One of one of the best things that I make is a Mexican hot chocolate recipe. Cuddling up on a blustery fall evening with a cup brings back good memories of my childhood. But recently it got me pondering exactly where it all begins. We think of chocolate often as being from places like Switzerland and France, but in reality chocolate has its roots throughout Central America and largely in Mexico.
Chocolate making in Mexico begins with the tropical tree Theobroma Cacao. It is indigenous to Mexico, and has been farmed there for around 3 thousand years. The earliest reported usage of cacao was around 1100 BC. Chocolate is produced with the seeds of the cacao tree into a raw or processed food. The flavour of the seeds is very bitter naturally, and must be fermented to make the flavour more palatable.
Mesoamerican peoples have made chocolate beverages for a long time, including the Aztecs and Mayans. The Aztecs made a beverage from it whose name translates as \"bitter water\". Both the Aztecs and Mayans used chocolate in both royal and religious events where priests would present seeds of the cacao tree as offerings to the gods. In addition they served chocolate liquor during sacred rituals. The Aztecs even instructed other peoples that they conquered that harvested cacao to pay it to them as a levy or tribute.
The development procedure for chocolate making in Mexico starts off with fermenting the cacao beans, and then drying and cleaning them before roasting them. After they are roasted, the shell is removed. This leaves what is called cacao nibs, that are then ground up to produce pure chocolate in raw form, often referred to as cocoa mass. Cocoa mass is usually liquified and molded along with other ingredients into chocolate liquor, which can be then further processed into cocoa solids and cocoa butter.
If you taste unsweetened baking chocolate from the store, you\'ll find it has a slightly bitter taste since it is consists of cocoa solids and cocoa butter in various proportions. The more common types of chocolate known today as sweet chocolate are merely mixtures of cocoa solids and cocoa butter with other fats and sugar. When sweet chocolate is mixed with condensed milk or milk powder you get milk chocolate. White chocolate is similar to milk chocolate but contains no cocoa solids.
Mesoamerican history shows that chocolate was always used simply as a drink there. In the 15th century, the Aztecs dominated Mesoamerica, and had adopted cacao into their culture associated with the goddess of fertility Xochiquetzal. Chocolate drinks were often used as sacred offerings. The Aztec drink was called Xocolatl, and was a frothy, bitter and spicy drink. It was wanted to be able to fight fatigue, and was seasoned with achiote (annatto), chile pepper and vanilla. Cacao was extremely difficult to develop within the dry central Mexican highlands, so it was imported and was considered a luxury good. Cocoa beans were often used as currency throughout the Aztec empire.
Chocolate is made of cacao beans, that are the partially fermented beans of the cacao tree (Theobroma Cacao). Theobroma is a scientific term that literally means \"food of the gods\". The three main types of cacao beans utilized in making chocolate are known as forastero, criollo and trinitario. Forastero is the most frequently grown bean from a large group of cultivated along with wild cacaos mostly native to the Amazon basin. It is typically potent in the classic chocolate flavor, but has a short duration and is not supported by any secondary flavors, which makes it a rather bland type of chocolate. Criollo makes up only about five percent of all grown cocoa beans, making it the rarest and most pricey available for sale. They are challenging to grow, and susceptible to a variety of environmental threats, which regularly causes low yields per tree of cacao. Criollo has a soft yet complex taste, with less classic chocolate flavor, though with more seconday notes of taste and of longer duration. Trinitario is a natural hybrid of both forastero and criollo. In the last 50 years, almost all of the cacao produced has been of the forastero or lower-grade trinitario varieties.
Today, Mexico produces chocolate candies that are mostly imported in the U . s . for Valentines Day celebrations. Since 2002, imports from Mexico have more than doubled into the US as cheaper labor and sugar is drawing candymakers south in the border. By way of example, Hershey features a 1,500 sq . ft . chocolate factory inside northern Mexico capital of scotland - Monterrey to change plants it\'s got already closed in the US as well as in Canada. Moving to Mexico actually started back many years ago while using makers of hard candies with confectioners looking to survive an arduous business climate brought on by high sugar prices in the usa propped up for many years by government subsidies. Hershey makes its new plant in Monterrey one for its corporate $575 big cost-cutting plan.
At the very least for all of us makers of chocolate, moving to Mexico have their own advantages by means of lower wages. Mexican processed food industry workers in \'09 made an average of only $2.70 1 hour. A similar worker in america in \'09 was making between $19 and $25 an hour. However, even with this advantage, Mexican cacao growers (mostly inside small state of Tabasco) find it progressively difficult to tackle the even cheaper imports from Brazil, Ivory Coast and Indonesia.
A lot of chocolate making in Mexico is becoming assembly (maquila) work, instead of farm work. This can be due primarily to floods and disease (frosty pod rot) which has caused Mexico\'s production of cacao to drop from 47,000 tons in 2003, to less than 20,000 tons in 2008. This is leaving Mexican chocolate production in a really tenuous situation, whilst exports of Mexican chocolate are increasing so that as chocolate factories are multiplying in number.
