Today I planted a grafted cacao tree. This strain is called UH8 and is a University of Hawaii selection. In Hawaii we have all kinds of cacao strains and it’s hard to tell at this point if you have a criollo, forastero, or trinitario which is also now an obsolete classification system for cacao. Most Hawaii cacao trees are grown from seed and have such varied genetics we can only classify them as ‘poi dog’ varities. But what we do know is that Hawaiian grown cacao beans have a lot fine flavor genetics compared to the hardy, fast growing Forastero types that make up 80% of the world supply.
Originally posted on 2021-02-27, part of the daily planting journal behind Ha’a Chocolate’s food forest on Hawai’i Island.