the Maya

Seeds (or beans) are extracted from the pod and fermented, dried, and roasted into what we recognize as cocoa beans. The shells of the bean are then separated from the meat, or cocoa nibs. The nibs are ground into a liquid called chocolate liquor, and separated from the fatty portion, or cocoa butter.

Early on, dark chocolate was the only form of chocolate available. It was developed around 1900 B.C. as a beverage in what is now Central and South America. Later the Mayans and the Aztecs made bitter dark chocolate beverages for ceremonial and medicinal purposes.

The people who produce it live in extreme poverty. For most people, chocolate is synonymous with indulgence, a rich treat to be relished. But for the millions of small-scale farmers producing most of the world’s cocoa, it’s a synonym for poverty.

Often considered the fifth food group, chocolate has inspired one of the most.

Enjoy your festive treats while you can, chocolate could once again become an expensive luxury item due to climate change, according to a new study. But he said chocolate will certainly become more expensive if demand continues to rise and climate change causes shortages of cocoa, making it a luxury item.

In the 1500s, Spanish conquistadors who sailed to Mexico in search of gold and other treasures ended up returning with chocolate instead. However, the delicacy was only available to royalty and the elite, because the chocolate was at that time considered a symbol of luxury, power, and wealth.

Luxury chocolate should contain only the best of ingredients and in preference to inferior ingredients, such as the artificial flavouring “vanillin” or hydrogentated fats, used instead of pure cocoa butter simply because its cheaper. Their chocolates are as pure as chocolate can be.

The smaller-scale production makes it a higher-risk enterprise, for which you’ll often pay a premium. At Hotel Chocolat, we’re committed to always paying our cocoa farmers more than the market rate for their cocoa beans, and our cocoa often comes from small scale farmss that are cared for by hand.

Britain’s best chocolate? Here are eight of the best hand-made, small-batch chocolate bars you can buy

• Wild Gorse Flower 50% Milk, Chocolarder.
• Island Sea Salt, Ocelot Chocolate.
• Toasted Madagascan White, Dormouse Chocolates.
• Nicaragua Sourdough, Damson.
• Asajaya Estate 73% Dark, Beau Cacao.

The glossy shine, satisfying snap and smooth texture of chocolate are the main characteristics that make it so appealing, and they are all achieved through clever chemistry. To form solid chocolate, a liquid cocoa butter mix is cooled so that its fat molecules join together in crystal structures called polymorphs.

“In the cocoa beans, you have dopamine, phenylethylamine, caffeine, and anandamide,” Thierry explains. “Anandamide is actually a happy neurotransmitter in your brain; it’s called the bliss molecule. So the anandamide makes you feel blessed, makes you feel happy, makes you feel good.

Dark chocolate naturally has a more bitter taste than milk chocolate, but levels of cocoa higher than 80 percent make it especially bitter due to low sugar levels. Sweet chocolate-lovers often do not tolerate the taste of this high cocoa content well.

Also, chocolate is high in sugar and saturated fat. It is a high-energy (high calorie) food, and too much can result in excess weight, a risk factor for cardiovascular disease. Healthier sources of polyphenols include beans, pulses, fruit and vegetables.