Knowra Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate is a food made from cacao components, commonly combined with sugar and sometimes milk. Its flavor and texture vary with ingredients and processing.
Cacao bean fermentation : Microbial processing of cacao pulp and beans that develops flavor precursors and reduces bitterness. Fermentation creates precursors that roasting later turns into chocolate’s characteristic aromas.
Cacao bean : The seed of the cacao tree, processed into the ingredients used to make chocolate. Cacao beans are the source of chocolate’s characteristic solids and fat.
Dark chocolate : Chocolate made without milk solids, typically with a higher proportion of cacao ingredients than milk chocolate. Dark chocolate shows how cacao intensity changes when milk is omitted.
Chocolate confectionery : Sweets made with chocolate, including bars, truffles, pralines, and filled candies. Confectionery is chocolate’s most visible family of finished products.
Cacao : The cacao tree and its seeds, which are processed into cocoa and chocolate ingredients. Chocolate takes its name and defining ingredients from cacao.
Chocolate roasting : Heating cacao beans to develop aroma, reduce moisture, and loosen their shells. Roasting builds flavor from compounds formed during fermentation.
Cocoa mass : A paste of ground cacao nibs containing both cocoa solids and cocoa butter. Cocoa mass provides the combined cacao components in many chocolate recipes.
White chocolate : A confection made with cocoa butter, sugar, and milk ingredients, but no nonfat cocoa solids. It contains cacao-derived fat but lacks the cocoa solids that give most chocolate its brown color.
Hot chocolate : A warm drink made by mixing chocolate or cocoa with milk or water. Dissolved chocolate carries its flavor into a drink rather than a solid confection.
Mesoamerican chocolate : Cacao-based drinks and preparations used by pre-Columbian Mesoamerican societies. Mesoamerican cacao preparations predate the sweet solid chocolate familiar today.
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