Facts About Chocolate: Just for Fun!

Test your chocolate trivia! Did you know?

• Aztec Emperor Montezuma drank 50 golden goblets of hot chocolate, dyed red and flavored with chili peppers, every day.
• The average American consumes more than 10 pounds of chocolate every year.
• Ever since WWII, chocolate bars have been an official part of U.S. Army rations as a source of energy and, of course, a taste pleaser.
• In 1905, the first U.S. recipe for chocolate brownies included Baker’s Chocolate and appeared in The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book.³
• Chocolate has long been used in survival kits, and for good reason. A single chocolate chip can provide enough energy for an adult human to walk 150 feet.
• The U.S. caught the chocolate wave in the late 1700s. The Baker’s Chocolate Company was founded in 1780 — almost a decade before George Washington was sworn in as president.
• The first to discover cacao plants as edible and delectable for man were monkeys as they would eat the pulp and spit out the beans.
• Normally, the shelf life of a bar of chocolate is a year, but it can be put in a freezer to be kept indefinitely.
• The melting point of cocoa butter, which is a fat extract from roasted and crushed Cocoa Beans, is just below the human body temperature, which is why chocolate melts when put into the mouth.
• Cocoa butter is also used as a massage cream. Chocolate has also been used as a perfume because of its ‘feel good’ smell like fresh baked bread and brewed coffee.
• The word “chocolate” comes from the Aztec word, “cacahuatl” or “xocolatl”, which means “bitter water”. Chocolate is extracted from Cocoa Beans. It was Cacao originally but changed to Cocoa as a result of constant misspelling. The scientific name for Cocoa tree is “Theobroma Cacao”, which is a Greek term meaning, “foods for the gods”.
• Chocolate has more than 500 flavor components, which is double the amount found in strawberry and vanilla.
• The annual consumption of cocoa beans averages around 600,000 tons per year.
• Consumers spend more than $20 billion annually on chocolate with chocolate manufacturers using around 40% of the world’s almonds and around 20% of the world’s peanuts.

Wish you had a piece of chocolate to nibble on? Well, sink your teeth into this: for a limited time only, you can indulge in Mannatech’s newest PhytoBurst® flavor — chocolate, of course!

Getting good nutrition has never been so delicious. Mannatech’s PhytoBurst chews support your diet with balanced nutrition. They provide essential nutrients with food-sourced vitamins, minerals and phytonutrients, as well as real cocoa flavor. They are naturally sourced, making them safe and great for the entire family. Learn more!

Valentine’s Day is in three weeks. What better way to show your love than with a bag of chocolate PhytoBurst chews! Hint, hint!

Order yours today!

The above facts were compiled from Just Chocolate: Everything You Need to Know About Chocolate, by Mr. Stephen S. Alison