Chocolate

The first uses of chocolate are located in Mesoamerica (extending almost all over the actual Central America). The first cocoa beans were found at the rainforests around 4000 years ago, in the year2000 BC; it won’t be until 1900 BC when the first cocoa beans were made into a beverage.
The ones who did these beverages were mainly the Maya and the Aztec culture; they mixed the cocoa seeds withdifferent seasonings in order to make a spicy and foamy drink. It uses depending on the geographic situation were quite despaired, for example, the Mayans made chocolate for religious ceremonies, butonly the richest classes of the Aztec population could have it due to its high price.
The Mayans used to call chocolate “chocol haa” which means hot water, for them it also symbolized life andfertility, that’s the reason why in many of their temples they carved cocoa pods.
The Aztecs referred to it as “xocoalt” which means bitter water. For Aztecs chocolate was an expensive luxury and was alsoa way of payment, something to offer to the gods. They usually said that chocolate was a tribute, because the priests were told to give it them –gods–, they also offered feathers, beads or ocelotskins as a tribute.
In 1528 Hernán Cortés, who was a Spanish conqueror, brought it from the actual Mexico (which was the Aztec Empire). He suggested to the Spanish king, Charles V, that just by adding alittle sugar to the beverage it was simply delicious and so he did it. Anyway, not until the XVII century became it popular around Europe –the Spanish kept the secret quite good, they were almostobsessed with chocolate–.
France was the first European country to try chocolate –apart from Spain–. It was Princess Maria Theresa who gave to her French fiancé Louis XVI of France; the sweet gift wasextremely popular all over Louis’ court in Versailles so he told one of his courtesans to sell and manufacture the chocolate, he not only did so but he also inspired erotic pleasures. By then, Paris...