A startup in Israel has developed the technology behind the world's first lab-grown chocolate bar.
It means that manufacturers such as Cadbury’s may no longer need to rely on traditional – and very expensive – cocoa grown on trees.
Instead, thanks to Celleste Bio, based in Misgav, northern Israel, they will be able to use lab-grown cocoa butter, created in a huge steel bioreactor.
It's a process known as "plant cell suspension culture," in which cells taken a single cocoa bean float and multiply in a mixture of water, sugar and vitamins.
Celleste announced on Wednesday that its lab-grown cocoa butter had successfully been used to make a dozen bars of chocolate at Cadbury's research and development centre at Bournville, Birmingham.
Cadbury's parent company, Mondelēz International, has invested heavily in Celleste.
The cocoa butter is indistinguishable from the tree-grown version, where the seeds from the bran have to be roasted and squeezed.
It has the same taste, texture, sensory experience and melting properties, and it even makes a "snap" when you break off a square.
Michal Beressi Golomb, Celleste Bio's CEO, told the JC: "I'm excited we've reached this meaningful milestone of proving that the technology works.
"And it excites me that looking forward we're going to change an industry. It is a really unique and important achievement."
Other companies have been racing to produce the world's first lab-grown chocolate bar, but her company crossed the line first, thanks she says to her team's creative approach and depth of experience.
The achievement comes at a critical time for the global chocolate market, which is worth an estimated £100 billion.
A perfect storm of climate change, disease and deforestation in key cocoa producing countries – primarily Ivory Coast and Ghana – has seen prices double in recent years and supply chains compromised.
"If we don’t change how we source cocoa, we won’t have chocolate in two decades," said Golomb.
Until now, chocolate production has required two tons of cocoa pods, approximately 5,000 sqm of land, and nearly 1,000 trees to produce a ton of cocoa butter.
"We are on track to produce 1 ton of cocoa butter annually in a 1,000 litre bioreactor from a single bean," said Celleste's chief technical and scientific officer Hanne Volpin.
The lab grown cocoa will supplement, rather than replace the tree-grown variety.
The first lab-grown chocolate bars are due to roll off Cadbury's production lines in late 2027. But there's every chance that chocolate eaters will not even realise it's not cocoa from a tree.
Because lab-grown cocoa butter is identical to traditional cocoa butter there may well be no requirement to amend the labelling.
"Our goal is to meet the standards of identity for cocoa butter, meaning products made with it can be labelled as real chocolate," said Golomb.
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