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Cocoa

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Food and agriculture

   Cocoa beans in a cacao pod
   Enlarge
   Cocoa beans in a cacao pod

   Cocoa is the dried and partially fermented fatty seed of the cacao tree
   from which chocolate is made. In the United States, 'cocoa' often
   refers to cocoa powder, the dry powder made by grinding cocoa seeds and
   removing the cocoa butter from the dark, bitter cocoa solids. Cocoa
   powder has an extremely bitter flavor.

   A cocoa pod has a rough leathery rind about 3 cm thick (this varies
   with the origin of pod). It is filled with sweet, mucilaginous pulp
   called 'baba de cacao' in South America, enclosing 30 to 50 large
   almond-like seeds (beans) that are fairly soft and pinkish or purplish
   in colour.

History

   The cacao tree apparently originated in the foothills of the Andes in
   the Amazon and Orinoco basins of South America. It was introduced into
   Central America by the ancient Mayas, and cultivated in Mexico by the
   Toltecs and later by the Aztecs.

   Cacao trees will grow in a very limited geographical zone, of
   approximately 10 degrees to the north and south of the Equator. Nearly
   70% of the world crop is grown in West Africa.

   Cocoa was an important commodity in Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica. Spanish
   chroniclers of the conquest of Mexico by Hernán Cortés relate that when
   Montezuma II, emperor of the Aztecs, dined he took no other beverage
   than chocolate, served in a golden goblet and eaten with a golden
   spoon. Flavored with vanilla and spices, his chocolate was whipped into
   a froth that dissolved in the mouth. No less than 50 pitchers of it
   were prepared for the emperor each day, and 2000 more for nobles of his
   court.

   Chocolate was introduced to Europe by the Spaniards and became a
   popular beverage by the mid 1500s. They also introduced the cacao tree
   into the West Indies and the Philippines. It was used in alchemical
   processes, where it was known as Black Bean.

   The cacao plant was first given its name by Swedish natural scientist
   Carl von Linné (1707-1778), who called it "Theobroma cacao" or "food of
   the gods".

Production

World Production

   Top Cocoa Producers
   in 2004
   (million metric tons)
   Flag of Côte d'Ivoire  Côte d'Ivoire 1.33
   Flag of Ghana  Ghana                 0.74
   Flag of Indonesia  Indonesia         0.43
   Flag of Nigeria  Nigeria             0.37
   Flag of Brazil  Brazil               0.17
   Flag of Cambodia  Cambodia           0.13
   Flag of Ecuador  Ecuador             0.09
   World Total                          3.6
   Source:
   UN Food & Agriculture Organisation
   (FAO)

   About 3,000,000 tonnes of cocoa are grown each year. The global
   production was

                1,556,484 t in 1974,
                1,810,611 t in 1984,
                2,672,173 t in 1994,
                3,607,052 t in 2004 (record).

   This is an increase of 131.7% in 30 years.

   There are three varieties of the Theobroma cacao: Forastero, Criollo
   and Trinitario. The first comprises 95% of the world production of
   cacao, and is the most widely used. Overall, the highest quality of
   cacao comes from the Criollo variety and is considered a delicacy ;
   however, Criollo is harder to produce, hence very few countries produce
   it, with the majority of production coming from Venezuela (Chuao and
   Porcelana). The Trinitario is a mix between Criollo and Forastero .

   The Netherlands is the leading cocoa processing country, followed by
   the U.S..

   Prices for cocoa reached a five-year high in November 2004 because
   exports from Côte d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) were likely to decrease due to
   escalating violence in the region.

   Cocoa and its products (including chocolate) are used world-wide.
   Belgium has the highest per-capita consumption at 5.5 kg, 10 times the
   world average .

Harvesting

   When the pods ripen, they are harvested from the trunks and branches of
   the Cocoa tree with a curved knife on a long pole. The pod itself is
   green when ready to harvest, rather than red or orange. Normally, red
   or orange pods are considered of a lesser quality because their
   flavours and aromas are poorer; these are used for industrial
   chocolate. The pods are either opened on the field and the seeds
   extracted and carried to the fermentation area on the plantation, or
   the whole pods are taken to the fermentation area.

Processing

   The harvested pods are opened with a machete, the pulp and cocoa seeds
   are removed and the rind is discarded. The pulp and seeds are then
   piled in heaps, placed in bins, or laid out on grates for several days.
   During this time, the seeds and pulp undergo "sweating", where the
   thick pulp liquifies as it ferments. The fermented pulp trickles away,
   leaving cocoa seeds behind to be collected. Sweating is important for
   the quality of the beans, which originally have a strong bitter taste.
   If sweating is overdone, the resulting cocoa may be ruined; if
   underdone the cocoa seed maintains a flavor similar to raw potatoes and
   becomes susceptible to mildew.

