In popular culture

A box of assorted chocolates, often given as a gift.

Holidays

Chocolate is one of the most popular holiday gifts. On Valentine's Day, a box of chocolates is traditional, usually presented with flowers and a greeting card. It may be given on other holidays, and birthdays. At Easter, chocolate eggs are traditional. This is a confectionery made primarily of chocolate, and can either be solid, hollow, or filled with other sweets or fondant. Many confectioners make holiday-specific chocolate candies, usually variants of their standard fare.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory 

Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory

Books and film

Chocolate has been the center of several successful book and film adaptations. In 1964, Roald Dahl published a children's novel titled Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. The novel centers on a poor boy named Charlie Bucket who takes a tour through the greatest chocolate factory in the world, owned by Willy Wonka. Two film adaptations of the novel were produced. The first was Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, a 1971 film which later became a cult classic. Thirty-four years later, a second film adaptation was produced, titled Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. The 2005 film was very well received by critics and was one of the highest grossing films that year, earning over US$470,000,000 worldwide. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was also recognized at the 78th Academy Awards, where it was nominated for Best Costume Design for Gabriella Pesucci.

Like Water for Chocolate 

Like Water for Chocolate (Como agua para chocolate), a 1989 love story by novelist Laura Esquivel, was adapted to film in 1992. The plot incorporates magical realism with Mexican cuisine, and the title is a double entendre in its native language, referring both to a recipe for hot chocolate and to an idiom that is a metaphor for sexual arousal. The film earned 11 Ariel Awards from the Academia Mexicana de Artes y Ciencias Cinematográficas, including Best Picture.

Chocolat, a 1999 novel by Joanne Harris, tells the story of Vianne Rocher, a young mother, whose confections change the lives of the townspeople. The 2000 film adaptation,Chocolat, also proved successful, grossing over US$150,000,000 worldwide, and receiving Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations for Best Picture, Best Actress, and Best Original Score.

Chocolate also features in a large number of other literary works, often in a role central to the plot such as JoAnna Carl's Chocoholic Mysteries series and Toby Moore's Death by Chocolate.

Death by Chocolate 

Toby Moore (Author) 

Types of chocolate

Cocoa butter

Chocolate is a range of products derived from cocoa (cacao), mixed with fat (i.e. cocoa butter and/or plant oils) and finely powdered sugar to produce a solid confection. There are several types of chocolate according to the proportion of cocoa used in a particular formulation.

The use of particular name designations is sometimes subject to governmental regulation.

Terminology

The cocoa bean (or other alternative) products from which chocolate is made are known under different names in different parts of the world. In the American chocolate industry:

• chocolate liquor is the ground or melted state of the nib of the cacao bean
• cocoa butter is the fat component
• cocoa powder is the nonfat part of the cacao bean, which is ground into a powder.

Cocoa powder

Classification

Chocolate is available in many types. Different forms and flavors of chocolate are produced by varying the quantities of the different ingredients. Other flavors can be obtained by varying the time and temperature when roasting the beans.

• "Unsweetened chocolate", also known as "bitter", "baking chocolate" or "cooking chocolate" is pure chocolate liquor mixed with some form of fat to produce a solid substance. The pure, ground, roasted cocoa beans impart a strong, deep chocolate flavor. With the addition of sugar, however, it is used as the base for cakes, brownies, confections, and cookies.

Unsweetened chocolate

• "Dark chocolate", also called "plain chocolate" or "black chocolate", is produced by adding fat and sugar to cocoa. It is chocolate with no or much less milk than milk chocolate. The U.S. has no official definition for dark chocolate but European rules specify a minimum of 35% cocoa solids. Dark chocolate can be eaten as is, or used in cooking, for which thicker, more expensive baking bars with higher cocoa percentages ranging from 70% to 99% are sold. Dark is synonymous with semisweet, and extra dark with bittersweet, although the ratio of cocoa butter to solids may vary.

