Tasting Hawaii

Meet the entrepreneurs behind the Aloha State's budding industry, agritourism, and bring an appetite!

Inside of a cacao pod
The Coopers believe their chocolate-processing plant, at 1,152 square feet, is the world's smallest. To fit that size and the Coopers' largely self-funded budget - the production line is improvised. Bob Cooper cleans his beans with a rigged-up treadmill he bought used for $100. He cooks them in a coffee roaster and breaks the nibs from their shells with a homemade contraption built in part from a five-gallon bucket, plastic vacuum hoses, and a liberal smattering of duct tape. From there, his beans enter a $45,000 machine imported from Barcelona that, for 15 hours, churns the cacao into liquid and mixes it with cocoa butter, sugar, lecithin, vanilla and - for some batches - milk powder.

And the $10 pricetag on a three-ounce bar? I'd raise an eyebrow, but after seeing what goes into the product, I'm happy to support the operation, which for six years, as Bob puts it in a deadpan Southern twang, "has not been in danger of making money." This year he hopes for a small profit on his annual production of 6,000 to 8,000 pounds.

He also hopes that cacao might be the next major crop for Hawaiian agriculture - a dream far from being realized but not unrealistic. By most accounts, agriculture in the state is at a crossroads. Sugar cane production has fallen 75 percent in the past 20 years. From 2001 to 2005, pineapple cultivation statewide dropped from 20,000 acres to 14,000 acres; Del Monte recently announced its intention to close its Hawaiian pineapple operation in 2008. But while developers have bought much of that vacated farmland, other parcels have become small, diversified farms.

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Coffee, tea and - geckos The author tours Hawaii's farms, and sees some surprising sights. (more)
Raising 5 kids, 300 pounds of vanilla The Reddekopps are growing a big family and a profitable vanilla business in Hawaii. (more)
Getting buzzed in Hawaii Tasting different types of java on a coffee mill tour. (more)

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Most stock quote data provided by BATS. Market indices are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2018 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Factset: FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2018. All rights reserved. Chicago Mercantile Association: Certain market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. Dow Jones: The Dow Jones branded indices are proprietary to and are calculated, distributed and marketed by DJI Opco, a subsidiary of S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC and have been licensed for use to S&P Opco, LLC and CNN. Standard & Poor's and S&P are registered trademarks of Standard & Poor's Financial Services LLC and Dow Jones is a registered trademark of Dow Jones Trademark Holdings LLC. All content of the Dow Jones branded indices © S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC 2018 and/or its affiliates.