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Sarah Bharath

@sarahbharath

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Soil to seed worker.
Share. Teach. Learn. Grow.
Gratitude. Change. Power. Creation.
#Be #Do #Have beyond cacao & chocolate.

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A post I read a couple days ago reminded anyone and everyone that, an animal you bring home is not meant to be a trial period specimen. Not meant to be discarded just because “they’re difficult……”

Rescued animals are particularly storied in just how much they’ve been traumatized in different ways. And working with that when they come to a home requires digging deeper as a human to learn the languages of fear, distrust, panic etc etc. and subsequently create space for those negatives to be replaced by positives.

I’m no dog-whisperer - though I wish I were. But what I do know is that every language and signal between beings is based on energy. And when that energy resonates with another, everything becomes Mission Possible.

The same goes for our relationship with plants, the land and the people who are part of it all.

Everything is relational. Everything is energy based. All system languages have their root in this.

Learn to honour that in every interaction and you will begin to see the collective landscape shift before your very eyes.

Speak Friend, and Enter.
🙏🏽❤️🎯 by @sarahbharath

There are days when samples to be evaluated just aren’t enough for a typical chocolate evaluation. Does that mean they can’t be broadly assessed? #itdepends

For me the answer is a resounding “heck no” There is ALWAYS something to be deduced from a sample - no matter how small.

My needs: understand the broad aroma & flavor landscape FIRST, from a processing parameters POV. What’s off? What’s too loud? What’s hiding? What is THAT?!🫪

And given that I’m a service provider sans fancy lab equipment and all, it means I get to be bare-bones creative and use what I have, right where I am.

Sometimes at farm location there may or may not be electricity. That means using a toaster oven or microwave even (!) or the lil popcorn machine (yes ⚡️) or a pot (no ⚡️)to do a quick toast of a handful of beans, hand shelling with the producer (while chatting about life), grinding with my little manual grinder and paying attention to every little detail that reveals itself as layers are pulled back on the bean story.

Yes, the IICR has wonderful methodology for field based evals and you should definitely look into their multiple language videos released some time ago to enrich yourselves of what’s officially recommended.

But since 2017 via the @meridiancacao Trinidad microlot project, I realised that I needed to cut to the chase when doing rapid evals of incoming batches at farmgate. To date, i still skip the saga of chewing on cocoa grounds and get the warm brew prepped for basic sensory adventures with the producer. Nothing compares to their reactions during this little exploratory exercise. It’s a masterclass sesh all on its own🎯🫠😍 I’ll share more on that in another post. Should the sample warrant a deeper dive, then I source a 1-1.5 kg sample to run the evals on 100% & 70%.

For today though, tiny lab vibes mean I can gear up and do things with a little more flair - in my Sophie-the-chocolate-giraffe-hat😉😍 - and a lot less chitchat 😆

Cheers ☕️ ! by @sarahbharath

Even after all these long years, this is a view that never ceases to amaze me.

Well played, Theo. Well played indeed. by @sarahbharath

Been a while since I revisited this piece.

Thank you @vduncan10 ♥♥♥ by @sarahbharath

I spend a lot of time with various kinds of breakdown processes. From soil to seed and back again.

And that gives me tremendous opportunity to learn the staggering subtleties (and lack thereof!) that exist between rot (🤢) and decomposition 😉.

As I’ve said myriad times before, I’m happy to leave the fancy aroma profiling to the experts 🫡🙏🏽.

Apparently I provide my best services by learning elbow and knee deep in the trenches of muck and slime (daily occurrence😵‍💫) as well as in the more enjoyable aerated spaces where “sweet smells” are actually a thing in the microbial world.

I’ve realized that I can’t learn the language(s) of one without the other. Resistance is indeed futile.

Onward into the abyssssssss 🤓 by @sarahbharath

Another day of wondering about all the nutrient building blocks that go into “la sangre de la Tierra”…..❤️🙏🏽

Wondering about all the health claims being made with and without appropriate testing to confirm that such is indeed the case…..given how much soil life/health collapse is happening across our growing regions.

Breaking news 📰 : soil health/life collapse -> plant health collapse-> human and animal health collapse.

Food for thought.

Yes indeed, we are what we eat. But we can only get into us what that food (plant, animal) got into itself.

And if that growing medium is devoid of the essential building blocks AND microbial mediation that plants need, then what are we really doing?

Like honestly…what are we really doing?