Chocolate making in Mexico begins with the tropical tree Theobroma Cacao. It is indigenous to Mexico, and has been farmed there for around 3 thousand years. The earliest reported usage of cacao was around 1100 BC. Chocolate is produced with the seeds of the cacao tree into a raw or processed food. The flavour of the seeds is very bitter naturally, and must be fermented to make the flavour more palatable.
Mesoamerican peoples have made chocolate beverages for a long time, including the Aztecs and Mayans. The Aztecs made a beverage from it whose name translates as \"bitter water\". Both the Aztecs and Mayans used chocolate in both royal and religious events where priests would present seeds of the cacao tree as offerings to the gods. In addition they served chocolate liquor during sacred rituals. The Aztecs even instructed other peoples that they conquered that harvested cacao to pay it to them as a levy or tribute.
The development procedure for chocolate making in Mexico starts off with fermenting the cacao beans, and then drying and cleaning them before roasting them. After they are roasted, the shell is removed. This leaves what is called cacao nibs, that are then ground up to produce pure chocolate in raw form, often referred to as cocoa mass. Cocoa mass is usually liquified and molded along with other ingredients into chocolate liquor, which can be then further processed into cocoa solids and cocoa butter.
If you taste unsweetened baking chocolate from the store, you\'ll find it has a slightly bitter taste since it is consists of cocoa solids and cocoa butter in various proportions. The more common types of chocolate known today as sweet chocolate are merely mixtures of cocoa solids and cocoa butter with other fats and sugar. When sweet chocolate is mixed with condensed milk or milk powder you get milk chocolate. White chocolate is similar to milk chocolate but contains no cocoa solids.
Mesoamerican history shows that chocolate was always used simply as a drink there. In the 15th century, the Aztecs dominated Mesoamerica, and had adopted cacao into their culture associated with the goddess of fertility Xochiquetzal. Chocolate drinks were often used as sacred offerings. The Aztec drink was called Xocolatl, and was a frothy, bitter and spicy drink. It was wanted to be able to fight fatigue, and was seasoned with achiote (annatto), chile pepper and vanilla. Cacao was extremely difficult to develop within the dry central Mexican highlands, so it was imported and was considered a luxury good. Cocoa beans were often used as currency throughout the Aztec empire.
Chocolate is made of cacao beans, that are the partially fermented beans of the cacao tree (Theobroma Cacao). Theobroma is a scientific term that literally means \"food of the gods\". The three main types of cacao beans utilized in making chocolate are known as forastero, criollo and trinitario. Forastero is the most frequently grown bean from a large group of cultivated along with wild cacaos mostly native to the Amazon basin. It is typically potent in the classic chocolate flavor, but has a short duration and is not supported by any secondary flavors, which makes it a rather bland type of chocolate. Criollo makes up only about five percent of all grown cocoa beans, making it the rarest and most pricey available for sale. They are challenging to grow, and susceptible to a variety of environmental threats, which regularly causes low yields per tree of cacao. Criollo has a soft yet complex taste, with less classic chocolate flavor, though with more seconday notes of taste and of longer duration. Trinitario is a natural hybrid of both forastero and criollo. In the last 50 years, almost all of the cacao produced has been of the forastero or lower-grade trinitario varieties.
Today, Mexico produces chocolate candies that are mostly imported in the U . s . for Valentines Day celebrations. Since 2002, imports from Mexico have more than doubled into the US as cheaper labor and sugar is drawing candymakers south in the border. By way of example, Hershey features a 1,500 sq . ft . chocolate factory inside northern Mexico capital of scotland - Monterrey to change plants it\'s got already closed in the US as well as in Canada. Moving to Mexico actually started back many years ago while using makers of hard candies with confectioners looking to survive an arduous business climate brought on by high sugar prices in the usa propped up for many years by government subsidies. Hershey makes its new plant in Monterrey one for its corporate $575 big cost-cutting plan.
At the very least for all of us makers of chocolate, moving to Mexico have their own advantages by means of lower wages. Mexican processed food industry workers in \'09 made an average of only $2.70 1 hour. A similar worker in america in \'09 was making between $19 and $25 an hour. However, even with this advantage, Mexican cacao growers (mostly inside small state of Tabasco) find it progressively difficult to tackle the even cheaper imports from Brazil, Ivory Coast and Indonesia.
A lot of chocolate making in Mexico is becoming assembly (maquila) work, instead of farm work. This can be due primarily to floods and disease (frosty pod rot) which has caused Mexico\'s production of cacao to drop from 47,000 tons in 2003, to less than 20,000 tons in 2008. This is leaving Mexican chocolate production in a really tenuous situation, whilst exports of Mexican chocolate are increasing so that as chocolate factories are multiplying in number.
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To read more and find your own mexican hot chocolate recipe follow this link.. Free reprint available from: A Look At Mexican Chocolate Production.