• "Semisweet chocolate" is frequently used for cooking purposes. It is a dark chocolate with (by definition in Swiss usage) half as much sugar as cocoa, beyond which it is "sweet chocolate."
• "Bittersweet chocolate" is chocolate liquor (or unsweetened chocolate) to which some sugar (less than a third), more cocoa butter, vanilla and sometimes lecithin has been added. It has less sugar and more liquor than semisweet chocolate, but the two are interchangeable when baking. Bittersweet and semisweet chocolates are sometimes referred to as 'couverture'. Many brands now print on the package the percentage of cocoa in the chocolate (as chocolate liquor and added cocoa butter). The higher the percentage of cocoa, the less sweet the chocolate is.
• "Couverture" is a term used for chocolates rich in cocoa butter. Popular brands of couverture used by professional pastry chefs and often sold in gourmet and specialty food stores include: Valrhona, Felchlin, Lindt & Sprüngli, Scharffen Berger, Cacao Barry, Callebaut, and Guittard. These chocolates contain a high percentage of cocoa.

Dark chocolate

•  "Milk chocolate" is solid chocolate made with milk in the form of milk powder, liquid milk, or condensed milk added. In the 1870s, Swiss confectioner Daniel Peter had developed solid milk chocolate using condensed milk; hitherto it had only been available as a drink. The U.S. Government requires a 10% concentration of chocolate liquor. EU regulations specify a minimum of 25% cocoa solids, however an agreement was reached in 2003 that allows milk chocolate in the UK and Ireland to contain only 20% cocoa solids. This type of chocolate must be called "family milk chocolate" elsewhere in the European Union.

Milk chocolate

• "Hershey process" milk chocolate is popular in North America. It was invented by Milton S. Hershey, founder of The Hershey Company, and can be produced more cheaply than other processes since it is less sensitive to the freshness of the milk. The process is a trade secret, but experts speculate that the milk is partially lipolyzed, producing butyric acid, which stabilizes the milk from further fermentation. This compound gives the product a particular sour, "tangy" taste, to which the American public has become accustomed, to the point that other manufacturers now simply add butyric acid to their milk chocolates.

•  "White chocolate" is a confection based on sugar, milk, and cocoa butter without the cocoa solids.
• "Cocoa powder" is used for baking, and for drinking with added milk and sugar. There are two types of unsweetened cocoa powder: natural cocoa (like the sort produced by the Broma process), and Dutch-process cocoa. Both are made by pulverising partially defatted chocolate liquor and removing nearly all the cocoa butter; Dutch-process cocoa is additionally processed with alkali to neutralise its natural acidity. Natural cocoa is light in colour and somewhat acidic with a strong chocolate flavour. Natural cocoa is commonly used in recipes that also use baking soda; as baking soda is an alkali, combining it with natural cocoa creates a leavening action that allows the batter to rise during baking. Dutch cocoa is slightly milder in taste, with a deeper and warmer colour than natural cocoa. Dutch-process cocoa is frequently used for chocolate drinks such as hot chocolate due to its ease in blending with liquids. However, Dutch processing destroys most of the flavonoids present in cocoa. In 2005 Hershey discontinued their pure Dutch-process European Style cocoa and replaced it with Special Dark, a blend of natural and Dutch-process cocoa.
• "Compound chocolate" is the technical term for a confection combining cocoa with vegetable fat, usually tropical fats and/or hydrogenated fats, as a replacement for cocoa butter. It is often used for candy bar coatings. In many countries it may not legally be called "chocolate".
• "Raw chocolate" is chocolate that has not been processed, heated, or mixed with other ingredients. It is sold in chocolate-growing countries, and to a much lesser extent in other countries, often promoted as healthy.

Flavors such as mint, vanilla, coffee, orange, or strawberry are sometimes added to chocolate in a creamy form or in very small pieces. Chocolate bars frequently contain added ingredients such as peanuts, nuts, fruit, caramel, and crisped rice. Pieces of chocolate, in various flavours, are sometimes added to cereals and ice cream.

