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Oscar Wilde is reputed to have said that all good things in life are illegal, immoral or fattening, but he evidently wasn't thinking of chocolate, which is none of the above. No, not even fattening, if eaten in moderation. In fact, studies have proved that it contributes to less than two percent of the fat and ten percent of the sugar in U.S. diets, and also that it could have some positive health benefits. Apparently chocolate contains the same antioxidants - phenolic compounds - found in red wine, which can help protect against or slow heart disease. Being a high-energy food, it is also said to be an aphrodisiac and an anti-depressant.
Enough technical jargon, though. Most of us who like chocolate don't need a scientific reason for doing so. We eat it because it tastes good. So good, that it was once thought to be the food of the Gods by the Aztec Indians, who are said to have first discovered it. Emperor Montezuma consumed as many as 50 portions of 'chocolatl,' a warm liquid made from cocoa beans, when the Spanish explorer Hernand Cortez visited his court in 1519. The original Chocolatl was a bitter liquid but the Spaniards, to whom Cortez took it back, sweetened it with cane sugar and blended it with cinnamon and vanilla to derive a concoction that is similar to what the world consumes today as drinking chocolate.
The Spanish guarded their new discovery with great secrecy for almost an entire century, and it was only when their princess Anna married Louis XII th of France in 1615 that chocolate spread to the rest of Europe.
It was not till the 18th century that this new and improved form of chocolate made its way back across the Atlantic, this time to the United States of America, where a factory for its production was set up by John Hanau and James Baker in New England in 1765.
The nineteenth century saw many landmarks in the history of chocolate, starting with the 1828 invention of the cocoa press by C.J. Van Houten, a Dutch chocalatier, which allowed for mass production of what was heretofore an elitist commodity; followed by the introduction of fondant 'eating chocolate' by English confectioner Joseph Storrs in 1847 (prior to which there had only been 'drinking chocolate' or a coarse grained solid variety); and the creation of 'milk chocolate' in 1875 by Swiss men M. Daniel Peter and Henri Nestle, who decided it was about time to put the abundant quantities of dairy products available in their country to good use!
Nestle soon found its way out of Switzerland and across the globe in all directions. Today it is well entrenched in India, as is one of the world's other leading brands, Cadbury. Each has six production factories in this country, and, to give you an idea of the kind of output they generate, Cadbury alone buys 10,000 tonnes of cocoa from Kerala annually, plus additional quantities from the other two cocoa-growing States, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh.
In addition to Cadbury and Nestle, Indians also have access to a number of other international brands, even ones that are not locally made, thanks to the flourishing grey and black markets. They also have their pick of a number of other sources - the confectionery shops of most five star hotels, which have their own chocolates and a host of private makers, some of them turning out some excellent products.
Having delved into the history of chocolate, it might be appropriate at this point to examine what exactly it is, and how it is made. The main ingredient of chocolate is the cocoa bean, the seed of the cacao tree. No one can say for certain whether this tree - genus, Theobrama, species, cacao - originated in the Amazon basin of Brazil, the Orinoco Valley of Venezuela, or in Central America. One thing is for certain, though; it is very much a tropical plant, and is grown within a geographical belt of within 20 degrees north and south of the equator.
The process of chocolate making begins with the roasting and fermenting of the cocoa bean to make (non-alcoholic) liquor that is the purest form of chocolate. To this liquor, manufacturers add cocoa butter, sugar, vanilla, milk (in the case of milk chocolate) and, of course, their own special ingredients that distinguish each brand from the others. The different ratios of these ingredients determine the type of the chocolate - bitter, bittersweet, semi-sweet, cooking, milk etc. The only exception to the basic formula is white chocolate, which has no cocoa liquor, just cocoa butter, as its base.
Chocolate, as we know it today, extends well beyond just drinking chocolate or solid slabs. It is an essential ingredient in many cakes and desserts, cookies and confectionery. It is even used to cook savoury items like Mole sauce by, who else but the Mexicans, the descendants of the original chocoholics, the Aztecs.
Chocolate has also taken on a significance that extends well beyond the culinary. It has taken over our lives and inspired paeans from people as un-alike as a medieval Cardinal from the Vatican, Francis Brancaccio; a French aristocrat, the Marquis de Sevigne; and a twentieth century actress, Katherine Hepburn, who went as far as you attribute her success to "the result of a lifetime of chocolate." Perhaps the most touching testimonial to chocolate, though, was made my Charles M. Schulz's unforgettable cartoon character, Lucy Van Pelt of Peanuts fame: "All I really need is love, but a little chocolate now and then doesn't hurt!" It most certainly doesn't!
Recipies :
Chocolate recipes from Scharffen-berger
The success story of the Belgian Chocolate
