If you’re new to the world of cacao, we're sharing answers to some of the most common questions we get asked about ceremonial cacao. Read on to find out!
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3. How Do You Prepare Ceremonial Cacao?
4. What Are The Benefits Of Ceremonial Cacao?
5. Is Cacao A Good Alternative To Coffee?
6. How Is Ceremonial Cacao Different From Chocolate Or Cocoa?
7. How Does Cacao Make You Feel?
1. what is ceremonial cacao?
Ceremonial cacao is an unsweetened drinking chocolate made from direct trade whole cacao beans. The cacao is minimally processed to retain its bioactive compounds. It supports sustained energy, heart health, boosts mood, and is sipped with gratitude and intention.
Ceremonial cacao is made from a single ingredient, whole cacao beans, with nothing added or removed. The cacao is ethically sourced from small holder, regenerative cacao farms. You, the person drinking the cacao, closes the circle of reciprocity with your relationship and desire for connection with cacao and its wisdom.
We’ve spent over eleven years constantly improving our craft and working with innovative partners and farmers disrupting the commodity cacao supply chain, to create the best possible ceremonial cacao for you.
2. Does Cacao Have Caffeine?
We’ve tested our ceremonial cacao and it has 36 mg of caffeine per 1 oz serving, or about 1/3 of what a regular cup of coffee has. It sounds like a lot, but 1mg of caffeine in cacao is not equivalent to 1mg of caffeine in coffee, because cacao has many other compounds that balance and down-regulate the caffeine.
One of these key compounds is cacao butter, which is 50% of the cacao itself. This healthy natural fat slows down the absorption of caffeine into your body (very similar to a bullet proof coffee).
3. How to make a delicious cup of cacao
Prepare your ceremonial cacao by adding about 25 discs (~23 grams) of cacao into a blender with 6oz of hot water or non-dairy milk (~180°F) and blend for 15 seconds until creamy. You can add natural sweetener like honey or maple syrup to taste. Pour into your favorite mug and enjoy!
Ingredients:
25 Cacao discs (about 23 grams)
6oz water or non-dairy milk
2 tsp sweetener of your choice, optional
Instructions:
Heat your water to 180 degrees. Like green tea, using boiling water with our cacao could heat out all the powerful nutrients. We like using electric kettles with temperature control or you can boil the water and let it cool down for a few minutes.
Select your dosage with intention. Cacao can be stimulating, we recommend one serving for this recipe but everyone's body is different - you can always start with half of this recipe and see how your body responds.
Make it creamy! Place the cacao in a blender, pour in 6 oz of heated water or plant-based milk per serving and gently blend to create a nice frothy drink. You can also use a hand-held electric milk frother for less cleanup.
*Bonus tip! The cacao tastes better when you pause and set an intention for your day before taking your first sip.
4. What Are The Benefits Of Cacao?
Ceremonial cacao is high in flavonoids (which supports cardiovascular health), it gently energizes with Theobromine, it boosts mood with neuro-modulators, and it remineralizes the body with magnesium, potassium, calcium, and iron.
We discovered that over 80% of the original flavonoids compounds present in raw cacao beans remain intact in our finished ceremonial cacao.
Furthermore, correlating our lab test data to recent scientific studies shows that flavonoid levels in a cup of Ora Cacao are very close to the “high flavonoid” protocols using standardized extracts in studies to establish positive health outcomes from consuming cacao flavonoids.
Our testing shows that Boundless Belize contains 764mg flavonoids per serving, and Thriving Tanzania contains 674mg flavonoids per serving. These are notably high compared to other chocolate products, and are similar to values used in studies for verifying health benefits from flavonoids.
Cacao has amazing benefits for mood and neurochemistry. There is substantial science that explains why ceremonial cacao is so beneficial. Pure cacao contains beneficial neurotransmitters and neuro-modulators already present in our brain. It also contains re-uptake inhibitors that block the pathways that our bodies normally use to break down and recycle these beneficial mood altering molecules, so the good mood lasts for longer. In the long term, regularly working with ceremonial cacao can have therapeutic health benefits, including creating new neural pathways that change our daily experience to include more joy, love, and connection.
The top mood boosting molecules in cacao include: Anandamide, Seratonin, Phenylethylamine, and Dopamine.
Due to these molecules and many others, when you drink ceremonial cacao you may feel expansive, blissful, connected to self and/or others, inspired, connected to your intuition & vision, connected to spirit, grounded, emotions arise, and the movement of stuck energy.
5. Is Cacao A Good Alternative To Coffee?
Many people drink cacao as an alternative to coffee because cacao provides gentle, sustained energy, without the jitters and crash of coffee.
What sets cacao and coffee apart are their main stimulants: coffee contains caffeine, while cacao contains theobromine. Although they are similar compounds, how they function in the body is vastly different.
One of the main differences between theobromine and caffeine is that caffeine stimulates the central nervous system (causing jitters, anxiety, etc.) and theobromine stimulates the cardiovascular system, increasing blood flow and alertness. Theobromine is also gentler and keeps you energized for longer periods of time.
Note: cacao also contains some caffeine (~35mg/serving), but theobromine is by far the dominant stimulant and the many other compounds in cacao moderate the caffeine that is present. So much so that many people sensitive to coffee report having no issue drinking cacao.
