
Is chocolate is better when the cacao beans travel by sail? We'll find out soon.
A seafaring tale with hints of smuggling, intrigue, stormy seas and a booty of sustainably-grown cacao beans? Yes please!
For the first time since 1939, a sailing vessel bearing a commercial cargo came to port in New York City. The Black Seal, a 70-foot schooner, docked alongside an Ecuadorean container ship at the Red Hook Waterfront last week, after four week voyage to the Caribbean and back.
The cargo? Twenty tons of meticulously-sourced Dominican cacao.
The client? Williamsburg’s Mast Brothers Chocolate.
The Wall Street Journal has the whole story. It’s a good one. Think negotiating with befuddled customs agents…navigating one of the busiest drug-smuggling routes in the world…weathering days-long gales, and trying to unload sacks of beans at a port designed to unload shipping containers from giant freighters…