Cacao paste and cacao powder: what's the difference

When we think of cocoa in its most "pure" form, often the first image that comes to mind is that of a brown, bitter powder.

But cocoa, in nature, is not a powder. IT IS NOT ITS NATURAL FORM.

Cocoa grows inside a fruit, the pod, in the form of seeds: cocoa beans. And it is precisely starting from these beans that we can understand the difference between two products often confused with each other: cocoa liquor and cocoa powder.

Both can be produced exclusively from cocoa, without other ingredients. But they are not the same thing.

[ Photo 1: cocoa liquor]

[Photo 2. Cocoa powder]

🌱 Let's start with the cacao bean

A fermented and dried cocoa bean naturally contains various components: a fatty part, mainly represented by cacao butter, along with proteins, fibers, minerals, and numerous compounds naturally present in the seed, including polyphenols.

When we roast the beans, remove the husk, and grind the nibs, something very simple happens.

The cocoa, when ground and slightly heated by friction, becomes a fluid mass.

This is cacao liquor, also called cocoa mass.

We don't need to add anything and, above all, we don't need to separate anything.

The bean remains substantially in its whole composition: solid part and cocoa butter together.

[ Photo 3: cocoa beans]

🤎 So what is cacao powder?

Here the process changes, and this determines the final product.

To obtain powder, it's not enough to simply "grind the cocoa beans more".

First, cocoa liquor is produced (stone-ground cocoa beans - first processing step). Subsequently, this is → pressed, separating a significant part of its natural fat, the famous "cocoa butter".

On one side, we then obtain → cocoa butter (Photo 4)

On the other side remains a → solid and compact mass, commonly called in different ways: cocoa cake.

This part is then → crushed and finely ground until a powder is obtained.

And that's how cacao powder is made.

So:

Cacao beans → roasting → husking of beans and winnowing into cacao nibs → grinding → cacao LIQUOR

To produce the powder, the process continues:

→ Cacao liquor → pressing → separation of part of the cacao butter → cacao cake → grinding → NATURAL CACAO POWDER

This is probably the most important difference to understand.

The liquor retains the components naturally present in the bean.

The powder, on the other hand, is a fraction of the cocoa, obtained after having separated a substantial part of the fat contained in the beans themselves (cocoa butter, therefore).

🍫 So, is cacao powder not "pure"?

It depends on what we mean by pure. A cocoa powder can be 100% cocoa, without sugar, flavorings, or other added ingredients. It would therefore be incorrect to say that it is not real cocoa.

But “100% cacao” does not necessarily mean cacao bean in its original composition. The difference lies precisely here.

100% cacao liquor still naturally contains both cocoa solids and its cocoa butter. → Powder, on the other hand, is the product obtained after extracting a part of that butter and after various steps.

For this reason, if we are looking for a processed form that remains as close as possible to the composition of the whole bean, cacao liquor represents one of the most integral expressions of the seed.

⚗️ And then there's alkalization: this unknown (industries - but not only - in fact, hide it and don't talk about it clearly)

There's another thing many people don't know.

Not all cacao powder is simply pressed and ground.

A significant portion of the cocoa used by the industry undergoes a process called alkalization (or dutching), also known as → Dutch process.

Cacao is treated with authorized alkaline substances in order to modify some of its characteristics: in fact, the Dutch process is a treatment used mainly in the industrial production of cocoa (yes, also of cocoa mass and cocoa nibs) and cocoa powder.

In practice, cocoa, which can be treated at different stages of processing, for example as nibs, mass or cocoa liquor, is brought into contact with an alkaline solution, using substances such as potassium carbonate.

This treatment modifies the natural pH of cacao, changing its acidity and causing a series of changes in its characteristics.

The result?

Cacao tends to become:

• darker, in some cases reaching very intense brown or almost black shades;
• less acidic and less astringent, less defects;
• more uniform in taste and color;
• different in technological behavior, for example in dispersion in some products.

Alkalization is a true chemical-physical treatment that modifies some original characteristics.

And it is important to know about it for another reason too.

Cacao naturally contains polyphenols and flavanols. Alkalization can very significantly reduce their quantity, and the more intense the treatment, the greater the loss can be.

This does not mean that alkalized cacao is "dangerous" or that it is no longer cocoa. Alkalization is a food technique that has been used for a long time and is allowed in the industrial production of cocoa, unfortunately, it also includes chocolate.

It simply means that that cocoa has been further processed to obtain certain characteristics of color, taste, and functionality - in search of standardization and to mask defects of the cocoa itself.

And this is exactly where the concept of minimally processed comes into play.