Here’s your Monday morning nudge to go back to basics, folks.

Return to first principles based on the currently understood AND field-based learnings. There are some things you need to see. by @sarahbharath

Flashback circa 2020.

Field surveys in Tobago that had nothing to do with cacao.
But they sure taught me a lot about forested systems and the price paid when “development plans” come barreling through a community.

I miss field days with the little crew. Now they seem like such easier times.

Go figure. by @sarahbharath

When the one curious chicken keeps showing up every time I sit down to “be serious about work” ….and sends me into a ball of laughter.

Silliest little dinosaur, I swear.

She is however, a crucial reminder that no one lives by (cacao) work alone😜🙏🏽🫡

Happy Saturday, Friends. by @sarahbharath

I forget now exactly how many years it’s been since I started using the cacao juice to teach important scientific concepts to especially my fave people : farmers.

We explore everything from rate of fermentative activity (as evidenced through carbon dioxide buildup) to delicate volatiles created especially by the yeasts’ behaviors. We also taste the juice to understand the important and subtle transitions from sweet, tart fruity to alcoholic fruity to alcoholic to alcohol with vinegar to full on vinegar.

Nothing imprints the process changes at a sensory level to the brain - the whole body really, like this demo. Hence the reason I love it so much as a teaching tool.

I know it’s been at least 9 years across many farms in many countries that I’ve allowed myself to be exploded on with fermenting juice. It’s a hoot and folks pay attention to what’s revealed after they’re done laughing with (at?) me. 😜

It’s always been a fascinating way to for me to qualitatively assess how the ferment microbes are behaving long before the bean-pulp mass in the box gets going.

On a more technical troubleshooting note, when I’m working on my own experimental batches, or I’m called in to work a new location’s material, it has helped me get an early warning signal into potentially problematic ferments (even when Brix levels are nice and high). In this way, I can quickly adopt some tailored mitigation measures to give the ferment batch a better chance at successful completion. And teaching all of that to producers who are also processors helps add another valuable assessment tool to their field toolkit - whether I am there or not🎯 #buildfarmeragency 🫡

In this way we all get to have fun learning the multiple languages of the system so that we learn to help vs hurt the process. Win-win situation while we joke around.

Who says you can’t play AND get good work done?!

CLEARLY it wasn’t me😜…..and it likely never will be😉

Video credits: @brahea_armata from an absolutely wonderful week of postharvest training sessions in Suriname this year thanks to the incredible project work of @tanbunskrati 🙏🏽🙏🏽 by @sarahbharath

Observing the system-things…..

Life always finds a way 🙏🏽🎯❤️ by @sarahbharath

I started my formal Theo-career working on fungal diseases, then ended it in postharvest processing and quality aspects.

When I left the formalities in favour of full-on farmer accompaniment, I continued that postharvest tangent (and still do), but with intensifying dis-ease with what the systems continued to show. In a phrase: systematic collapse.

These last years made it abundantly clear to me that Theo had been preparing me for a return to home base: get back to first principles and let me show you the literal and figurative ROOT causes of what’s happening. A true call to walk the path of soil to seed and back again!

And what a journey this is turning out to be🤯🔥🫡🫠

I now spend an inordinate amount of time #sorrynotsorry🤷🏽‍♀️ on and under the ground 😂 learning and sharing about connections there. Connections that matter at a fundamental level to crop and system health, productivity and longevity - with the wonderful knock-on effects for the rest of us on this planet.

And this year, thanks to the ever-present incredible support of both Gino @meridiancacao and the wonderful team @nwchocolate festival, I got the chance to bring a few key provoking thoughts via show-and-tell 🥰to the discussion spaces.

I am officially smitten with my new portable 3D print of the cacao tree architecture. The real deal is always best, but hey, where tech can help me amplify the crucial messages and get us all to ask better questions, then let’s GOOOOOOO🎯❤️🙏🏽

Looking forward to all the fun learnings ahead🥰

Photo creds: @mountpleasantchocolatiers (#2) & @profromi (#4) 🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽 by @sarahbharath

Before I post anything else today, let me send you in the direction of the latest newcomer to Youtube!

I just saw her announcement on Substack, so in case you're shockingly after me (I'm usually the last to know anything cool hahah), go check out Raven Hanna's @onecacaotree Youtube channel!

Yay Raven!!!! ♥♥♥

And get her books while you're at it. Wonderful investments!! by @sarahbharath