History of Chocolate

Everyone loves chocolate, but few people know the history of chocolate. The history of chocolate may have started around the time Columbus discovered America. Columbus brought some cocoa beans back for King Ferdinand. However, they weren’t quite sure what to do with the beans. It was Hernando Cortez who discovered the Aztec Indians making chocolatl, a warm drink made of the cocoa beans. The chocolatl was very bitter, so Cortez came up with the idea of adding cane sugar to make it more appealing to the Spaniards. They held on to the secret of chocolate for almost one hundred years until the Spanish monks processing the beans spilled the beans about it. By 1657, it had spread to Britain and they opened businesses that served chocolate. In America, the history of chocolate began ever before the Revolutionary War. Chocolate was expensive when it was first made, but when the cocoa press was invented in 1828, the price became affordable. Solid chocolate was not invented until the mid 1800s and in 1876; Daniel Peter of Switzerland found a way to add milk to the chocolate, thus creating milk chocolate that we know today.

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Try your luck with chocolate fortunes, you never know what you will get!

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There are several names you think of when you think about the history of chocolate. One is Hershey. Milton Hershey produced the first milk chocolate bar in 1900 and built his first chocolate factory in 1903. Cadbury, another name famous for making chocolate, developed their milk chocolate bar in 1904. On July 1, 1907, one of the most popular forms of milk chocolate was created – the Hershey kiss. By 1925, many of the chocolate bars we are familiar with today were in production – Mr. Goodbar, Milky Way, Mounds, Heath Bar, and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. Since then, some changes have occasionally been made, like adding almonds to the Hershey Kisses or creating Reese’s Pieces, but for the most part, the original chocolate bars are still loved today.