Chocolate is a confection made from the roasted and ground seeds of the tropical cacao tree, a plant native to the forests of the Amazon basin. For more than three millennia, pre-Columbian cultures — the Olmecs, Maya, and Aztecs — prepared cacao as a bitter, frothing drink of water, chili, and maize, revered as xocolatl, the "food of the gods," and valued so highly that its beans served as currency. In the sixteenth century, Spanish conquistadors carried this New World beverage to Europe, where sugar replaced chili and the drink became a prized indulgence of the aristocracy. The modern age of chocolate began in 1828, when Dutch chemist Coenraad van Houten devised a press to separate cocoa butter from solids, yielding fine cocoa powder. In 1847, the English firm Fry and Sons blended this powder with sugar and restored cocoa butter, creating the world's first mass-produced solid eating bar. - AsNotedIn
| Place | AsNotedIn | Location | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Place | AsNotedIn | Location | |
| Jordi's Chocolate, HK | Hradec Kralove, CZ | Hradec Kralove Region, CZ | |
| Le Chocolat Alain Ducasse, Le Comptoir Saint-Benoit | Paris | Ile-de-France | |
| Switzerland |
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