten. He said there is so much they need, some sort of vehicle to get around and other things. I told him to write up his requests and submit to the board.  They also want their own machine to make cocoa paste so they don't have to buy from SOCOPLAN."

 

It was time for our meeting with some village representatives, so we walked over to the lunch place.  

On the way, we passed rice and cocoa beans drying. 

 

Antoine, the chief’s spokesman.  In yellow, the chief pro-tem, as the chief is too ill to be part of the proceedings. 

We had a lovely lunch for about 12 people.  Chicken in a spicy sauce with a machoiron stock (local fish).  Served with local rice (hulled in our mill).

Right before leaving, Servando showed us the working well that we paid for maybe three years ago.  The well is maybe 40 feet from the factory, so it would be a good place to set up a water tower, as the factory has no running water. 

They re-did the roof and gave it more pitch, as water was pouring in.  PHF paid for the repairs.  Now they need some wood members to be replaced.

We left Pezoan, went to the hotel, checked out, went back to Pezoan to say goodbye, then we drove to nearby Depa where we picked up 20 Kg of sorted cocoa beans for roasting in N’Douci and 5 Kg of already roasted beans to show Roger how to use the cracker/winnower and the small mélangeur.

A friend in Cordes had lent me a refractometer, so we opened a few cocoa pods to check the sugars.  High sugar level equals fast and good fermentation. 

This pod is a little overripe;  the Brix is 16.5 (%).

 

This pod is mature-ripe and the sugar content is 19.7% or Brix.  This produces a better tasting fermented dried bean.

 

We got on the road about 5:30 PM.  We had only an hour of light left, which we needed in order to avoid cracking an axle in one of the numerous deep pot holes between Issia and Gagnoa.  By 6:30, we were in Gagnoa, and the road was safe after that.  We arrived at 9:30 PM