United States

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulates the naming and ingredients of cocoa products:

Product	Chocolate Liquor	Milk Solids	Sugar	Cocoa Fat	Milk Fat
Milk Chocolate	≥ 10%	≥ 12%
Sweet Chocolate	≥ 15%	< 12%
Semisweet or Bittersweet (Dark) Chocolate	≥ 35%	< 12%
White Chocolate		≥ 14%	≤ 55%	≥ 20%	≥ 3.5%

In March 2007, the Chocolate Manufacturers Association, whose members include Hershey's, Nestlé, and Archer Daniels Midland, began lobbying the FDA to change the legal definition of chocolate to allow the substitution of "safe and suitable vegetable fats and oils" (including partially hydrogenated vegetable oils) for cocoa butter in addition to using "any sweetening agent" (including artificial sweeteners) and milk substitutes. Currently, the FDA does not allow a product to be referred to as "chocolate" if the product contains any of these ingredients.

Canada

The legislation for cocoa and chocolate products in Canada is found in Division 4 of the Food and Drug Regulations (FDR), under the Food and Drugs Act (FDA). The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) is responsible for the administration and enforcement of the FDR and FDA (as it relates to food). 

Product	Cocoa Butter	Milk Solids	Milk Fat	Fat-Free Cocoa Solids	Cocoa Solids
Milk Chocolate	≥ 15%	≥ 12%	≥ 3.39%	≥ 2.5%	≥ 25%
Sweet Chocolate	≥ 18%	< 12%		≥ 12%	≥ 30%
Chocolate, Bittersweet Chocolate, Semi-sweet Chocolate or Dark Chocolate	≥ 18%	< 5%		≥ 14%	≥ 35%
White Chocolate	≥ 20%	≤ 14%	≥ 3.5%

The use of cocoa butter substitutes in Canada is not permitted. Chocolate sold in Canada cannot contain vegetable fats or oils.

The only sweetening agents permitted in chocolate in Canada are listed in Division 18 of the Food and Drug Regulations. Artificial sweeteners such as aspartame, sucralose,acesulfame potassium, and sugar alcohols (sorbitol, maltitol, etc.) are not permitted.

Products manufactured or imported into Canada that contain non-permitted ingredients (vegetable fats or oils, artificial sweeteners) cannot legally be called “chocolate” when sold in Canada. A non-standardized name such as “candy” must be used.

European Union

Products labelled as "Family Milk Chocolate" elsewhere in the European Union are permitted to be labelled as simply "Milk Chocolate" in the U.K. and Ireland.

Product	Total Dry Cocoa Solids	Cocoa Butter	Non-Fat Cocoa Solids	Total Fat	Milk Fat	Milk Solids	Flour/starch
Chocolate	≥ 35%	≥ 18%	≥ 14%
Couverture Chocolate	≥ 35%	≥ 31%	≥ 2.5%
Chocolate Vermicelli or Flakes	≥ 32%	≥ 12%	≥ 14%
Milk Chocolate	≥ 25%		≥ 2.5%	≥ 25%	≥ 3.5%	≥ 14%
Couverture Milk Chocolate	≥ 25%		≥ 2.5%	≥ 31%	≥ 3.5%	≥ 14%
Milk Chocolate Vermicelli or Flakes	≥ 20%		≥ 2.5%	≥ 12%	≥ 3.5%	≥ 12%
Family Milk Chocolate	≥ 20%		≥ 2.5%	≥ 25%	≥ 5%	≥ 20%
Cream Chocolate	≥ 25%		≥ 2.5%	≥ 25%	≥ 5.5%	≥ 14%
Skimmed Milk Chocolate	≥ 25%		≥ 2.5%	≥ 25%	≤ 1%	≥ 14%
White Chocolate		≥ 20%				≥ 14%
Chocolate a la taza	≥ 35%	≥ 18%	≥ 14%				≤ 8%
Chocolate familiar a la taza	≥ 30%	≥ 18%	≥ 12%				≤ 18%
Note: "Total Fat" refers to the combined cocoa butter and milk fat content.

Japan

In Japan, 'chocolate materials' and 'chocolate products' are classified on a complex scale (q.v. ja:チョコレート#チョコレートの規格).

