You say potato, I say cacao!
I've been refrained from being intimate on this particular topic of enlightening the chocolate lovers on the background and birth to every bite you take, every move you make to all the weight watching you fake. It'll be an attempt at a intellectual yet entertaining journey of chocolates and ofcourse, the brands I love! It's going to be a series of yadda yadda on the life of our beloved cacao which we very casually refer to as "Kuch metha hojae!"(let's have something sweet) Which is ironic cause I love my blend of 70% finest south american beans..my absolute bitter sweet indulgence with a massive cup of american breakfast tea..Oh dear...must control... emotions.
You know what they say...I'm sure you do. However, what you don't know is what I'm about to rant. Several years ago this earth was found bearing the beans from the tree call Theobroma cacao, the original source of chocolate. Theobroma literally translates to "food of the gods" in greek.
You hear me? no? I'm sure you don't. Try and feel it buddy..cause it only gets better on this blog. There are dozens of interpretations on what the three C's really mean. It started off from the olmec people which literally means rubber people (more on that someday at my house for tea?) which is now mexico and is believed as the original name of the plant. We will learn later on how chocolate's journey is traced from the land of the maya in central america to spain and rest of europe, and then back across the atlantic to the united states.
Cacao is the only word ever used in the hispanic languages to describe what english speakers thinks of as cocoa. Some say it was spelt wrong, others claim it was easier to pronounce which suprisingly took over the original. This was for the left side of your membrane and now for the right side.. Cacao is the bean from the cacao pods that look like large american football sized fruits grow off the trunk and limbs of the cacao tree inside which you find cacao beans.
The harvest,fermented and dried beans that are cleaned and roasted where the shells are then removed to make the cacao nibs. The nibs are ground to cocoa mass. Cocoa is also known for the processed. The Cocoa mass which is usually liquefied then molded with or without ingredients is called chocolate liqour, which can be separated into cocoa butter and cocoa powder.
Chocolate is formed by combining the cocoa butter and cocoa powder in varies amounts with or without other ingredients.
Bored? I hope not!! cause here comes the recap!
Cacao for the plant and all it's products before processing, cocoa after processing and chocolate is the fine mama blend.
Sadly, I have no pictures of the initial processes of chocolate making of my own to share at the moment however, to thank you for getting through the first post on chocolate without pulling your hair out.. below are some saliva teasing delicacies made at ICCA Dubai
Until next time
weight fluctuating-ly yours,
A xx
Photo credit: Pauline Benzon Tana
