Fun Facts About Chocolate

By the Numbers

Fun Facts About Chocolate...

5, 026 - pounds - the weight of the largest chocolate bar ever made, According to the Guiness World Book of Records. It was produced by Elah-Dufour United Food Companies at Turin, Italy, in March 2000.

52% - the percentage of Americans who choose chocolate over vanilla as their favorite flavor

65% - the percentage of American chocolate eaters prefer milk chocolate.

3.3 - billion lbs. - The amount of chocolate eaten in the U.S. in the year 2000!

230 - the number of calories which the average 1.5- to 1.6-ounce milk chocolate bar has with more than half of those coming from fat.

3.5 - million pounds - the amount of whole milk used every day to make chocolate by U.S. chocolate manufacturers

7 - milligrams - The amount of caffeine in an ounce of milk chocolate - about the same amount contained in a cup of decaffeinated coffee. A cup of full-strength coffee has more than 20 times that much.

96 - degrees - the melting point of cocoa butter which is just below the human body temperature, and why it literally melts in your mouth.

60% - the percentage of Americans said they gave boxed chocolates as a winter holiday gift.

63% - the percentage of Americans who can't resist buying a chocolate treat for themselves when buying chocolates for someone else.

51% - the percentage of Americans who choose what chocolate they eat by the shape of the piece

40% - the percentage of women who regularly crave chocolate

15% - the percentage of men who regularly crave chocolate

$13 billion The amount Americans spend a year on chocolate.

More...

• the word "Chocolate" comes from the Aztec word "xocolatl", which means "bitter water"

• chocolate is a great natural antidepressant. It contains tryptophan which helps you create serotonin, your body's own antidepressant. Also, the phenylethylamine, found in chocolate has been shown to release serotonin and endorphins- two known chemicals that make us feel happy!

• The seeds of the cacao tree grow not on the end of its branches, but directly off the branches and the trunk.

• Each pod is about the size of a pineapple and holds thirty to fifty seeds - enough to make about seven milk chocolate or two dark chocolate bars.

• Cacao flowers are pollinated by midges, tiny flies that live in the rotting leaves and other debris that fall to the forest floor at the base of the tree. Those midges have the fastest wingbeats in the world: 1,000 ties per second!

• Farmed cacao trees today are endangered by natural threats, such as the witch's broom fungus and other diseases and pests. Along with the rest of the rainforest, their wild counterparts are threatened by lumber companies, which harvest the taller trees that shelter the cacao and help maintain the cacao's fragile ecosystem.

• Cacao seeds are not sweet. They contain the chemicals cafeine and theobromine, which give them a bitter taste.

• Cacao is not related to the coconut palm or the coca plant, the source of cocaine.

• Aztec Indians believed chocolate to be an aphrodisiac

• Chocolate contains high-quality anti oxidants that can protect you from developing cancer and heart disease

• Several studies over the past three decades have failed to find a link between chocolate and acne

• Chocolate is poisonous to dogs (and other domestic animals). The theobromine found in chocolate is a stimulatant, and can be too much for small animals

  Fun Facts About Chocolate...cont'd

• Some of the earliest European cocoa-makers were apothecaries seeking medicinal uses of the plant.

• Chocolate contains two stimulants also found in coffee-caffeine and theobromine-but in relatively small amounts. Fifty M&Ms for example, have about as much caffeine as a cup of decaffeinated coffee.

• America produces more chocolate than any other country

• Cadbury's in England produced the first ever bar of chocolate in 1842

• the shelf life for most chocolate is a year

• the haze sometimes found on chocolate is actually a harmless substance known as bloom -- an accumulation of fat crystals on the surface of the chocolate that can form as a result of storage temperature, various cooling methods or the presence of certain types of fat in the chocolate. But fortunately, it usually doesn’t affect the taste of the chocolate

• chocolate really is "The Food Of The Gods" - The cacao tree is a species of the genus theobroma, which translates into "food of the gods"

• It takes 4 cacao seeds to make one ounce of milk chocolate and 12 seeds to make 1 ounce of dark chocolate.

  
  
  

  There's more... Facinating Facts About Chocolate

  Quakers in England hoped to persuade the poor to give up drinking alcohol in favor of the healthier chocolate drink. When they later emmigrated to Colonial America, primarily to Pennsylvania, it was one of those descendants, Milton Hershey, who was later to become perhaps the most important name in the chocolate industry.

  Hershey's Kisses were introduced in 1907 and Hershey produces around 23 million a day in a variety of flavors. During the 2nd world war, the US government commissioned Hershey to create a chocolate bar suitable for soldiers' rations and Hershey was called upon again in the Persian Gulf War which would be able to withstand high temperatures. These "desert bars" were added to soldiers' rations and also sold as survival kit basics.

  Who Eats Chocolate? More Facts about Chocolate

• Not many Africans. A great deal of chocolate is grown in Africa, but it is mostly for export.

• Not a lot of Asians. Although chocolate's popularity is growing in China and Japan, there's still comparatively little chocolate culture in Asia. The Chinese, for example, eat only one bar of chocolate for every 1,000 eaten by the British.

• the Swiss consume more chocolate than any other country, followed by the English

• Mexicans consume chocolate more as a traditional drink and a spice than as a candy. They use it to make one variety of the wonderful sauce called mole and offer chocolate drinks at many social gatherings.

• Americans for sure eat chocolate an average of 12 pounds per person per year! In 1998 that came to a total of 3,3 billion pounds. Americans spend $13 billion a year on chocolate.

• Europeans definitely eat chocolate too! As far back as the late 1700's the people of Madrid, Spain consumed nearly 1 million pounds of chocolate a year. Today 15 of the 16 leading per capita chocolate consuming countries are in Europe, with Switzerland leading the pack.
  

  
  9 Piece Mixed Swiss Chocolates
  9 pieces of our most popular dark and light Swiss chocolates and truffles.
  
  Schoggi Signature Caramel Cup, Thai Princess, Ice Square, Champagne Truffle, Dark Nougat Truffle, Falliere, Classic Dark Truffle, Pineapple Slice, Milk Chocolate Truffle. Net weight .24 lbs

  
  
  

  leave Facts About Chocolate