Cocoa beans don’t grow in the United States, do they? After all, one normally associates them more with the tropics than the snow-choked plains of the US. In fact, this holds true for our country, too. Cocoa beans do indeed grow in the USA, but only in very limited areas. There is a narrow band known as the Cocoa Bet or the Chocolate Belt. That sounds more enticing that the Rust Belt or the Snow Belt! The Cocoa Belt essentially follows the tropics, extending twenty degrees north and south of th...

You’ve probably heard people describe themselves as “chocoholics.” But can people really become addicted to chocolate? And is part of chocolate’s “addictive” nature due to its reputation as an aphrodisiac?

The cocoa connection dates back to ancient history. In fact, chocolate has been around almost as long as man. All the while, chocolate was gaining popularity not only for its decadence, but also for its reputed aphrodisiac properties. Today, we know that chocolate contains phenylethylamine, a naturally occurring amino-acid – the same one that we humans release when we are falling in love.

Everyone's favorite treat is full of fascinating history. Read on for some fun facts about chocolate.

In our last post, we presented Twelve Fun Facts You May Not Know About Chocolate. Due to popular demand, we're back with some more facts about everybody's favorite snack. Enjoy!

1. Does chocolate contribute to intellectual superiority? Perhaps. Eat up, because there is a positive correlation between the amount of chocolate a country consumes and the number of Nobel Laureates that country has produced.

Chocolate made its way back across the Atlantic Ocean with British settlers to the colonies, with the first chocolate factory established in pre-revolutionary New England in 1765.

Christopher Columbus was spellbound by this new elixir, and he first presented cacao beans to the Spanish royal court in 1502. Explorer Hernan Cortés brought the Aztec cocoa drink back to Spain, and adapted it by heating and adding cane sugar, vanilla, and cinnamon to make it more agreeable to the European palate. Wealthy patrons grew a taste for this hot chocolate, which stoked demand and led Spanish colonizers to plant even more cacao trees in Ecuador, Venezuela, Peru, and Jamaica, in order to...

Chocolate as we know it is believed to have its origins more than two thousand years ago with the Olmec people. This pre-Colombian tribe settled the fertile lowlands of the Gulf of Mexico and cultivated corn, chilies, avocados, pumpkins, and beans. It was under these conditions that the Olmecs first cultivated the cocoa tree, Theobroma cacao.