   The liquified pulp is used by some cocoa producing countries to distill
   alcoholic spirits.

   Boy collecting cacao

   Cacao drying under the sun

   Cacao drying square in front of church, Chuao, Venezuela.

   Woman drying cacao

   The fermented beans are dried by spreading them out over a large
   surface and constantly raking them. In large plantations, this is done
   on huge trays under the sun or by using artificial heat. Small
   plantations may dry their harvest on little trays or on cowhides.
   Finally, the beans are trodden and shuffled about (often using bare
   human feet) and sometimes, during this process, red clay mixed with
   water is sprinkled over the beans to obtain a finer colour, polish, and
   protection against molds during shipment to factories in the United
   States, the Netherlands, United Kingdom, and other countries. Drying in
   the sun is preferable to drying by artificial means, as no foreign
   flavours such as smoke or oil are introduced which might otherwise
   taint the flavour.

Chocolate production

   Chocolate
   Enlarge
   Chocolate

   To make 1 kg (2.2 pounds) of chocolate, about 300 to 600 beans are
   processed. In a factory, the beans are washed and roasted. Next they
   are de-hulled by a "nibber" machine that also removes the germ. The
   nibs are ground between three sets of stones into a thick creamy paste.
   This "liquor" is converted to cocoa powder by removing part of its
   fatty oils (the " cocoa butter") using a hydraulic press or the Broma
   process. This process produces around 50% cocoa butter and 50% cocoa
   powder. Standard cocoa powder has a fat content of approximately 10-12
   percent. The extracted fatty oils are used in confectionery, soaps, and
   cosmetics.

   Adding an alkali produces Dutch process cocoa powder, which is less
   acidic, darker and more mellow in flavour than what is generally
   available in most of the world. Regular (nonalkalized) cocoa is acidic,
   so when added to an alkaline ingredient like baking soda, the two react
   and leave a byproduct.

Uses of cocoa

   The uses of cocoa beans are numerous. Chocolate or cocoa powder is
   mixed into cakes, ice creams, creams, cookies, or drinks as a natural
   flavour. It is the second most popular ice cream flavor, after vanilla.
   Sometimes it is merely used as a natural coloring agent for food, such
   as pasta.

   One of the most common forms of cocoa is the chocolate or candy bar. It
   is also available in chocolate syrup, used as an ice cream topping or
   to make chocolate milk.

   Cocoa has about twice as many antioxidants as does red wine, and up to
   three times more than green tea. Antioxidants are thought to be healthy
   compounds. Several chocolate manufacturers are beginning to offer
   chocolate products with guaranteed levels of these antioxidants, called
   polyphenols. The high antioxidant level in cocoa gives dark chocolate
   an ORAC value of 13,120 and milk chocolate an ORAC value of 6,740. A
   15-year study of elderly men published in the Archives of Internal
   Medicine in 2006 found a 50 percent reduction in cardiovascular
   mortality and a 47 percent reduction in all-cause mortality for the men
   regularly consuming the most cocoa, compared to those consuming the
   least cocoa from all sources.

Issues with cocoa as a commodity

     * Sustainable cocoa farming encourages the economic, social and
       environmental conditions necessary to improve the livelihoods of
       small scale cocoa farmers in the tropics. The World Cocoa
       Foundation is working with private and public sector partners to
       support this effort.
     * Many cocoa farmers receive a low price for their production. This
       has led to cocoa and chocolate being available as ' fair trade'
       items in some countries. However, this fair trade remains as a tiny
       percentage of the total trade.
     * Child slavery has commonly been used in its production to cover the
       lower profit margin. According to the U.S. Department of State,
       more than 109,000 children were working on cocoa farms in Côte
       d'Ivoire in 'the worst forms of child labor' in 2002. See Cocoa
       Protocol for an effort to end this practice.
     * Pollination is exclusively by midges, which may be affected by
       pesticides.

Cocoa Trading

   Cocoa beans, Cocoa butter and cocoa powder are traded on two world
   exchanges: London and New York. The London market is based on West
   African cocoa and New York on cocoa predominantly from South East Asia.
   Cocoa is the world's smallest soft commodity market. The futures price
   of cocoa butter and cocoa powder is determined by multiplying the bean
   price by a ratio. The combined butter and powder ratio has tended to be
   around 3.5. If the combined ratio falls below around 3.2, production
   ceases to be economically viable and some factories cease extraction of
   butter and powder and trade exclusively in cocoa liquor.
   Image:cocoa-trading-graphs.jpg

   Retrieved from " http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocoa"
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   with only minor checks and changes (see www.wikipedia.org for details
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