Organic carob powder — the roasted, ground pod of Ceratonia siliqua, the carob tree. Naturally sweet, high in fibre, and containing no caffeine and no theobromine.
A Portuguese tree, which is worth saying
Carob is alfarroba, and the Algarve is one of the great growing regions for it — gnarled, drought-hardy trees that need almost no water and hold dry soil together on ground where little else will grow. For most of the twentieth century the Portuguese crop went mainly to animal feed and to the seed, which is milled into locust bean gum (E410) and turns up as a thickener in half the ice cream in Europe. The pod itself, which is the sweet part, was largely overlooked.
It is worth knowing that the seeds are also the origin of the word carat. They were once used as jewellers' weights because they were thought to be unusually consistent.
What it is not
Carob was sold to a generation as a chocolate substitute, which did it a great disservice — it loses that comparison, and it was never trying to win it. It does not taste like chocolate. It tastes of dried fruit, malt and toffee, with a roasted edge and a faint tannic dryness at the finish. Judged on its own terms it is very good; judged as chocolate it will always disappoint.
Why the caffeine and theobromine matter
This is the practical reason people choose carob, and it is a real one.
Cocoa contains theobromine and a little caffeine — both stimulants. Carob contains neither. That makes it the sensible chocolate-flavoured thing for:
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Children in the evening, and anyone who reacts badly to stimulants.
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Anyone avoiding caffeine — in pregnancy, for reflux, for migraine, or for sleep.
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Dogs. Theobromine is the compound that makes chocolate poisonous to dogs; carob does not contain it, which is why carob is what dog treats are made with. It is not a health food for a dog — it is sugar — but it is not toxic.
It is also naturally around half sugar by weight and low in fat, where cocoa is bitter and fatty. So in a recipe it sweetens as well as flavours.
Baking with it
Not a straight swap for cocoa, and here is why. Cocoa is bitter, fatty and pale-flavoured until sugar is added; carob is sweet, dry and low in fat.
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Replace cocoa by weight, then reduce the sugar in the recipe by roughly a quarter to a third.
- You may need a little more fat or liquid — carob is drying, and a straight substitution can give a tight, dusty crumb.
- It burns more easily than cocoa because of its own sugars. Drop the oven by 10–15 °C or watch the last few minutes.
- Sieve it. It clumps more than cocoa does.
Beyond baking: whisked into hot milk or oat milk it makes an excellent evening drink for a child; a spoonful goes into porridge, smoothies, energy balls and flapjack; and it works surprisingly well in savoury braises where a cook might otherwise reach for a square of dark chocolate.
Honest note
Carob is high in fibre and free of stimulants, and both of those are simply true. There is no authorised EU health claim for carob powder, so anything you read about it lowering cholesterol or settling a stomach is not something a shop is allowed to tell you, and we will not. Buy it because it tastes of toffee and malt, because it has no caffeine in it, and because it grows on a tree that asks almost nothing of the land.
Storage
Cool, dry and airtight. It absorbs moisture from the air and will cake; a sealed jar keeps it loose for a very long time.
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