The Story of Chocolate
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZygrg_PF2A
The Origin of Chocolate
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dF5fkHfNjVs
Cacao Tree
Chocolate comes from the cacao tree, which is
formally known as Theobroma Cacao.
Cacao trees grow in three main regions:
•West Africa
•South and Central Americas
•Southeast Asia and Oceania
Cacao trees flourish only in the hot, rainy
tropics, 20 degrees north and south of the
Equator.
Cacao trees are delicate plants that live in the
understory of tropical forests and require
other, taller trees to shelter them from wind
and sun.
Pods
The fruit of the cacao tree is a football-shaped
pod that comes in various colors depending on
genetics and degree of ripeness—green,
yellow, orange, red, purple or maroon.
Inside each pod is sweet white pulp and
juice—which can be used to make drinks with
a sweet, mild flavor—covering 50 to 60 seeds.
Before the pod can grow, however, the tree’s
flowers must be pollinated. They have no
scent. Insects such as a type of gnat called a
midge pollinate them naturally, or a farmer can
do so by hand. Of the thousands of flowers on
each tree, only three to 10 percent will
become fruit.
The same tree may have both cocoa flowers
and fruit on it at any given time, as the tree
bears fruit year round. Pods ripen after five to
six months.
Beans
The 50 to 60 seeds that nestle in the pods’
sweet juicy pulp are what we call cocoa beans.
Harvesting Beans
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=or8YbcFMaFs
Fermenting Beans
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQwgOW32LIU
The Chocolate Farm
For the most part, cacao is grown by hand on
family-run farms as small as two and one-half
acres apiece
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPl7B3HWSSU
The Chocolate Factory
While details differ, most manufacturers follow
the same general process to turn cacao seeds
into scrumptious chocolate.
No matter what the step, professionals at the
factory take and test samples to ensure the
chocolate meets or exceeds safety and quality
standards. Computers control temperatures,
air moisture content, length of processing
steps and more to ensure each batch is
consistent and high quality.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Exbn8PjtBuo
Roasting and Pressing
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJqGF2kFjtU
The Story of Chocolate
What is it? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RtWJGThNfb8
Who Depends on it?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64Vy57rpWtA
Savor it? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4dmYl-ZoZI
Ingredients
Ingredients
Chocolate is a natural product made of these
ingredients:
Chocolate Liquor: Cocoa beans with their
shells removed that have been fermented,
roasted and ground until they liquefy. This
liquid is made up of cocoa butter and cocoa
solids; both are naturally present in the bean.
Cocoa Butter: Natural fat from the cocoa bean;
extra cocoa butter enhances chocolate’s flavor
and mouth feel.
Sugar
Lecithin: An emulsifier, often made from soy,
that makes the ingredients blend together.
Vanilla or vanillin and other flavors.
It also may include
Milk: For milk chocolate.
Kinds
Dark Chocolate: The bare essentials
Dark chocolate is simply chocolate liquor (the
centers of cocoa beans ground to a liquid),
extra cocoa butter, sugar, an emulsifier (often
lecithin) and vanilla or other flavorings. Dark
chocolates may contain milk fat to soften the
texture, but they do not generally have a
milky flavor.
Dark chocolate also is known as semi-sweet
chocolate. Unsweetened chocolate, or baking
chocolate, is 100 percent chocolate liquor and
is typically very bitter and astringent.
Darker chocolates often have a higher percent
cacao, which means they have a higher
proportion of cocoa beans in them than other
chocolates do
Kinds
Milk Chocolate: All of the above, plus milk solids
Surprisingly, sweet and creamy milk
chocolate isn’t usually made with cold,
frothy milk. It’s usually made with dry
milk solids, which look like powdered
milk. Milk chocolate has at least 10
percent cocoa liquor by weight, and at
least 12 percent milk solids. It’s the
most common kind of eating
chocolate.
Kinds
White Chocolate: Cocoa butter takes center stage.
White chocolate features cocoa
butter—think milk chocolate minus
the cocoa solids. In addition to the
cocoa butter, sugar, milk solids,
lecithin and vanilla, white chocolate
may contain other flavorings. It has at
least 20 percent cocoa butter, 14
percent milk solids, and no more than
55 percent sugar.
Additional Information
Baking Chocolate: Chocolate liquor, served straight up, is all that’s in baking chocolate. Its
bitterness comes from pure nibs, the finely ground centers of roasted cocoa beans. Also called
unsweetened chocolate, it has no sugar and is used often in dessert recipes with sugar as a separate
ingredient. All other chocolate is called eating chocolate.
•Bittersweet Chocolate: The darkest of eating chocolate, bittersweet has the highest percentage of
chocolate liquor and may contain extra cocoa butter. Both bittersweet and semi-sweet chocolate
must contain at least 35 percent chocolate liquor, but bittersweet usually contains at least 50
percent cacao. Chocolates in this range are often referred to as dark chocolate.
•Cacao and % Cacao: Pronounced “kuh-KOW” or “kuh-KAY -oh”, cacao represents the three
ingredients derived from a cocoa bean—chocolate liquor, extra cocoa butter and cocoa powder. The
% cacao refers to the total amount of these ingredients contained, by weight, in the finished product.