In our process, we don't need to alkalize the cacao, we don't try to correct its acidity, artificially darken its color, or standardize its taste.

We prefer that origin, fermentation, roasting, and processing of the bean determine the final character.

Darker does not necessarily mean "more cacao content", nor better cacao, and this is a mistake people make when choosing products, mistakenly thinking they are buying the purest part.

It can simply be the result of the process used.

🌿 And antioxidants (flavanols - polyphenols and epicatechins)?

Here alkalization makes a big difference

Cacao is naturally a very rich source of phenolic compounds, including flavanols such as epicatechin and catechin, and various procyanidins.

But these compounds are very sensitive to processing.

In particular, alkalization can further drastically reduce the original polyphenol content of cacao.

Studies show that the loss increases with the intensity of the treatment: in heavily alkalized cacaos, even the vast majority of flavanols present in natural cocoa can be eliminated, with reductions in polyphenols reaching around 80–90% in some processes.

→ This means that a very dark, alkalized, and intensely processed powder can retain only a small fraction of the phenolic compounds originally present in cocoa.

And this is an important aspect, because consumers often automatically associate the word "cocoa," or even a very dark color, with the nutritional characteristics of the bean.

But this is not necessarily the case. The process matters. And it matters a lot.

🔎 When you buy cacao powder, do you know where it comes from? (red flag 🚩)

Then there's an issue that is fundamental for us: origin.

Grab a package of cocoa powder at the supermarket and try to look for:

- Which country do the beans come from?

- Which region?

- Which producers or cooperatives?

- Which cacao variety/varieties or genetics were used?

- How was it fermented?

Is "alkalization" or E501 – potassium carbonates listed on the label?

Very often this information is not available. Have you noticed? Bad news even for those who think that by buying "organic cocoa" it is not alkalized. Almost all (if not all) industrially processed cocoa is.

Not because it's impossible to produce excellent traceable cocoa powder – there are producers who do – but because much of the cacao destined for the industrial market is purchased, aggregated, and processed on a large scale, and the identity of the single origin can be lost along the supply chain.

And this is where another fundamental difference emerges.

For us, cacao is not simply a brown raw material with a standardized taste.

Cacao from Guatemala is not the same as cocoa from Mexico. Cacao from Nicaragua is not the same as cocoa from El Salvador. And in these same countries, there are completely distinct territories and terroirs, as well as genetics. It's not enough to just name one country. 

→ Territory, genetics, fermentation, drying, and processing all contribute to its aromatic identity.

Exactly as happens with coffee, wine or oil.

🌰 From bean to cup: why we choose cocoa liquor

When we produce cacao liquor, our goal is not to extract a single component of the seed.

It is to process the bean while keeping it as whole as possible.

If we start with 100 kg of cocoa nibs and grind them, we obtain a mass naturally composed of cocoa solids and its butter.

- We do not intentionally extract the fat to obtain a powder.

- We don't need to alkalize the cacao

- We don't have to standardize its color.

The cacao paste that we process in our artisanal workshop is simply created by grinding 100% traceable, roasted, and hulled cacao beans.

And that's precisely what makes it so different from powder.

🤎 Liquor and powder are not "the same thing in two forms"

This is perhaps the most important thing we would like to leave with the reader.

The difference is not simply:

solid vs powder. It's a difference in "process" and "composition".

Cocoa liquor keeps the cocoa butter and the solids naturally present in the bean together.

To obtain cocoa powder, however, the mass is pressed to extract some of the cocoa butter, and the residual material is then ground. In some cases, it is also alkalized (with the addition of potassium salts).

This does not automatically make the powder a low-quality product.

There are natural, non-alkalized cocoa powders, produced with cocoa of known origin and processed with great care, whose processing is artisanal. But they are very difficult to find because the machinery to process it has not yet been adapted to artisanal production, making these machines rather inaccessible for small artisanal processing.

But it means that "cocoa powder and cocoa liquor are not interchangeable and do not tell the same transformation story of the seed."

If we want to get close to the bean while keeping its natural components together, cocoa liquor is the simplest form:

beans → roasting → winnowing → grinding → liquor.

Few steps. No separation of cocoa butter. And that's why, before simply asking:

“Is it 100% cocoa?”

perhaps we should start asking a few more questions:

Where does this cocoa come from?

How was it processed?

Was it alkalized?

Is all its natural cocoa butter still present?

Because behind the word cocoa, profoundly different products and processes can hide.

Conclusion:

We hope we have clarified every aspect; if not, please write to us here in the comments, or send us an email: hello@vaicacao.com