FIVE INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT CHOCOLATE

In a country with more cocoa beans than money it’s not that surprising when you think about it that the Aztec’s used the beans as a currency. In the 1500’s cocoa beans were regularly being traded for slaves, service and goods across a large part of Latin, Central and Southern America in a process that has documented proof stretching as far back as around 1900 BC.

Chocolate is good for you. Not only does it improve your mood it is also loaded with more antioxidants than the equivalent amount of green kale. In fact it also has more of the good stuff than red wine, blueberries and broccoli! The United States Department of Agriculture gives unprocessed cocoa powder a 26,000 rating on the ORAC (Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity) scale. Next in line is the acai berry, at 18,500.

Chocolate also contains virtually no caffeine, but does contain some trace amounts of related substances called theobromine which, like caffeine, is a much milder stimulant. As always the darker the chocolate the more of this compound there is.

In the 1700’s us British are responsible for misspelling the word cacao bean. An English importer when rushing through his inventory misspelt the word on his inventory and somehow the altered word became the norm around the world; and the world became used to Cocoa.