Mexico chocolate

6 Mexico chocolates from 4 independent UK chocolatiers, from £3.49.

Mexico is where chocolate began — the Olmec, Maya and Aztec cultures domesticated cacao here millennia ago — and it remains a distinctive fine-flavour origin. Cacao grows in the south, chiefly Tabasco, Chiapas and Oaxaca, including rare native Criollo. Mexican chocolate flavour leans earthy, nutty and spiced, with dried fruit, cinnamon-like warmth and a mellow, rounded body; some traditional styles are deliberately rustic. For UK buyers, a single-origin Mexican bar offers a deep, spiced, historically-rich profile, and craft makers here often work directly with indigenous communities preserving heirloom varieties. It is chocolate with the longest story of all — and increasingly, the modern fermentation care to match.