How much does the Chima chocolate workshop cost?

The traditional Oaxacan chocolate workshop at Chima costs 1,650 MXN per person, about 90 USD, when I went in August 2026 and the same figure is listed on chimacacao.com. It lasts two to three hours and you leave with the chocolate you ground. Other formats are priced separately: the cacao tasting 1,250 MXN, the children's experience 1,250 MXN, the chocolate bar class 1,950 MXN.

Do I need to book Chima in advance?

Yes. Workshops at Chima run at set times for small groups and Sundays are by reservation only. Book by WhatsApp or phone at +52 951 287 3407 or through the booking pages on chimacacao.com. A few days ahead is enough outside high season; in Day of the Dead week and December book earlier.

Where is Chima in Oaxaca?

Chima is at Calle 5 de Mayo 210, Centro, Oaxaca de Juárez 68000, a block or two south of the Santo Domingo church. The workshop sits in a patio at the back of the building and is easy to miss from the street, so look for the small sign and walk through.

Is the Chima workshop in English?

Yes. Chima runs the workshop in English or Spanish, and the founder and staff switch between the two. Ask for your language when you book so the group is matched.

Can children do the Chima workshop?

The main workshop is for ages 15 and up. Chima offers a separate children's experience for ages 3 to 14, priced at 1,250 MXN, which is shorter and built around tasting and grinding rather than roasting over the comal.

Can I visit Chima without taking a workshop?

Yes. Chima is also a shop where you can taste and buy chocolate bars, drinking chocolate and cacao. Bars are priced at a premium; a 40 g bar was 155 MXN, about 8.50 USD, in August 2026. Shop hours are Monday to Friday 10 am to 8 pm and Saturday 10 am to 6 pm.

Pataxte, Theobroma bicolor, is a rare relative of cacao with white seeds and an unusual ridged shell. At Chima you taste it alongside criollo and forastero cacao during the workshop. It is fermented and used in traditional Oaxacan drinks, and next to it plain dark chocolate tastes sweet and caramel-like.

Where does Chima's cacao come from?

Chima buys cacao from small farming families in Oaxaca, with the deepest links to the Zoque community of Santa María Chimalapa in the Isthmus, where the founder is from, and to villages such as San Felipe de León. The farms grow cacao under shade with other native plants. The name Chima comes from the Zoque words for gourd and gold.

Chima Oaxaca cacao workshop: price, booking, what to expect

Chima, Oaxaca: the cacao workshop where you roast, peel and grind your own chocolate

Two-hour hands-on cacao workshop: tasting, roasting, peeling and grinding your own drinking chocolate, which you take home. 1,650 pesos per person, 15+, in English or Spanish. Book ahead via WhatsApp or website. Also works as a store, where you can taste and buy some incredible and a bit pricy chocolates (155 peso for 40g) and cacao.

A two-hour hands-on chocolate experience and shop in a hidden patio on Calle 5 de Mayo, run by Ervit Hernández from Santa María Chimalapa with cacao from small Oaxacan farms. Here is what the workshop covers, what it costs, how to book and what to buy if you skip it.

What Chima is

Chima, Cacao con Origen, is a cacao workshop and chocolate shop in a patio at the back of a building on Calle 5 de Mayo in Oaxaca’s historic centre, a short walk south of the Santo Domingo church. It is not a restaurant and not a factory tour. It is a small room decorated with candles, clay masks and cacao pods where you spend two to three hours learning how Oaxacan drinking chocolate is made, then make it yourself.

The project describes itself as an independent effort to promote the culture, history and tradition of Oaxacan cacao. The cacao comes from small farming families across the state, with the strongest ties to the Zoque community of Santa María Chimalapa in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. The name is Zoque: chima means gourd, the vessel chocolate is drunk from, and lapa means gold.

There is a shop at the front where you can taste and buy bars, drinking chocolate, cacao nibs and whole beans without joining a workshop. The place is hard to spot from the street. Look for the sign and walk through to the patio.

Who is behind it

The founder is Ervit Hernández Hernández, who grew up in Santa María Chimalapa in the rainforest of eastern Oaxaca and has worked with cacao professionally for about eight years. He leads most sessions himself, in Spanish or English, and buys beans directly from farming families and cooperatives in the Isthmus and the Chinantla region, including the village of San Felipe de León, paying more than local intermediaries do. The team around him includes a chocolate maker, a biologist, a gastronomy graduate and a Zoque language teacher. The project was profiled by The Christian Science Monitor in August 2026 in a piece on Mexican chocolate culture.

