3 minutes starts now. 1

White Lie?

One of my favourite pastimes is a cup of black tea and a couple of pieces of organic dark chocolate. I’m sure many of you would agree with me that dark chocolates bitter qualities is definitely a somewhat acquired taste. But is dark chocolate as unpopular as fake chocolate? Please do not adjust your screen or refresh the page, that was not a typo. I did indeed type fake chocolate. For any die hard chocolate fans out there you will know that I am talking about white chocolate because by definition white chocolate is not technically chocolate.

Excuse me?

Before I give you the nitty gritty details here are some facts about the addictive confectionary. The word Chocolate itself originated from the Aztec’s word Xocalati translating to ‘bitter water’. The Aztecs were known to produce a drink by mixing cocoa beans with chillies, achiote and cornmeal. Twice as many women eat chocolate than men and indeed dark chocolate can be good for you (Yay!). In moderation of course which is around 1 to 2 pieces of organic (minimum 70% cocoa solids) and with no filling e.g. peanut butter.

I can’t believe it’s not… Chocolate?

So where does white chocolate come from if it is not real? White chocolate comes from the cocoa bean, which is the same as any other chocolate out there, except only the fat (which is turned into cocoa butter) from the cocoa bean is used. After the beans have been extracted, roasted and crushed the chocolate liquor is pressed to draw out the cocoa butter. The brown cocoa solids which give chocolate its brown colour are separated. The butter is then combined with milk, sugar and other flavourings such as vanilla to give it the correct taste. But as a result, white chocolate does not contain the antioxidant properties other chocolates would normally contain such as phenylethylamine, theobromine, thiamine and riboflavin.

So there you have it folks, whether white chocolate is real or not is up to you to decide. Personally I’m a sucker for white chocolate and raspberry cookies. So I’m happy to class white chocolate as real chocolate.

Last Minute Fact.

“The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog”

The above sentence uses every letter of the English alphabet. So next time you want to see how fast you can type or you just want to test out your calligraphy remember the sentence above.