• Chocolate materials (チョコレート生地 chokorēto kiji):
• Pure chocolate material (純チョコレート生地 jun-chokorēto kiji)

Cocoa content ≥35%, cocoa butter ≥18%, sucrose ≤55%, lecithin ≤0.5%, no additives other than lecithin and vanilla flavouring, no fats other than cocoa butter and milk fats, water ≤3%

• Pure milk chocolate material (純ミルクチョコレート生地 jun-miruku chokorēto kiji)

Cocoa content ≥21%, cocoa butter ≥18%, milk solids ≥14%, milk fats ≥3.5%, sucrose ≤55%, lecithin ≤0.5%, no additives other than lecithin and vanilla flavouring, no fats other than cocoa butter and milk fats, water ≤3%

• Chocolate material (チョコレート生地 chokorēto kiji)

Cocoa content ≥35%, cocoa butter ≥18%, water ≤3%. It is also permitted to substitute milk solids for cocoa content as follows: cocoa content ≥21%, cocoa butter ≥18%, combined milk solids & cocoa content ≥35%, milk fats ≥3%, water ≤3%.

• Milk chocolate material (ミルクチョコレート生地 miruku chokorēto kiji)

Cocoa content ≥21%, cocoa butter ≥18%, milk solids ≥14%, milk fats ≥3%, water ≤3%

• Quasi chocolate material (準チョコレート生地 jun-chokorēto kiji) 

Cocoa content ≥15%, cocoa butter ≥3%, fats ≥18%, water ≤3%

• Quasi milk chocolate material (準ミルクチョコレート生地 jun-miruku chokorēto kiji)

Cocoa content ≥7%, cocoa butter ≥3%, fats ≥18%, milk solids ≥12.5%, milk fats ≥2%, water ≤3%

• Chocolate products (チョコレート製品 chokorēto seihin):

Products using milk chocolate or quasi milk chocolate as described above are handled in the same way as chocolate / quasi chocolate.

• Chocolate (チョコレート chokorēto)

Processed chocolate products made from chocolate material itself or containing at least 60% chocolate material. Processed chocolate products must contain at least 40% chocolate material by weight. Amongst processed chocolate products, those containing at least 10% by weight of cream and no more than 10% of water can be called raw chocolate (生チョコレート nama chokorēto)

• Chocolate sweet (チョコレート菓子 chokorēto kashi)

Processed chocolate products containing less than 60% chocolate material

• Quasi chocolate (準チョコレート jun-chokorēto)

The Quasi symbol should officially be circled. Processed quasi chocolate products made from quasi chocolate material itself or containing at least 60% quasi chocolate material.

• Quasi chocolate sweet (準チョコレート菓子 jun-chokorēto kashi)

Processed quasi chocolate products containing less than 60% quasi chocolate material

Definition

Chocolate is a product based on cocoa solid and/or cocoa fat. The amount and types of cocoa solids and fat that the term implies is a matter of controversy. Manufacturers have an incentive to use the term for variations that are cheaper to produce, containing less cocoa and cocoa substitutes, although these variations might not taste as good.

There has been disagreement in the EU about the definition of chocolate; this dispute covers several ingredients, including the types of fat used, quantity of cocoa, and so on. But, in 1999, the EU at least resolved the fat issue by allowing up to 5% of chocolate's content to be one of 5 alternatives to cocoa butter: illipe oil, palm oil, sal, shea butter, kokum gurgi, or mango kernel oil.

A recent workaround by the US confection industry has been to reduce the amount of cocoa butter in candy bars without using vegetable fats by adding polyglycerol polyricinoleate(PGPR), which is an artificial castor oil-derived emulsifier that simulates the mouthfeel of fat. Up to 0.3% PGPR may be added to chocolate for this purpose.

Etymology

The word "chocolate" entered the English language from Spanish. How the word came into Spanish is less certain, and there are multiple competing explanations. Perhaps the most cited explanation is that "chocolate" comes from Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs, from the word chocolātl, which many sources derived from xocolātl [ʃokolaːtɬ], fromxococ 'sour' or 'bitter', and ātl 'water' or 'drink'. However, as William Bright noted the word "chocolatl" does not occur in central Mexican colonial sources, making this an unlikely derivation. Santamaria gives a derivation from the Yucatec Maya word "chokol" meaning hot, and the Nahuatl "atl" meaning water. Sophie and Michael D. Coe agree with this etymology.

