Celebrating Chocolate Week
THE weather both here and many other places may have been miserable at times over the past week but at least in the UK they have had the benefit of celebrating Chocolate Week. With a couple of days still to go, we shall join in on the tail-end of the celebrations and look at things chocolate this week.
According to food writer Matthew Fort — most recently seen on TV as a Great British Menu judge — chocolate is “another debt we owe to Central and South America (along with potatoes, corn, chillies and tomatoes)”. Cocoa beans come from the cacao tree, which thrives in the steamy climate of the Tropics and originated in the Amazon and Orinoco River basins of Ecuador and Brazil. The Mayans and Aztecs (hands up those of you who remember Aztec Bars) are known to have used cocoa beans during religious ceremonies and although the Aztecs lived too far north to grow cacao, they obtained it through tribute or trade with more southern tribes. The word “chocolate” comes from the Aztec “xocolatl”, which translates as “bitter water”. The Aztecs had no sugar, so the final brew was not only bitter but also heavy and difficult to digest because it was about 50 per cent fat.
Although Columbus had come across cocoa beans in 1502, Europeans attached no real importance was attached to them until about 1512, when Cortes, the Conquistador, wrote to Spain of their value at the court of Montezuma. Xocolatl was the drink of royalty and was usually served only to Montezuma and the men of his court, who considered it an aphrodisiac. It was so revered that the golden bowls used to serve xocolatl were used only once and then thrown into Lake Tezcoco. After the conquest of the Aztecs, the Spanish drained the lake and retrieved the vast treasure of gold cups that lay on the bottom.
The Spanish court kept the secret for almost 100 years. When it finally leaked out, chocolate houses began to appear throughout Europe, serving those who could afford it. At one point, it became so socially desirable that the Catholic Church had to forbid cocoa-addicted parishioners from bringing cups full of their favourite drink to Sunday Mass.
The Quakers, on the other hand, considered chocolate a healthy alternative to Dutch gin. Whichever way you look at it, chocolate was principally consumed as a drink until the mid-19th century, when the Dutch company, Van Houten, developed a method of removing most of the cocoa butter fat by mechanical pressure, which then smoothed out cocoa’s sharp flavour. This process is still known as “Dutching”. From that point, it was only a small step to the development of hand-held (as opposed to drinking) chocolate, achieved by putting some of the cocoa butter back into the Dutched chocolate and then hardening the solid result into bars.
In Britain, the first people to take an interest in cocoa were apothecaries who focused on chocolate’s medicinal properties; it is a source of many minerals, including iron, potassium and magnesium. It was in this way that Fry’s of Bristol and Terry’s of York made their first forays into chocolate making. In 1761, Dr Joseph Fry bought the patents and recipes of an apothecary called Walter Churchman, although Fry’s did not produce chocolate bars until 1847. The principal British chocolate families — Fry, Cadbury, Terry and Rowntree — were all staunch Quakers and were as well-known for their pioneering views on social welfare as for their confectionary.
The next step in the evolution of the modern chocolate bar came in 1875, when two Swiss manufacturers, Daniel Peters and Henri Nestlé produced the first milk chocolate and in 1879, another Swiss, Rodolphe Lindt, developed a process called “conching”, to make the first really fine chocolate.
As explorers and colonisers travelled further afield, more and more cocoa-growing areas emerged. Nowadays, the Ivory Coast and Ghana are the largest producers but the best cocoa beans come from Ecuador.
Cocoa beans are packed with natural antioxidants called flavonoids. However, flavonoids taste bitter and degrade quickly when heated or processed (eg in Dutching), so only raw cocoa (often referred to as “cacao” nowadays) and, to a lesser extent, dark chocolate, offer antioxidant benefits. Nevertheless, cocoa contains a stimulant called theobromine, which has some well-known and positive health effects and some studies suggest it is better at suppressing coughs than codeine.
Good quality chocolate should make a crisp snapping noise when you break it; cheap chocolate will make a dull cracking sound instead. If you have gone to the expense of buying good chocolate to cook with, you should treat it with respect.
Received wisdom these days is that you should not melt chocolate in a microwave as it is easy to burn or overheat it, which means you won’t get the gloss or texture you want. Treating chocolate with respect doesn’t mean you have to be frightened of it, though. Melt it in a heatproof bowl over (not in) a pan of gently simmering water. Let it cool slightly before mixing with anything; adding ingredients to chocolate which is too hot may make it “sieze” and turn grainy.
Chocolate teams up well with strong, clean flavourings such as ginger, mint and rose. Try adding a teaspoon of ground ginger and a couple of drops of rosewater to your favourite shortbread recipe, then cut the dough into fingers and bake in the usual way. Dip the baked and cooled shortbread fingers into melted chocolate, allow the excess to drip off and arrange on a tray lined with baking parchment. Scatter over some finely chopped crystallised ginger or rose petals and leave to set, before storing in an airtight container.
But what about using chocolate in dishes other than puddings or bakery? Good quality chocolate does add richness to sauces for meat, as in Mexican mole (pronounced “mole-ey”) poblano. It can also raise simple chilli con carne to a higher TexMex level.
CHOCOLATE-RICH CHILLI CON CARNE
1 tablespoon olive oil 1 onion, finely chopped 2 garlic cloves, minced 2 red peppers, deseeded and sliced
2 teaspoons hot chilli powder (or 2 chillies, fresh or dried, chopped) 1 teaspoon cumin 500g beef mince
1 x 400g tin chopped tomatoes 250ml beef stock 20g dark chocolate, preferably 70 per cent cocoa solids 1 x 400g tin red kidney beans, drained and thoroughly rinsed Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Heat the oil in a large saucepan and add the onion. Cook for a few minutes until beginning to soften, then add the garlic and peppers. Continue cooking until the peppers are just tender.
Stir in the chilli powder (or chopped chillies) and cumin, then add the mince. Cook for about five minutes until brown all over, stirring with a wooden spoon to break up any lumps. Pour in the tinned tomatoes and stock, bring to a gentle simmer and cook for 40 minutes.
Roughly chop the chocolate and add to the chilli, along with the beans. Stir to combine and melt the chocolate, then simmer for another 15 minutes until the mixture has thickened slightly. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
Garnish with chopped coriander and serve with plain rice.