CHOCOLATE AND COCOA

Cristropher Columbus found Central Aerican Indians using cacao beans for money. But he failed to discover the real treasure hidden in the dark brown, almond shaped been. This was left to the Spanish explorer Hernando Cortes.

When Cortes and his men conquered the Aztec Empire in Mexico in 1519, they dound the Indian using the cocoa beans to make a beverage called chocolatl. This early from of chocolate was very bitter, abd Spaniards didn’t like the drink until they sweetened I with sugarcane.

Cortes took cacao beans back with him to Spain, where chocolate became the special drink of the aristrocacy. The Spaniards experimented with new flavorings, such ad vanilla or cinnamon. Menwhile the art of chocolate making itself was kept a closely guarded Spanish secret.

Another 100 years passed before the other courts of Europe were introduced to the exotic drink. The elegant court of France adopted it at once. In England chocolate made its appearance in 1657 at thje first “chocolate hause”, which soon became a fashionable meeting place.

Chocolate was too expensive for any but the very wealthy, since the beans had to be ground by hand. In 1730 the invention of a machine that speeded up the grinding process lowered the price.

In 1828 C.J Van Houten, a Netherlander, revolutionized the chocolate industry by inventing a press that squeezed the rich cocoa butter out of the cacao beans. He ground the remaining chocolate into powder. This chocolate powder, or cocoa, made a smoother, less rich drink than the thick chocolate of the 18th century. Even more revolutionary., the cocoa, the cocoa butter that had been squeezed out was added to a sugar and chocolate combination and molded into bars. People began to eat chocolate as well as drink it.

But the chocolate wass still coarse and bitter. In 1876 M. D. Peter, of Vevey, Switzerland, put milk into his chocolate and produced a new flavor. A few year later final refinement turned chocolate into the smooth grained, vevelty candy of today.