Pointing to various sources dating from the time period of the Spanish conquest, they identify cacahuatl ("cacao water") as the original Nahuatl word for the cold beverage consumed by the Aztecs. Noting that using a word with caca in it to describe a thick, brown beverage would not have gone over well with most speakers of Spanish due to the fact that caca means faeces in Spanish, the Coes suggest that the Spanish colonisers combined the Nahuatl atl with the Yucatec Maya chocol, for unlike the Aztec, the Maya tended to drink chocolate heated. The Spanish preferred the warm Mayan preparation of the beverage to the cold Aztec one, and so the colonisers substituted chocol in place of the culturally unacceptable caca.

More recently, Dakin and Wichmann derive it from another Nahuatl term, "chicolatl" from eastern Nahuatl, meaning "beaten drink". They derive this term from the word for the frothing stick, "chicoli". However, the Coes write that xicalli referred to the gourd out of which the beverage was consumed and that the use of a frothing stick (known as amolinollo) was a product of creolisation between the Spanish and Aztec; the original frothing method used by the indigenous people was simply pouring the drink from a height into another vessel.

Introduction

Chocolate is a raw or processed food produced from the seed of the tropical Theobroma cacao tree.

Theobroma cacao tree

 Cacao has been cultivated for at least three millennia in Mexico, Central and South America. Its earliest documented use is around 1100 BC. The majority of the Mesoamerican people made chocolate beverages, including the Aztecs, who made it into a beverage known asxocolātl, a Nahuatl word meaning "bitter water". The seeds of the cacao tree have an intense bitter taste, and must be fermented to develop the flavor.

After fermentation, the beans are dried, then cleaned, and then roasted, and the shell is removed to produce cacao nibs. The nibs are then ground to cocoa mass, pure chocolate in rough form. Because this cocoa mass usually is liquefied then molded with or without other ingredients, it is called chocolate liquor. The liquor also may be processed into two components: cocoa solids and cocoa butter. Unsweetened baking chocolate (bitter chocolate) contains primarily cocoa solids and cocoa butter in varying proportions. Much of the chocolate consumed today is in the form of sweet chocolate, combining cocoa solids, cocoa butter or other fat, and sugar. Milk chocolate is sweet chocolate that additionally contains milk powder or condensed milk. White chocolate contains cocoa butter, sugar, and milk but no cocoa solids.

White chocolate

Cocoa solids contain alkaloids such as theobromine and phenethylamine, which have physiological effects on the body. It has been linked to serotonin levels in the brain. Some research found that chocolate, eaten in moderation, can lower blood pressure. The presence of theobromine renders chocolate toxic to some animals, especially dogs and cats.

Chocolate has become one of the most popular food types and flavors in the world. Gifts of chocolate molded into different shapes have become traditional on certain holidays: chocolate bunnies and eggs are popular on Easter, chocolate coins on Hanukkah, Santa Claus and other holiday symbols on Christmas, and chocolate hearts or chocolate in heart-shaped boxes on Valentine's Day. Chocolate is also used in cold and hot beverages, to produce chocolate milk and hot chocolate.

Hot chocolate

Cocoa mass was used originally in Mesoamerica both as a beverage and as an ingredient in foods. Chocolate played a special role in both Maya and Aztec royal and religious events. Priests presented cacao seeds as offerings to the gods and served chocolate drinks during sacred ceremonies. All of the areas that were conquered by the Aztecs that grew cacao beans were ordered to pay them as a tax, or as the Aztecs called it, a "tribute".

The Europeans sweetened and fattened it by adding refined sugar and milk, two ingredients unknown to the Mexicans. By contrast, the Europeans never infused it into their general diet, but have compartmentalized its use to sweets and desserts. In the 19th century, Briton John Cadbury developed an emulsification process to make solid chocolate, creating the modern chocolate bar. Although cocoa is originally from the Americas, today Western Africa produces almost two-thirds of the world's cocoa, with Côte d'Ivoire growing almost half of it.