For Eduardo Ponce—the chocolatier opening up Californio Chocolate on Anaheim Street in the Zaferia district—the world of Mexican cacao is one that is not just underrated but deeply sacred.
“Even I, as a Mexican, did not know the roots of chocolate in my home country,” Eduardo said. “When I thought of chocolate, I thought of Belgium. I thought of Switzerland. I never knew Mexico had a hand in it… We, quite literally, pioneered it worldwide. For us, it was cultural currency.”
He is not wrong: Long before chocolate became a global confection, it was a sacred drink. It was a tender both financially and socially. And across literal centuries, a cultural cornerstone deeply rooted in Mexico. The history of Mexican chocolate stretches back thousands of years to the Olmec, Maya, and Mexica civilizations, all of whom cultivated and revered cacao long before Europeans had the audacity to believe they “discovered” the Americas.
When having the giddy pleasure of unfolding one of Eduardo’s green foil-wrapped bars, you will be greeted with this 4,000-year-old history on the lining of the bar’s box. It is a history worth sharing—and perhaps no one in Long Beach believes that stronger than Eduardo.
Californio Chocolate is the result of divine ancestral communication and, of course, sheer determination.…