•Chocolate-Flavored Coating: These coatings may contain chocolate liquor and/or cocoa powder,
but use vegetable fats to supplement or replace cocoa butter. While often used to cover
confectionery or ice cream products, they can be molded into solid bars or shapes. While coatings
made with vegetable fats cannot be called “chocolate,” they may legally use the claim “made with
chocolate” if they are made with chocolate liquor, since U.S. regulations consider “chocolate” and
“chocolate liquor” as synonymous.
•Chocolate Liquor: Grinding the nib, or center, of a cocoa bean into a smooth, liquid state
produces what’s called chocolate liquor—also called chocolate mass, cocoa mass, cacao mass and
cocoa paste. According to U.S. regulations, chocolate liquor may also be called chocolate,
unsweetened chocolate, baking chocolate, or bitter chocolate. An essential part of dark and milk
chocolate, this ingredient with the many names does not contain alcohol, or vegetable fat.
Coco Powder http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uny_8rfnSMM
Additional Information
•Cocoa Beans: The source of all things chocolate, cocoa “beans” are actually seeds
from the fruit of Theobroma cacao, a tree native to the tropical Amazon forests that is
now grown commercially worldwide within 20 degrees latitude of the Equator.
Approximately 20 to 40 seeds cluster inside football-shaped pods and are covered by
sweet white fruit pulp.
•Cocoa Butter: Cocoa butter is the fat naturally present in cocoa beans. It melts just
below body temperature, giving chocolate its unique mouthfeel. The nibs, or centers of
the cocoa beans, are 50 to 60 percent cocoa butter. There is no connection to dairy
butter.
Additional Information
•Cocoa or Cocoa Powder: Comes from pressing chocolate liquor, the liquid that comes from grinding the
nibs or centers of cocoa beans, to separate out of the cocoa butter. What’s left are the chocolate solids,
called press cake. The press cake is then ground, becoming the dry cocoa powder used in hot cocoa mixes
and baking. Under U.S. regulations, “cocoa” and “cocoa powder” can be used interchangeably.
•Cocoa Solids: Chocolate liquor without most of the cocoa butter—the ground nibs, or centers of cocoa
beans, with the cocoa butter pressed out. Cocoa solids, sometimes called chocolate solids, often are
ground into cocoa powder.
•Dutch (or Dutched) Process: While being ground into chocolate liquor and pressed into cocoa powder,
nibs may be treated with an alkaline solution to neutralize acidity. This process darkens the color of the
cocoa and produces a milder chocolate flavor. When treated cocoa is used in a food product, the terms
“dutched” or “alkalized” are included on the ingredient declaration for products sold in the U.S.
•Nib: The nib is the center or meat of the cocoa bean. Roasted or unroasted cocoa beans are cracked
mechanically to break off the cocoa bean shells and expose the nibs. See more about
•Organic Chocolate: Chocolate grown without agricultural chemicals and meeting USDA Organic
requirements.
•Raw Chocolate: Raw chocolate is made from unroasted cocoa beans
•Semisweet Chocolate: Like bittersweet chocolate, semisweet chocolate is required by U.S. regulations to
contain at least 35 percent chocolate liquor. Generally, semisweet chocolate contains 35 to 45 percent
chocolate liquor. Semisweet chocolate is often referred to as dark chocolate.
•Sweet Chocolate: Sweet chocolate is a combination of chocolate liquor, cocoa butter and sugar
containing at least 15 percent chocolate liquor.
•Unsweetened Chocolate: The same as baking chocolate (above).
Health and Chocolate
Chocolate has been an enjoyable part of people’s diets and has been used as
medicine by various cultures throughout the ages. In recent years, scientific
evidence has begun to indicate that the nutrients, phytonutrients and fatty acids
found naturally in cocoa may be associated with a lower risk of cardiovascular
disease. These effects have been attributed to flavanols, which are natural
compounds that occur in a wide range of fruits and vegetables and have been
extensively studied in cocoa.
Over the past decade, studies examining the eating patterns of adults and their
overall health over the course of several years suggest that those who regularly
included cocoa products and chocolate in their diets maintained better
cardiovascular health.
Over the past five years, in various studies that examined the cocoa and chocolate
eating habits of over 90,000 adults of mixed ages, ethnicities and genders over
the course of multiple years, individuals who reported eating chocolate on some
regular basis were less likely to develop a range of cardiovascular
problems. Findings included a reduction in overall mortality and blood pressure.
In a Nut Shell
How is chocolate made?
Chocolate, known in ancient societies as "food of the gods," comes
from cocoa beans, cacao, grown in tropical locations around the world.
After the beans are removed from their pods they're fermented, dried,
roasted and cracked, separating the nibs (which contain cocoa butter)
from the shells. The nibs are ground to extract some of the cocoa
butter, leaving a thick, dark brown paste called chocolate liquor.
Next, the chocolate liquor is refined (sugar, milk or other ingredients
are added), and finally, it goes through conching, a process by which
huge machines with rotating blades slowly blend the heated chocolate
liquor, ridding it of excess moisture and acids.
The result is the sweet, delicious dark brown squares, bars, chips and
chunks we love so much!