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Chocolate History
Chocolate
was introduced to Spain when Christopher Columbus
returned from his fourth voyage to the New World in 1502.
Chocolate grew in popularity with
the Spaniards, who had learned its use from the Aztecs at
the time of the invasion by the Spanish explorer Hernán
Cortés in 1519. Cortés tasted chocolate prepared by the
Aztecs and learned how to convert the bitter bean into a
wonderful drink. He brought this treasure back to Spain
where the origin and preparation method remained a secret
for nearly 100 years.
In France, chocolate was met with
skepticism and was considered a "barbarous product
and noxious drug". The French court was doubtful and
accepted it only after the Paris faculty of medicine gave
its approval. A French queen finally saved the day. In
1615, Anne of Austria, wife of Louis XIII declared
chocolate as the drink of the French court.
During the early seventeenth
century, chocolate found its way to Italy and England,
among other European countries. In 1650, chocolate became
the rage in Oxford and in 1657, a shop called the The
Coffee Mill and Tobacco Roll opened in London.
Although chocolate was not featured, the drink quickly
became a best seller. As the popularity of chocolate
grew, England imposed an excessive duty of 10-15
shillings per pound. By the way, the duty was comparable
to approximately three-fourths its weight in gold. It
took almost 200 years before the duty was dropped.
In the United States, chocolate
was first manufactured in 1765. It was introduced at
Milton Lower Mills, near Dorchester, Massachusetts by
John Hanau and James Baker who opened a processing house.
The Swiss began making chocolate
in the mid 1800's. Switzerland, at the time, had cows but
did not have abundant commodities of chocolate and sugar.
In 1876, M. Daniel Peter attempted to add milk to
chocolate to produce a smoother chocolate. However,
adding water to chocolate made the chocolate shrink,
separate and generally disintegrate. Milk has water in
it, and it took Peter 8 years of experimenting before
taking his product to Henry Nestle, a maker of evaporated
milk. Nestle had perfected the manufacture of condensed
milk, and he and Peter hit upon the idea of mixing
sweetened condensed milk with chocolate.
The invention of the cocoa press
in 1828 by C. J. Van Houten, a Dutch chocolate master,
helped reduce the price of chocolate and bring it to the
masses. By squeezing out cocoa butter from the beans, Van
Houten's "dutching" was an alkalizing process
which removed the acidity and bitterness, which is why
alkali processed cocoa is also called Dutch chocolate.
Chocolate was available only as
cocoa or as a liquid until 1879. It was Rodolphe Lindt
who thought to add cocoa butter back to the chocolate.
Adding the additional cocoa butter helped the chocolate
set up into a bar that "snaps" when broken as
well as melting on the tongue.
It was World War I that really
brought attention to the chocolate candies.
The U.S. Army Quartermaster Corps
had commissioned various American chocolate manufacturers
to provide 20 - 40 pound blocks of chocolate to be
shipped to bases in the field. The blocks were chopped up
into smaller pieces and distributed to doughboys in
Europe. Eventually the task of making smaller pieces was
turned back to the manufacturers.
By the end of the War when the
doughboys arrived home, the American chocolate business
was assured. Why? Because the returning doughboys had
grown fond of chocolate candy and now as civilians wanted
more of the same. |
