FermenteaWhere food goes to change
Equipment · Tanks and vats
sweatbox · stepped box bank
A wooden box for fermenting wet cacao, with a perforated floor for drainage, a raised position above the drain and a leaf cover; designs and batch sizes vary by place.
A cacao fermentation box holds fresh beans with their mucilage while the mass ferments. The documented vessels are assembled from wooden boards. Holes in the floor let liquid drain, and the box is raised above the ground or a drain. In the Côte d’Ivoire study, plantain leaves cover the beans. A box may be used alone or as one part of a stepped bank, where workers move the mass between levels; these are different arrangements rather than one fixed design.
A 2003 Cuyagua study describes two local saqui-saqui boxes: a square box 15 cm on each side and a rectangular one 10 × 15 × 20 cm. Each had five 0.8 cm openings in its floor and stood 2 cm above the floor on wooden strips. The trial vessels held 3 kg. These figures describe experimental equipment, not recommended production dimensions.
The beans enter with pulp. As the mucilage liquefies, juice drains through the floor. In the Côte d’Ivoire experiment, holes in the wooden and plastic box floors were described as allowing liquid to drain and air to reach the mass; those floors were raised over a drain and the beans were covered with plantain leaves. A separate Tamil Nadu Agricultural University guide describes a larger wooden box with openings in its bottom and sides. The designs vary, so the openings and lift need to be read from the actual vessel rather than assumed from a generic box shape.
The Cuyagua boxes were each filled with 3 kg and turned after 24 and 48 hours in a five-day trial. The Ivorian study reports 100 kg batches and compares four- and five-day treatments with or without turning. Those are study conditions, not a universal operating method or a litre capacity.
In the Venezuelan comparison, box design affected measured fermentation characteristics: the square vessel reached higher temperatures and showed higher fermentation-index values than the rectangular vessel under those Cuyagua conditions. The authors considered the square design potentially more efficient in that experiment. The result does not establish a universal preference; the paper discusses the effects of mass volume and handling.
The Côte d’Ivoire paper compares wooden boxes, plastic boxes and heaps under another farm and batch setup. It describes raised floors with drainage holes and plantain-leaf covers, but gives no wood species or standard wooden-box dimensions. Results varied with method and turning. A university extension guide describes still another scale, with wooden boxes reported at 1.2 × 0.95 × 0.75 m and up to one tonne of wet beans. These records show why design, load, cover, drainage and handling must be considered together rather than attributing outcomes to wood alone.
The cited research contexts are Cuyagua in Venezuela and Kpada in the Soubré area of Côte d’Ivoire. They document particular cacao-growing settings, not a single origin for the wooden box. A Wikimedia Commons photograph shows beans in a wooden box under cut banana leaves, but does not establish the dimensions or exact design used in either experiment.
The sources do not give a common capacity in litres, a maintenance method or a procurement route. They do not show that every perforated box will produce the same result. Drainage openings and elevation matter within documented methods, while performance remains tied to how much cacao the box holds and how workers manage the batch.
Published studies document wooden cacao boxes in Venezuela and Côte d’Ivoire. The 2003 Venezuelan paper records square and rectangular saqui-saqui boxes used in Cuyagua and compares their effects in small experimental batches; a 2010 Côte d’Ivoire study compares wooden boxes with plastic boxes and heaps. These are dated attestations, not invention dates.
The sources do not establish standard dimensions, capacity or a universally superior box shape; their results apply to specific bean loads, handling and study conditions.
Source →This source studies two local box designs; it does not establish that their measurements are standard outside the experiment.
The study names Kpada, a cacao-producing village in the Soubré area; this is one documented trial, not a claim about all Ivorian growers.
Jars, barrels, skins, leaves, pits and whole rooms decide much of what happens to fermented and cured food. This is how a container works on its contents, and how people in different places chose theirs.
Soft, spreadable Calabrian pork sausage made with a great deal of red chilli and fatty pork, stuffed into natural casings, sometimes smoked and matured while staying soft.
A way to add independent temperature logging to an existing food dehydrator without changing its built-in controls or protections. It is a monitoring method, not a rewiring plan.
Pleurotus cystidiosus is the abalone mushroom, a cultivated oyster-type fungus with dark brown caps that grows more slowly and is more demanding than other Pleurotus species.
A dark, balanced vinegar from Emilia-Romagna made by combining cooked or concentrated grape must with wine vinegar, then acetifying and refining it in wood under a protected specification.
A living dairy inoculum that starts controlled cream fermentation, developing acidity and aroma before sour cream or cultured butter is finished.
A small electric incubator holds jars at a selected temperature for yogurt and other documented warm food preparations. Controls, capacity and vessel arrangement vary by model.
Adygean salt is a seasoned table salt associated with Adygea and the wider North Caucasian culinary tradition. Salt is blended with garlic and a variable selection of herbs and spices; the exact mix depends on the named style and maker.
The African Caesar-group mushroom, Amanita masasiensis, is a wild ectomycorrhizal species of central and southern African woodlands, eaten locally. The genus contains deadly poisonous species, so identification needs care.
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Agronomía Tropical / SciELO VenezuelaMethod · Equipment · Geography · History
Fermentación del cacao en dos diseños de cajas de maderaThe Cuyagua study compares square 15 cm boxes and rectangular 10 × 15 × 20 cm saqui-saqui boxes, with five 0.8 cm floor holes, raised 2 cm above the floor, each holding 3 kg.
In the five-day experiment with turns at 24 and 48 hours, design affected measured characteristics; the square box reached higher temperatures and fermentation-index values under those conditions.
Cited in: A drained box for wet cacao; Drainage, cover and handling; Different boxes, different study conditions; Places and evidence limits
Advance Journal of Food Science and Technology / Maxwell Scientific OrganizationMethod · Equipment · Geography
Effect of Turning Beans and Fermentation Method on the Acidity and Physical Quality of Raw Cocoa BeansThe Kpada/Soubré Côte d’Ivoire study compares wooden boxes, plastic boxes and heaps using 100 kg of wet beans.
Both box floors had holes for liquid drainage and aeration and were raised above ground over a drain; plantain leaves covered the beans.
Reported results differed by fermentation method and turning conditions.
Cited in: Drainage, cover and handling; Different boxes, different study conditions; Places and evidence limits
Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, TNAU Agritech PortalMethod · Equipment
Post Harvest Technology :: Plantation Crops :: CocoaThe box method describes wooden boxes 1.2 × 0.95 × 0.75 m with bottom and side openings, up to one metric tonne of wet beans, and mixing by transferring beans between boxes on alternate days.
These are guide-specific figures and are not dimensions for the Cuyagua or Kpada experimental boxes.
Cited in: Drainage, cover and handling; Different boxes, different study conditions
Wikimedia CommonsImage reference
File:Fermentation of cacao seeds.jpgThe inspected CC0 photograph shows cacao beans fermenting in wooden boxes under cut banana leaves; it supports the box-and-cover appearance, not dimensions.
Cited in: Places and evidence limits