The History of Chocolate

The History of Chocolate

Chocolate is definitely something that is part of daily life. Many of us might say we can not live without chocolate. However how many of us have actually stopped and thought about where this wonderful creation began. Historians have estimated that chocolate has been around for about 2,000 years. However many scientists believe it may even date back to 1400BC. 

The history of chocolate begins in Mesoamerica which was a region in the Americas. The cacao tree is native in Mesoamerica and cacao was used extensively. The Mesoamericans first cultivated the cacao plants. They roasted and ground the beans into a paste which they mixed with water, vanilla, honey, chilli peppers and other spices to brew a frothy chocolate drink that was quite bitter. The Myan people and the Aztecs both believed the cacao bean had divine or magical properties and used it in sacred rituals. The cacao beans even became a form of currency in the Aztec Empire. Records from the Spanish conquistadors tell us the value of the bean and that 100 beans could buy a turkey hen. The Aztecs believed the cacao bean was a gift from a god, Quetzacoat. 

Hernando Cortes first realised the commercial value of cocoa beans and brought the cacao beans back to Spain in 1528. Cortes and his men did not like the drinking chocolate at first. One of the men described it in his writings as a 'bitter drink for pigs'. However once they mixed it with honey or sugar cane, it became popular. The custom of drinking chocolate spread across Europe, reaching England in the 1650s. It remained very much a drink for the rich throughout Europe until the invention of the steam engine made mass production possible in the late 1700s.

Joseph Fry created the first modern day chocolate bar in 1847. 'He discovered that he could make a mouldable chocolate paste by adding melted cacao butter back into Dutch cocoa'. In 1868 Cadbury started marketing boxes of chocolate in England and the rest as they say, is history.

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