IV.

MANUFACTURE OF CHOCOLATE AND BREAKFAST COCOA.

We have already called attention to the simple process by which the natives of Central America prepared a nutritious beverage from the seeds of the chocolate-plant. The essential features of this process, modified and greatly improved by modern science, are worthy of consideration at this time.

The selected cocoa-beans are first cleaned from the dust and attached particles which have come from various sources during the fermentation of the seeds. The machines for cleaning the beans are very ingenious and effective, removing from the seed-coat every trace of foreign matter.

The cleaned seeds are next roasted in the most careful manner, every precaution being taken to secure a uniform effect through the whole mass. During the roasting the seeds change color somewhat and become more or less modified in taste. In under-roasted seeds the flavor is not fully developed, while in over-roasted seeds the pleasant taste is likely to become greatly impaired, or it may even be wholly replaced by a bitter and harsh flavor. These relations of color and taste to the roasting of the seeds make this portion of the manufacture one of the most delicate processes from beginning to end.

By the roasting the shell becomes more readily detachable, and its complete removal is the next step. The crushing of the seeds into small fragments is easily accomplished; and this is followed by a thorough winnowing, by which the lighter shells are carried away by themselves, leaving the clean fragments of the roasted seeds ready for further manipulation.

Among the fragments can be detected minute and very tough bits of tissue. These bits are the hardened germs, or rather portions of the germs, and these are separated from the rest by an apparatus of much simplicity and efficiency.

The clean shells are usually placed at once in packages for transportation. They are extensively used for the domestic preparation of a wholesome and very low-priced drink. This beverage contains a fair proportion of the active principle of the chocolate-seeds themselves, and the flavor is suggestive of chocolate.

The cleaned fragments constitute the so-called “cocoa-nibs” of some foreign markets, and in this state they are used for the preparation of a simple decoction. But in this form they require to be boiled a good while for the development of flavor, and it is therefore better to have them treated beforehand in order to reduce the time of boiling; and this is all the more necessary, since during the long boiling a part of the more delicate aroma peculiar to chocolate-seeds is apt to be dissipated.

We are next to trace these fragments, through the chocolate-mill, and afterwards follow similar fragments through the cocoa-factory.

In the preparation of chocolate, the fragments are ground by a complicated mechanism until they attain the greatest degree of fineness, and constitute a perfectly homogeneous mass or paste. If the chocolate is to be a plain chocolate, it is to receive its delicate flavoring and then go directly into the moulds for shaping it. Every step of the process has to be watched with the most assiduous care. When the chocolate is formed and properly cooled, it is wrapped and packed for the market.

But if the chocolate is to be sweetened, a definite amount of the purest sugar, previously pulverized, is to be added, the whole ground and commingled, the proper flavoring of pure vanilla added, and the semi-solid mass formed in moulds as before. After being moulded it is sent to the packing-room and wrapped.

The variations in the process are innumerable, but all of them are comparatively unimportant when taken singly; the skill in the manufacture requires that each of these slight changes should be made at just the right time and in the right way. In the manufacture of Walter Baker and Co.’s chocolate, this skill has become developed to a very high degree during the hundred years of success. That the firm is ready to avail itself of every appliance known in modern manufacture, is seen by their adoption of the complicated machinery illustrated on page 29. This chocolate-machine has a capacity of five tons of pure chocolate daily. It is accessible to visitors, who may apply at the office in Dorchester for permission to see it in operation.

It is unnecessary to detail the steps of manufacture of many of the chocolate specialties of the firm.

We turn now to the consideration of breakfast cocoa.

The manufacture of breakfast cocoa is based upon two important factors: first, the removal of a definite portion of the cocoa-oil from the roasted seeds; and second, increasing the miscibility of the powdered seeds by securing the greatest practicable degree of fineness.

[Illustration: ONE OF THE CHOCOLATE-MACHINES AT THE MANUFACTORY OF WALTER BAKER & CO.

CAPACITY, FIVE TONS OF CHOCOLATE DAILY.]

While the oil of the chocolate-seed is perfectly wholesome, there are some persons who find in the percentage natural to the seeds a too large amount for easy digestion. The removal of a part of this, which might with propriety be called an excess of the oil, was practised even in very early days, as is seen in the cut herewith given, taken from an old work on the subject. The present method of extracting the oil is not essentially different, save in a few particulars, from that here figured, and therefore need not be described in detail.

[Illustration]

The method of manufacture is substantially as follows: the ground fragments of roasted seeds are subjected to pressure, and with the result of withdrawing just as much oil as the manufacturers desire to abstract. The pressed mass is, in the most successful process, treated mechanically in such a manner as to divide and subdivide the minute particles until they are capable of passing through a sieve having several thousand meshes to the square inch. But such pulverization as this would, under ordinary circumstances, reduce the mass to a dull and unattractive powder. In the process devised by the firm of Walter Baker and Co., this high degree of fineness is secured without any loss of brilliancy in the powder,--the color being of the bright-red which is not only attractive in appearance, but when conjoined with the natural chocolate odor and flavor is characteristic of absolutely pure cocoa of the highest grade.

It is instructive to compare such cocoa with the cocoas prepared by what is known in chemical technology as the chemical process. The latter are prepared by treatment with alkaline matters which act on the coloring substances in the seeds, increasing the apparent effect of hot water when the latter is added. In chemically prepared cocoas, the exquisite natural odor and flavor of pure cocoa-seeds have been diminished or wholly lost by the severe treatment to which the materials have been subjected. In some cases the loss of the natural flavor is sought to be partially supplied by the use of fragrant gums, wholly foreign to the natural product.

The detection of these admixtures is generally easy. Comparison with the well-known pure breakfast cocoa of Walter Baker and Co. will reveal at once the vast superiority of a product which has not been treated by chemicals, but which contains only the finest possible powder of the best chocolate-seeds freed from the excess of oil. The exquisite flavor and odor of the pure product are due wholly to the seeds themselves, since absolutely no foreign matter is added from first to last. Walter Baker and Co.’s breakfast cocoa can be used by students of the microscope and of chemistry as a perfect type of the highest order of excellence in manufacture. The enormous increase in consumption of Baker’s cocoa and chocolate indicates that our discriminating public appreciate a thoroughly good article when they see it.