Milestones of Chocolate
Good and Bad History of Chocolate...
The history of chocolate dates back to 4000 years ago. According to historical sources, chocolate was being used as a drink in Mexican territory for the first time. In B.C. 1900s, the discovery of the population which continues to live on the present Mexican territory before Olmeks.
Chocolate production occurs by planting cocoa seeds in tropical rainforests in Central America and then fermenting them and turning into the paste. The first chocolate was much different from today's chocolates... It was a bitter drink in liquid form... And its formula is: Fermented and pasty cocoa, water, vanilla, honey, hot pepper and other spices ... Olmek, Aztec and Mayas believe that this drink is a mystical feature, giving you energy and power and making you happy.
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Chocolate spreaded from America to Europe and then to the world by a Spanish explorer named Hernan Cortes. As a matter of fact, it is claimed that Christopher Columbus discovered cocoa for the first time but never brought it to his country or even tasted it at all. The sailor Cortes, who occupied Mexico, was also the first person to bring chocolate to Europe. The Spanish werw taken an important step for today's chocolate by adding sugar for the first time in this drink. Spain has been hiding chocolate from other countries for as long as a hundred years. Even until King of Spain III. Philip's daughter Princess Anne and King of France XIII. Louis got married. The princess, adores tochocolate directed the history by taking her chocolates to France. Cocoa fields were established in colony countries in Europe as chocolate demand has increased over time, and cocoa production rapidly began.
The production of chocolate, which was a long time aristocrats and noblesses food underwent a revolution by cocoa machine, which is a an invention of Dutch chemist Coenraad Johannes van Houten. The machine, invented in 1828, separates cocoa butter from roasted cocoa seeds and the remaining chocolate can turn into a dry powder. This powder can be mixed with liquids and other components, becomes easily digested chocolate by solidified and eat.
So the price of chocolate production reduces and this makes the chocolate a food that public can also reach it.
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And in the 1800's, the chocolate giants, still exist today such as Cadbury, Mars & Hershey developed.
Chocolate in Ottoman Empire
"We learn the first tip that chocolate was being sold in Istanbul at the beginning of the nineteenth century from an economy page. In 1857, the gazette Journal de Constantinople published a list comparing the prices of some need items in the first thirty years of the century.
This list also includes chocolate in 1804. The chocolate, one okka of it is 5 kurus (approx. 1 kg and 250 gr) was about twice as expensive as than gravy cheese, one okka of it hundred money and six times as expensive as tahn chicken, sold against 32 money at the same year."
"The Ottoman market adopted the chocolate as solid food, not as a drink, especially with the advent of milky Swiss chocolates. Although a decline has been observed in recent years, milk chocolate is still consumed more than white or dark chocolate in Turkey. Today the rise of dark chocolate consumption is the sign that our deeply rooted habit has begun to change."
ÇUKULATA
Extracted from the book named as "Çikolatanın Yerli Tarihi"……
Author Saadet Özen