How the workshop works

Chima lists six formats on its website. The one I did is the traditional Oaxacan chocolate workshop, which runs two to three hours and follows these steps:

Introduction. Where cacao comes from, how it moved through Mesoamerica, and how it is used in Oaxaca today.
Tasting. You compare cacao types side by side. The purple-seeded forastero is the common workhorse. The almond coloured criollo is rarer. Pataxte, a cousin of cacao with white seeds and a ridged shell, is the surprise: after it, plain dark chocolate tastes like caramel. You also taste fresh seeds from an opened pod, which are juicy and sweet like mangosteen, and learn why beans fermented with their pulp taste more complex than washed beans.
Roasting. The beans go onto a clay comal over fire, which drives off acidity.
Peeling. You separate the beans from their shells by hand.
Grinding. A hand mill turns the beans to paste, and you add spices and sweetener to a recipe you choose.
Drinking. Hot water, a wooden molinillo, and your own chocolate, served with a cacao-based snack.

The drinks in the workshop are made from the purple forastero. The cacao you grind and do not drink is packed as powder for you to take home.

What I did

I did the full traditional workshop, tasted the three cacao types and the fresh pod, roasted and peeled my own beans and ground them with spices into drinking chocolate. I took the rest home as cacao powder. The pataxte tasting was the part I did not expect.

Other formats: a cacao tasting of more than fifteen preparations, a children’s experience for ages 3 to 14, a chocolate bar class where you temper and mould your own bar, a short chocolate walk, and a multi-day cacao route to the farms.

What it costs

Prices listed on chimacacao.com and observed in August 2026:

Item	Price
Traditional chocolate workshop, per person	1,650 MXN, about 90 USD
Cacao tasting	1,250 MXN, about 68 USD
Children’s experience, ages 3 to 14	1,250 MXN, about 68 USD
Chocolate bar class	1,950 MXN, about 105 USD
Chocolate walk	650 MXN, about 35 USD
Cacao route, multi-day	8,000 MXN, about 430 USD
Chocolate bar in the shop, 40 g	155 MXN, about 8.50 USD

The workshop price includes all tastings, the drink you make and the chocolate you take home. The shop bars are expensive by Oaxaca standards, which reflects direct purchasing from small farms. Prices move, so check the site before you book.

How to book

Reservations are required for every workshop, and the shop opens on Sundays only for bookings.

WhatsApp or phone: +52 951 287 3407.
Online: the experience pages on chimacacao.com have booking forms.
Social: @chima.cacao on Instagram.

Shop hours: Monday to Friday 10 am to 8 pm, Saturday 10 am to 6 pm, Sunday by reservation. Workshops run in small groups at set times; ask for English or Spanish when you book. A few days’ notice is enough most of the year. In Day of the Dead week and over Christmas book one to two weeks ahead.

Getting there

Address: Calle 5 de Mayo 210, Centro, Oaxaca de Juárez, Oaxaca 68000, Mexico.
Neighbourhood: the pedestrian core of the Centro Histórico, on the street that runs parallel to the Alcalá.
On foot: about 5 minutes from Santo Domingo and 10 minutes from the Zócalo.
Finding the door: the workshop is in a patio at the back of the building and the street entrance is discreet. If you reach the corner with Murguía or Morelos and have not seen it, walk back slowly.
Parking: none. The area is pedestrian and taxis drop at the corner.

Before you go

Minimum age 15 for the main workshop. Children under 15 need the separate kids’ format.
Allow three hours. The website says two to three, and groups that ask questions run long.
Eat first. You taste a lot of cacao and finish with one drink and a snack, not a meal.
Expect smoke and heat at the comal. Wear clothes you do not mind smelling of roasted cacao.
Bring a bag for the cacao you take home. It is packed as loose powder. It keeps for months in a cool cupboard.
Cash and card both work in the shop. Confirm card payment for the workshop when you book.
Pair it with a bakery. Chima’s drinking chocolate and a pastry from Pan con Madre make a good Oaxaca breakfast, and the bakery is a short walk away.
Check the hours before you go. The hours on this page come from the venue’s public listings, which drift, so confirm on Google Maps or the venue’s own channels before a special trip.

Watch the visit

The reel above shows the beans, the pod, the comal and the grinding. For more places in the city, open my Oaxaca map or browse the rest of the Oaxaca recommendations.