Port Antonio’s favourite restaurant, the intimate al fresco Mille Fleurs at Hotel Mockingbird Hill, have a special chocolate offer this Mother’s Day.
We’re inviting families that want to give their mum a special treat to bring them to our rather special Mother’s Day lunch where, as an indulgent luxury, they can enjoy a free glass of Prosecco before the meal and Jamaica’s best home-made chocolates to end the meal.
Mums do hone their chocolate divining skills when bringing up their kids and although they may not always be a daily occurrence, our hand crafted chocolates made with local sustainable cocoa are a luxury treat that any mum will savour all week.
We love to promote Jamaica’s cocoa, not only is it wonderful but the plants are sustainable too. Prof. Robert J. Lancashire, at the University of the West Indies in Kingston recorded all the advantages to growing cocoa as a crop
• It is second only to forest in protecting the soil from erosion by the inter-locking of the foliage of adjacent trees.
• It will grow well on steep slopes which need protection.
• It is less subject to praedial larceny than other crops.
• It is easier to reap and sell than other crops.
• Animals find the husks from its pods attractive as feed.
• When planted under coconut trees, it suppresses weeds, thereby significantly reducing the cost of weeding.
• There is only one disease affecting Jamaican cocoa – Black Pod Rot. However this is only severe in areas with heavy rainfall and on the lower sides of narrow valleys.
• Cocoa costs less to maintain than other crops.
• Cocoa is the easiest tree crop to propagate.
• There are central fermentaries to process the Jamaican cocoa crop.
• A big advantage of cocoa as a crop is that even in a massive hurricane such as Gilbert (1988), only a small number of trees are totally uprooted and killed. Although foliage is lost from trees and they may be partially uprooted, the bulk of the trees do not perish.
