17 Things You Didn’t Know About Chocolate
From solid chocolate to white chocolate, here are some interesting tidbits you didn’t know about this sweet treat.
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7. Chocolate Celebrations
Chocolate is deliciously sweet and deserves to be honored as such which is no surprise that there are actual holidays out there that commemorate it. There are at least 30 different holidays on the Gregorian calendar that observe the significance of chocolate. There is at least one recognized day for chocolate each month. Some of these “holidays” include International Chocolate Day on September 13, National Milk Chocolate Day on July 28, and even National Bittersweet Chocolate With Almonds Day which is on November 7. July 7 is known as Chocolate Day which is supposed to recognize when it was first brought to Europe.
6. Dark Chocolate
Also referred to as “plain chocolate” and “black chocolate,” dark chocolate is regarded as being the more healthier alternative out of all the other varieties of chocolate. It’s even been regarded as being “a potential superfood” due to the fact that it does contain antioxidants and has a pretty low sugar content than milk and white chocolate. Instead of being made with a milk-based butter, dark chocolate is instead made with cacao butter and must have a certain percentage of cacao solids in order to truly be considered dark chocolate. It varies by market but generally the threshold must contain between 70-85 percent of cacao solids.
5. Milk Chocolate
This type of chocolate has been around since 1839 when it was first created by the German company Jordan & Timaeus, though it was only available as a drink. The first account of actual solid milk chocolate was recorded in 1875 when a Swiss confectioner by the name of Daniel Peter invented it with his neighbor Henri Nestlé, thee Henri Nestlé of Nestlé. The chocolate is made by mixing solid chocolate with, drumroll please, milk. Well, milk that comes in the form of milk powder, liquid milk, or condensed milk. To qualify as milk chocolate, it needs to be made with at least 10 percent cacao liquor as stated by the US Government.
4. White Chocolate
White chocolate was first introduced to the public sometime back in the 1930’s and is often regarded as not being true chocolate at all due to it not having cacao solids or chocolate liquor, specifically in Europe. White chocolate comes from ripe cacao beans that are fermented, dried, and then roasted. The insides are then removed from their shells and those are what we refer to as cacao nibs. The nibs are ground into a paste which is called chocolate liquor which is then separated into both cacao butter and cacai solids by using a press. The cacao butter is then used to create the white chocolate by adding other ingredients such as vanilla, sugar, and milk fat to make it taste better.
3. Sweet Vegetable?
All chocolate starts off in the form of a bean, the cacao bean to be precise. Now, the cacao bean grows from the branches of the cacao tree. The cacao seeds are located inside of the fruit pods which are then harvested at the appropriate time. And so begs the question: “is chocolate really a vegetable?” The thing is that the cacao tree is also classified in the same family as the vegetable okra and even cotton, that family being Malvaceae. And as of last year, the FDA has actually acknowledged this and now recognizes chocolate as being a vegetable. Eating vegetables just got a whole lot easier.
2. The Fourth Chocolate
For the past 80 years give or take, there have only been three official varieties of chocolate that are recognized. Those three varieties being dark chocolate, milk chocolate, and white chocolate. However, as of last year, a Swiss chocolatier named Barry Callebaut has introduced what is being hailed as the fourth type of chocolate: ruby. Derived from the ruby cacao bean, ruby chocolate gets its pink-reddish hue naturally and has a flavor like no other. It’s been described as having “ a berry-fruitiness and luscious smoothness.” It’s been in development since 2004 and the new flavor is said to be available for purchase after January 9, 2018 in South Korea and Japan as a new kit-kat bar flavor.
1. Chocolate Origins
The cacao bean itself can be traced all the way back to at least 1250 B.C. when it was being cultivated by the Natives of Mexico, Central and South America. The incredibleness of chocolate is recorded to have been introduced to the region of Europe all the way back in 1550 all thanks to colonization. It’s been said that chocolate may have found its way to Europe even earlier in 1504 during Christopher Columbus’ return from his final trip of exploiting the America’s natives and their land. Though chocolate originates from the Americas, today seventy percent of the world’s cacao supply is now grown in Africa.