The Wonderful World of Chocolate

Chocolate has become one of the most popular food type and flavors in today’s industry. From dark, to milk, to white, and so many other flavors, the enhancing ability this ingredient has is very important to chefs in order to make their dishes staples. From putting it into a chilli to folding it into batter there is no other flavor that can compare to chocolate. But where does this extraordinary flavor come from, how do we get it, and what is the difference between all the different types of chocolate and different cocoa percentages? From learning through the bakeshop ingredients chapter and experimenting with the different types of chocolate the answers to these questions are closer than you may think.

Chocolate is the by-product of fermented cocoa seeds that have been processed. The cocoa trees from where we cultivate our seeds are found in tropical rainforests near the equator. The trees sprout blossoms. Only one out of the 300 sprouts however will contain cocoa beans. To harvest a cocoa pod you must cut the pod open, by hand, with a machete in order to get to the beans. Now the processing begins.

After obtaining the cocoa beans they are piled up and covered with banana leaves. This begins the fermentation process. The fermenting is what develops the chocolate flavor so very familiar to our pallets. The pulp of the bean changes color as well, from white to brown. The beans must then be dried, preferably in the sun. Some farms have fans and heaters in order to speed up the process. Beans are then sorted, graded by their various sizes and then shipped to the factory.

At arrival to the factory, the beans are weighed, cleaned, and then blended. Roasting of the beans follows to develop the beans’ flavor and to make removal of t...

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...f the chocolates were sweet and milky for the milk chocolates. The white chocolate had a milky vanilla flavor. The Lindt with the Sea Salt was the most appealing I believe to the class because the salt helps to intensify the cocoa flavor which was very intriguing.

In conclusion, even with this vast growing industry chocolate is still standing tall as one of the most popular food and flavors. The labor intensive process to get that one bite is definitely worth it because chocolate can make almost anything taste better and this is what chefs are looking for. To make their food stand out and make it taste better for the consumer. And through experimentation I know understand better understand how chocolate can make food taste better and why. If you don't have any chocolate in your pantry I’d recommend you go out and get some and start experimenting just as I did.