History of Chocolate

 Chocolate has become a commonplace, especially in American culture. Chocolate chip cookies, chocolate cakes with chocolate frosting and chocolate ganache, and chocolate covered candy bars are all quintessential flavors that everyone knows. Most people don’t mind that most common types of chocolate products have Parrafin Wax in them (1), and associate the flavor with sweet delicacies. But this now baseline flavor that we see as the opposite of vanilla was once locked to only one region, where it was harvested by the Olmecs, then the Mayans, and finally by the Aztecs, where it was used as both a currency (2) and was to be taken with chili peppers (3) rather then with nougat.

The beans were first used as a drink, dried and ground before being mixed with water to create a strong, bitter and invigorating drink. Cacao fruits were also used as an item to trade. They were a gift from the gods, and were valued higher then gold among the Aztecs, being an upper class chocolate that lower classes would only consume during special events (3), whereas those such as Kings would drink gallons at a time. The name of this drink, Xocolatl, is potentially the source of the English word for Chocolate (2). But how did the Cacao bean become the Cocoa fruit and become widespread in places such as the old world?

There are conflicting theories as to the way it travelled. There are some claims that Christopher Columbus “found” the fruit by intercepting a trade ship and brought them back with them, or that a group of friars presented them to the king as a gift (3). Another major player would be Hernando Cortes, during their domination of the Aztec empire, who noted down information about the fruit and pushed for the construction of slave powered Cacao plantations in the newly conquered land (4). However, there is no solid proof for who or how the fruit truly first arrived on old world soil. It is much easier to track once it became commonplace, however.

In Spain, once the Cocoa (a misspelled variation of Cacao which stuck in the English language (2)) fruits first arrived, they were initially used as medicine. However, being a bitter taste the Spanish were not used to, they looked to sweeten it, using sugar or honey to offset the taste. This made it a much more appetizing drink for the Spanish courts and upper class, and soon cemented it as a sign of status and culture. However, Cocoa retained the regal roots from the Aztecs by still being unattainable to the lower classes. It took centuries of technology to reach a point where anyone could taste chocolate.

Coenraad van Houten is credited with this change. Being both a chemist and an engineer, Coenraad discovered how to use Alkaline salts, making a powdered chocolate that mixed with water much easier then the previous methods. Alongside that, he (or his father (3)) invented the Cocoa Press, a hydraulic way of separating the cocoa butter from the cocoa beans. These two changes in the preparation of chocolate made it suddenly easy to mass-produce chocolate powder, which made the prices go down and therefore let everyone enjoy chocolate. This also made chocolate much reasonable to experiment with, which brings us to our current view of chocolate bars instead of Cocoa powder (2). 

Advancements came quick for chocolate after the invention of the press, after staying stagnant for centuries. J.S. Fry and Sons are credited with the creation of  the first chocolate bar in 1847. In 1876, Daniel Peter was the first to add dried milk powder to the chocolate powder, creating the first milk chocolate. A few years later, the Nestle company was made to bring this creation to the populace. In 1879, the Conch machine was invented by Rudolf Lindt, a device that gave us the texture we’re currently used to. It was at this point where the progress in chocolate began to slow, as we reach the type of chocolate we see today (3).

However, although chocolate is a fantastic taste and it is good to see it commonplace instead of reserved for the highest echelon of society, there has always been a history of slavery tied into chocolate. From Hernando Cortes’ installation of plantations and the enslavement of the natives (4), to the current epidemic of over 1.5 million children being used to cultivate chocolate today (5), there is still an intense problem that needs to be focused on. Although it is completely possible for slave-free chocolate to be made and used, Nestle and other companies continue to exploit this fact (3). It’s our job to keep this in mind and push for better regulations so we can eat chocolate, truly guilt free.

(1) Bliss, Stasia. “Does Your Chocolate Contain Wax?” Guardian Liberty Voice, 31 Aug. 2016, https://guardianlv.com/2013/08/does-your-chocolate-contain-wax/.

(2) “A Brief History of Chocolate.” BBC Bitesize, BBC, 14 Sept. 2021, https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/articles/zngsqp3.

(3) “History of Chocolate.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 14 Dec. 2017, https://www.history.com/topics/ancient-americas/history-of-chocolate.

(4) “HERNANDO CORTES: DISCOVERER OF COCOA?” We Create Beautiful Travel-Inspired Chocolate., Cocoa Hernando , 7 Jan. 2013, https://www.cocoahernando.com/hernando-cortes-discoverer-of-cocoa/#:~:text=Hernando%20Cortes%20was%20a%20famous,first%20European%20to%20discover%20chocolate.

(5) Slave free chocolate. Slave Free Chocolate. (n.d.). from https://www.slavefreechocolate.org/