Guess how big the world’s largest chocolate bar is? On the other hand, don’t bother. It’s just SO big… Anyway, it was recently confirmed as the new Guinness World record holder leaving the previous record holder in its cocoa dust…
Celebrity Chef Nick DiGiovanni (centre) accepts certificate confirming his Guinness record.
Brown object in background is a portion of the world’s largest chocolate bar (to date)…
The new ‘World’s Largest Chocolate Bar’ record holder is a 416-sq. m / 4,477.78 sq. ft. monster as-sembled in Ecuador by celebrity chef Nick DiGiovanni. It dwarfs the previous 383.24 sq. m / 4,125.16 sq. ft. record holder.
And it took DiGiovanni and his 12-member team of competitive chocolatiers a full 12 hours to put it together.
Envronmentally aware cocoa
But it wasn’t all about owning the record. DiGiovanni says he and his sponsor, Blue Stripes of Ecuador, wanted to spotlight the current and worsening world cocoa crisis.
Blue Stripes is all about sustainability and wants chocolate lovers to understand why the price of their favourite snack has risen to high lately.
According to Reuters, Ivory Coast and Ghana, two West African countries, grow 60 percent of the world’s cacao. But climate change has slammed them with three years of poor harvests, and a fourth is expected. Blue Stripes is dedicated to sustainable cocoa production.
A higher purpose
The mega-bar project was not just about capturing the world record…
“It was about spotlighting the challenges in the cacao industry and showing the world how we can re-imagine chocolate,” Blue Stripes Founder Oded Brenner emphasized in a press release.
Brenner says the industry should be, “using every part of the cacao fruit to reduce waste, make addi-tional value to the cacao farmers without the need to grow additional crop and create something extraordinary delicious and healthy.” Just like his company does.
One look at the Blue Stripes product list tells a tale of creativity and innovation.
My take
Congratulations to DiGiovanni, Blue Stripes and everyone else involved in the recent world record effort. I hope they are at least as successful getting out the message about the cocoa crisis.
If you were wondering what happened to the Big Bar… DiGiovanni and crew broke it into 100,000 20 x 25 cm regular-sized bars and donated them to local schools and community centers…
~Maggie J.