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TODAY is World Chocolate Day – so why not defy the heatwave, hope your sweet treat doesn’t melt and enjoy everything about Britain’s No1 indulgence snack. July 7 supposedly marks the day when chocolate
Chocolate is the only edible substance to melt at around
93F, just below the human body temperature, which is why chocolate literally melts in the mouth.
Europeans eat more chocolate than the rest of the globe. According to the International Cocoa Organisation we scoff almost half the world’s chocolate.
On average Brits, the Swiss and Germans consume 11kg each of chocolate a year.
90% of the world’s cacao is grown on small familyrun farms, no larger than 12 acres.
White chocolate isn’t real chocolate. In order to be classified as real chocolate, a product has to contain cocoa solids or cocoa liquor. White “chocolate” contains cocoa butter instead. It’s allowed to be called chocolate within the European Union as long as it is made from at least 20% cocoa butter, 14% total milk solids, and
3.5% milk fat. The same applies in the US, although there are also limits there on the amount of sugar allowed.
KitKat is produced worldwide by Nestlé, except in the US where its competitor Hershey makes it.
It takes two to four days to make a single serving of chocolate bar.
Cacao trees are so delicate that farmers lose approximately
ABEFGHwas first brought to Europe in 1550 and has been observed since 2009 around the world. It’s an important day considering now approximately 1billion people eat chocolate every day, and the organic chocolate market worldwide is valued at £670million. So grab your KitKat, Dairy Milk or Twix bar as JENNIFER DUNKERLEY brings you 15 fun facts to help celebrate all things chocolate...
30% of their crop each year.
In 2011 to celebrate its 100th birthday, Thorntons created the world’s largest chocolate bar, weighing 5,792.50kg – that’s nearly six tonnes.
So many Toblerone bars are sold each year that, if they were laid end to end, they would stretch for
38,500 miles, a distance greater than the circumference of the Earth.
Chocolate has more than 600 flavour compounds.
Chocolate chip cookies were invented by mistake. In
1930 Ruth Wakefield realised she was out of baker’s chocolate and mixed broken pieces of Nestlé chocolate into her cookie dough, expecting the chocolate to be absorbed and create chocolate cookies. Instead, she accidentally created chocolate chip cookies, and later sold the idea to Nestlé in return for a lifetime supply.
M&Ms were created in 1941 as a means for soldiers to enjoy chocolate without it melting and are now often taken into space by astronauts.
Crisps dipped in chocolate once existed. Back in 2013, Lay’s (known as Walkers in the UK) in America, sold crinkle crisps dipped in a layer of milk chocolate.
IJMNIt is possible to die if you eat too much chocolate. The sweet treat contains high levels of a powerful stimulant called theobromine. It can cause heart failure, seizures, acute kidney damage and dehydration. But to ingest enough theobromine for it to be fatal, you would have to eat about 22lb of chocolate, the equivalent of 40 bars of Dairy Milk.
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