6. How Is Cacao Different From Chocolate or Cocoa Powder?
All ceremonial cacao is made from one single ingredient, cacao beans, that have been roasted, shelled, ground into liquid chocolate and cooled into discs or bricks.
Ceremonial-grade cacao also includes the intentionality that goes into it, the ethical sourcing outside of commodity supply chains, the regenerative farming practices, and the minimal processing that keeps the spirit of cacao intact.
Cocoa powder, on the other hand, is processed substantially further than ceremonial cacao in order to remove the cacao butter. Cacao paste is loaded into truly massive industrial presses that exert hundreds of tons of force to squeeze out the cacao butter. Then the remaining material is finely hammered to create a powder. Cocoa powder is typically made from secondary or tertiary quality cacao and processed at high temperatures to mask defects and create uniformity.
In truth, cocoa powder is a waste stream product from making cocoa butter, which is a high-grade fat in great demand for skin care, hair care, and culinary applications. Slick marketing of cocoa powder sells it as a superfood, but we've found that the true superfood is whole-food ceremonial cacao, as it still contains high-grade cacao butter, which is the best carrier fat for the medicinal properties of cacao. It doesn’t matter if the cocoa powder is raw or organic certified. It all fundamentally goes through this same process that renders it far inferior to ceremonial-grade cacao.
Most commercial chocolate bars are made from cacao powder, cacao butter, sugar, preservatives, and stabilizers. This means the cacao bean has been processed into powder and butter and then recombined with additives.
There are some craft bean-to-bar chocolate bars with transparent, ethical sourcing, using high quality cacao beans and cacao paste (meaning the cacao has never been highly processed). The difference here between ceremonial cacao is that those chocolate bars usually have added sugar in them and are intended to be consumed as a treat, like candy. Ceremonial cacao is crafted without sweetener to be used intentionally and mindfully to support your wellbeing.
7. How Does Cacao Make You Feel?
Cacao creates a gentle, uplifting shift in your body and in your mood.
Most people experience a gentle energy boost without the jitters or crash of coffee.
At the same time, cacao supports mood and emotional openness. Naturally occurring compounds help elevate serotonin and dopamine, often leading to a feeling of warmth, ease, and subtle joy.
You may also notice:
- Increased presence and mental clarity
- Feeling relaxed and grounded in your body (thanks to high magnesium content)
- A softening or “opening” of the heart, making it easier to connect, reflect, or create
Rather than a sharp spike in energy like coffee, cacao invites a more balanced, connected state—where you feel awake, centered, and in tune with yourself.
8. Is Cacao Safe To Drink Daily?
Yes, for most people, cacao that is high quality and intentionally sourced is safe to drink every day.
Cacao is naturally rich in flavonoids, powerful plant compounds that support circulation, brain function, and mood. Regular consumption of flavonoid-rich cacao has been associated with heart health, reduced inflammation, and overall well-being.
At the same time, like many common foods like potatoes and rice, cacao can contain trace amounts of heavy metals such as lead, which is a post-harvest contaminant, and cadmium, which is absorbed from the soil.
What matters most is quality and sourcing:
- Rigorous testing matters: Well-sourced cacao that is regularly lab-tested can fall well within established safety guidelines.
- Not all cacao is the same: Studies show heavy metal levels vary widely by region, farming practices, and processing methods.
- Moderation + quality = safety: Daily consumption of tested cacao that falls within the safety limits is totally fine. Similar to potatoes and rice which can also contain trace environmental elements.
Drinking cacao daily can be a nourishing ritual but be sure to choose cacao that is transparently sourced and tested for heavy metals.
One contraindication to be aware of: cacao impacts mood-related neurotransmitters like serotonin and dopamine. If you are taking SSRIs, it’s best to consult your healthcare provider before drinking cacao to avoid seratonin syndrome. We do know folks who have reduced antidepressants by working with cacao but everyone's body is different so consult your healthcare provider and start with very small amounts.
9. What Makes Cacao Ceremonial-Grade?
Here is what we’ve come to define as the gold standard for ceremonial cacao: regeneratively farmed, ethically sourced, 100% pure cacao, sipped intentionally with gratitude.
- Regeneratively Farmed - means we’re improving soil health, increasing biodiversity, and stewarding watersheds. Cacao is the primary cash crop for our farmers, but they grow dozens of food staples for their families and communities. In many cases, the cacao farms serve as buffer areas for protecting untouched pristine and second growth rainforest areas.
- Ethically Sourced - we purchase directly from thousands of small family farms and pay above market price to support farmer livelihoods. The direct trade model supports long term farmer livlihoods, unlike the broken cacao commodity system that keeps farmers in poverty and results in desparate abuses like child labor.
-100% Pure Cacao - Ceremonial cacao begins with a single ingredient - whole, raw cacao beans. Nothing is added or removed in our process (unless we’re adding superfoods for our botanical cacaos), a big contrast to the mainstream chocolate industry that uses all kinds of sweeteners, waxes, emulsifiers, and fats.
- Sipped With Gratitude - Taking a moment to slow down and drink cacao with embodied gratitude can open our apertures to a far greater experience than simply a delicious beverage with health, mood, and energy benefits. This subtle inner shift in how we approach cacao is an important part of shifting out of the paradigm of consumerism, into right-relationship and reciprocity with the gifts of this Earth.