Santo Domingo based Eduardo Cortés is the scion of the oldest chocolate house in the Caribbean, the Cortés Hermanos, founded in 1929. Alongside his father and brother, Eduardo runs a multinational chocolate business ranging from liaising with cocoa farms, managing production to shipping their vast offering of chocolate bars, confectionery and hot cocoa product around the Caribbean, the United States and Europe. Their diverse product line is derived from cocoa beans grown in their native Dominican Republic as well as neighbouring Puerto Rico. The Cortés brand is hugely popular in Spanish speaking communities but they have a strong connection to English speaking Jamaica under the Richmond cocoa brand. Thanks to my dear friend cocoa industry insider Clayton Williams, I was able to engage in a wonderful discussion with Eduardo, the man who has “cocoa running through his veins”.
The world is taking note of Caribbean chocolate, why this sudden interest?
I imagine that the chocolate market has evolved in the last 10-15 years as the trend for higher percentage cacao has been very evident. That has made people more interested in the origin of cacao not just where the chocolate is actually manufactured. Since the Caribbean cacao has a maintained a high-quality standard from the diversity of cacao varieties and from great traceability and quality efforts by farmers, Caribbean chocolate has received attention as interest for cacao origin has increased in the general chocolate market. Also, the fact that the Caribbean is such an exotic and appealing region for the rest of the world and chocolate is such an indulgence, the two go great together when it comes to marketing and branding.
What is the relationship with your farmers like and what variety of cocoa beans do you grow in the Dominican Republic?
We work directly with farmers in Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic. Specifically, we invest in the production and distribution of high-quality cacao hybrids and grafted trees. In each respective country, we work to conserve the national collections and gene pool. We distribute trees from the IDIAF (Instituto de Dominicano de Investigaciones Agropecuarias y Forestales) in the Dominican Republic and the USDA-TARS Mayagüez (Tropical Agriculture Research Station) in Puerto Rico. Each institute has dedicated extensive research in identifying the most productive, disease-resistant, and flavourful beans from a wide pool of trees that include all types of Forastero, Criollo, and Trinitario varieties.
Your family are pioneers in the Caribbean cocoa industry, one of the oldest chocolate houses founded in 1929. Tell us some more about your 91-year-old history, the first product you made, what have been the highs and lows?
The company first started as a rum manufacturer in the Dominican Republic. Eventually, my great grandfather Don Pedro Cortés managed a deal for some chocolate equipment as payment from an old debt and that’s how we began making chocolate. Our first product was the traditional Cortés Chocolate Bar used for baking and making a hot chocolate drink in the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico.
The highs have been establishing local institutional brands in both Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic becoming products that are recognized in each country as being representative of local tradition and culture. This has helped us grow and maintain a strong foothold in the industry in general by constantly developing new products and markets as the years have passed.
It is hard to mention lows when you live in the Caribbean and work with chocolate! 😉
In Jamaica, traditionally cocoa was primarily used for “chocolate tea”, chocolate balls grated and boiled in water with the addition of coconut milk or condensed milk, cinnamon leaves and nutmeg for a delicious hot beverage. Old-timers used to also make a liquor, which we never see these days but hope it is resuscitated. What are the cultural uses of chocolate in your country and Puerto Rico?
The chocolate balls are definitely alive and well in the Dominican Republic as the cacao production is so influential, many families have their own sources of artisanal chocolate balls. In Puerto Rico, it still exists but to a lesser extent as cacao has always existed in the back yards of Puerto Ricans as the island had a cacao industry in the 1800s that was almost completely wiped out by cash crops (sugar, coffee, tobacco) by the colonization of the United States.
Nevertheless, Cortés products maintain a strong cultural representation of chocolate used in both Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, specifically with the Embajador and Cortés baking chocolate brands.
You have a wide range of products from baking to hot chocolate and many bars in between from every day delights to premium gourmet treats. Outside of the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, what markets are they available in and how can we source your delicious offerings, any new products on the horizon?
We source all of the East Coast of the United States. Our products are available in cities and towns with large Latin communities across the East Coast. We also export a good amount of industrial cacao derivatives to manufacturers across the rest of the USA and Europe. We actually produce a local chocolate brand for Jamaica called Richmond and Roxianna Chocolate bars and Richmond Valley Cocoa Powder. We sell a good variety of our products to several other islands in the Caribbean as well.
