Several years ago, I was visiting two of our chocolate-making friends, a couple, in the French Alps.

They had been running their business for a number of years, just to close it not long ago. They were running it for long enough to know that “we'll see how it goes” is sometimes not a perfectly respectable business plan.

They also happened to be two of the most outdoorsy people I've ever met.

Patagonia. Mountains. Hiking. That sort of thing.

Inevitably, one day I ended up climbing a mountain with them.

When I started, I was full of fresh air and enthusiasm.

This lasted for quite some time.

We were followed by what I now call the 70th Club — men and women in their late 70s and early 80s who apparently had somewhere much more important to be than I did.

Closer to the summit, about 12 km into the hike and with 1.5 km of elevation behind me, I started questioning my decision.

Unfortunately, turning back was no longer an option.

I was out of breath, the path was narrow, and the only people around me were 70–80-year-olds who seemed to have discovered a previously unknown source of energy.

So I continued.

Or, more accurately, I was pushed uphill by them.

They marched on with the decision and determination of a Roman legion, while smiling, chatting and generally having a lovely time.

I was doing my best not to die.

Later, I thought that perhaps I was the main source of their smiles.

The next day, I met two members of the 70th Club in one of the little town bistros.

Two skinny, smiley women.

Smoking cigarettes.

Drinking wine.

Enjoying themselves.

It was 12 PM.

And I remember thinking: I want to join this club.

Not necessarily the smoking part.

Not even necessarily the wine part.

But the vive la vie part.

Being outside. Beautiful nature. Old friends. Good food. A little wine. And, apparently, the ability to walk 12 kilometres uphill at an age when I was already negotiating with my lungs.

There was something very attractive about it.

And this, eventually, brings us to chocolate.

And sugar.

The elephant in the chocolate room

Sugar has somehow become the villain of the chocolate room.

The biggest elephant, too.

We have never really joined the health-obsessed conversation about it.

Not because sugar is some kind of miracle food. It isn't.

And not because everyone should eat it. Obviously not.

It's simply because we sell chocolate, and we think chocolate should make you happy.

That's it.

If a little sugar in your chocolate makes you happy, I'm not going to ruin the moment by sending you a notification about your insulin response.

If sugar makes you miserable, don't eat it.

This seems like a fairly reasonable system.

The same applies to coffee. Wine. Bread. Meat. Cheese. Whatever the internet has decided is today's nutritional equivalent of a small nuclear reactor.

There is always another study.

Another warning.

Another expert explaining that the thing you enjoyed yesterday is quietly destroying you.

And, strangely enough, all this information doesn't always make people healthier.

Sometimes it just makes them anxious.

So we decided a long time ago that we'd rather help you find chocolate you actually enjoy.

Which brings us to Meybol Cacao.

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Meybol Cacao

Meybol is not a place in Peru.

Meybol is a person.

Meybol Estendorfer-Moran was born in Peru and now lives with her family in Hamburg.

Her chocolate company sits rather neatly between those two worlds.

The cacao comes from Peru.

The chocolate is made in Peru too.

And the connection between the two is not simply a matter of putting “Peru” on a chocolate wrapper.

Meybol says she grew up seeing the darker side of the cocoa trade — including exploitation of farmers, child labour and environmental destruction. Her answer was to build relationships with Peruvian smallholder farmers and work with rare native cacao varieties.

The company was founded in 2018 and has built its identity around direct trade, rare Peruvian cacao genetics and what it calls a Tree-to-Bar approach.

And that last part is worth paying attention to.

Because “bean-to-bar” has become fairly familiar in chocolate.

Tree-to-Bar goes one step further back.

Where did the cacao come from?

Which trees?

Which farmers?

Which variety?

What happened to the beans after harvest?

How were they fermented?

How were they selected?

And, eventually, how did they become the chocolate in your hand?

Meybol's model is built around keeping those connections visible.

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Chuncho: the cacao behind the story

One of the most interesting parts of Meybol Cacao is Chuncho.

Chuncho is a rare native cacao associated with Peru, particularly the Cusco and VRAEM regions.

Meybol describes Chuncho as one of the rarest cacao varieties in the world and makes preservation of native cacao genetics part of its work.

And the company's chocolates can get remarkably specific about origin.

Take its Chuncho Collection No. 7.

Meybol describes it as a 80% chocolate made from Chuncho cacao from the Cusco/Quillabamba region, from a single plantation. The company says the complete process, from harvest to finished bar, takes around six months.

Or Chuncho Collection No. 5, another single-plantation chocolate from Cusco/Quillabamba, this time at 70%. Meybol says the single-plantation approach gives the chocolate maximum varietal purity.

This is where I find the story more interesting than the usual “award-winning chocolate” story.

Because awards are nice.

But knowing that a chocolate came from one particular place, one particular cacao population and a relatively small number of trees is much more interesting.

You start tasting the place.

Or at least you start trying to.

And that's what good chocolate can do.

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A chocolate company trying to keep trees in the ground

There is another part of the Meybol story that matters.

The company has been working with cacao farmers in the VRAEM-Ayacucho region of Peru since 2021, with a project focused on cacao cultivation, reforestation and biodiversity.

According to Meybol, the project includes planting native cacao trees, paying farmers more than twice the local market price with an offtake guarantee, and providing training around sustainable cultivation, biodiversity and quality. The company's original goal was to plant more than 50,000 new cacao trees, although Meybol says it has not yet reached that target.

That's an important admission.

The story isn't presented as: We have saved the rainforest.

It's more: We're trying to build something that makes keeping cacao trees — and the surrounding ecosystem — economically worthwhile.

That seems much more interesting to us.

Because sustainability becomes considerably more useful when it also has to work for the person actually growing the cacao.

Meybol's other projects in the VRAEM region focus on supporting smallholder farmers, biodiversity and the protection of the rainforest.

And the company's record in chocolate competitions is substantial as well. Its awards page lists medals going back to 2018, including Gold awards and multiple international recognitions for Chuncho and other Peruvian chocolates. In 2023, for example, Meybol lists Gold for its Solo Kakao 100% and Single Origin VRAEM 68%, alongside Silver awards for Chuncho Collection No. 3 and No. 5.

But again: The medals are not the interesting bit.

The trees are.

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Chocolate without the moral crisis.

But the reason we're talking about Meybo Cacao isn't really the health angle.

It's the curiosity.

Chocolate has been around for a very long time.

We're still figuring out what to do with it.

And that is one of the things we like about Meybol.

There is a connection between the old and the new.

Ancient cacao genetics.

Modern chocolate making.

A Peruvian woman living in Hamburg.

Farmers in the Peruvian Andes.

A German chocolate company.

Bars made without sugar.

None of this requires us to declare one way of eating superior to another.

You can eat sugar.

You can avoid sugar.

You can eat a square of chocolate and then go climb a mountain.

Preferably not immediately after.

The important thing is that the choice is yours.

Because perhaps that's what I liked about the 70th Club.

They weren't trying to optimize their lives.

They were living them.

Outside.

With friends.

With food.

With wine.

And apparently with considerably better cardiovascular fitness than mine.

Maybe that's the real lesson.

Eat good chocolate.

Go outside.

Meet your friends.

And if a 78-year-old overtakes you on a mountain, try not to take it personally.

Vive la vie.