Eating and Using Chocolate

Kimberly Singleton We tend to think of chocolate as a rich, creamy food a favourite ingredient in many dishes and a luscious indulgence in its own right. But until recently in fact, (for 90% of its history), people drank chocolate; they didnt eat it. Peoples of Mesoamerica liked their chocolate drink frothy and spicy. The Classic Period Maya (250-900 C.E. [A.D.]) and Aztecs (1250-1521) were early 5connoisseurs of chocolates flavourful properties. They made chocolate by mixing crushed cacao seeds with water. The result was a tepid, foamy, and quite bitter beverage. The Aztec people spiced their drink with chilli peppers, thickened it with cornmeal, or flavoured it with honey, vanilla, or flower petals. Sugar wasnt yet available as a sweetener in the Americas. Europeans liked their chocolate drink sweet and hot. When the Spanish conquered the Aztecs, 10they found the native chocolate drink too bitter for their tastes. To sweeten and flavour it, the Spanish added sugar, cinnamon, cardamom, and other spices. The Spanish managed to keep their delicious drink a secret from others for almost 100 years. But eventually versions of the brew spread like wildfire throughout Europe, becoming the popular drink of the continents rich and elite. Today, people worldwide love sweetened chocolate as a drink and as a food. 15During the mid-1800s, new machines made it possible to inexpensively mass-produce solid chocolate candy. No longer a rich persons treat, chocolate became affordable to a much wider audience. Today, chefs in many countries have incorporated chocolate into specialty dishes, desserts, and drinks so that this sweet can now be found in some form on most menus around the world. 20Chocolate is more than just a food. Its rarity and richness have secured it a special status in history. For hundreds of years and in many different cultures, the act of eating chocolate has taken on symbolic significance. Chocolate has been linked to religion, power and romance especially when chocolate was considered an expensive and rare luxury. At sacred altars, Aztec priests presented cacao seeds as offerings to their deities. Drinking chocolate was often a part of 25special religious events. And only elite members of society merchants, soldiers, priests, and rulers were allowed to consume such a sacred and powerful drink. In the Aztec culture, only high-ranking figures were deemed worthy of drinking chocolate. And when the Spanish first brought the beverage home, the custom remained the same. The rare and expensive import was a status symbol fit for (and affordable to) only elite members of society. Although relatively 30inexpensive today, chocolate's richness still symbolically represents luxury. Chocolates allure as an aphrodisiac is legendary. The Aztec ruler Montezuma II is said to have drunk an extra cup of chocolate before consorting with favoured ladies. Even today, chocolate remains a popular Valentines Day gift. For centuries, chocolate has been shrouded in mystery and legend. Many cultures believed that 35chocolate was a gift from the heavens, or that it had special healing properties. Today, many cultures still consider chocolate a potent weapon in the fight against disease and illness. Modern scientists have only recently begun to understand what, if any, medicinal powers chocolate contains.
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Maya and Aztec people drank chocolate not only for pleasure, but also for its perceived healing 40and nourishing powers. They used it to treat a host of illnesses, such as seizures, fevers, dysentery, diarrhoea, and skin infections. Like most new foods, chocolate was received with mixed reactions by Europeans. Encountering chocolate for the first time in the 1600s, some believed it could induce sleep, aid digestion, purify the blood, ease childbirth pains, and enhances libidos though others believed it could cause drunkenness or illness. Some doctors 45even claimed chocolate prolonged life and cured everything from ringworm to ulcers! Modern science says that chocolate may not be all bad for you. For a long time, the medical profession assumed that traditional folk remedies using chocolate were pure wives tales. In fact, chocolate developed a bad reputation for causing everything from acne to tooth decay. But current research reveals the fact and fiction behind many of these beliefs. Although scientists 50are still trying to understand the more than 300 chemicals in chocolate, there may be some beneficial side effects to eating chocolate.

Taken from: http://www.fmnh.org/chocolate/eat_intro.html