Chocolate products were first consumed around 5000 years ago in South America.
For a long time, it was considered the ‘food of the gods’ and was available only to the wealthy.
Then under the Aztecs (the 15th-century rulers of the area in and around modern-day Mexico), chocolate gained the reputation of being an aphrodisiacA food or drink that stimulates sexual desire, and so, the love food.
It is said that when the Spanish invaders arrived in Mexico, they were told that the Aztec king drank 50 cups of bitter chocolate a day to increase his libido.Sexual desire.
Upon conquering Mexico, the Spanish took chocolate to Spain from where it spread to other parts of Europe.
But it continued being a drink of the wealthy and retained its reputation of being a love food.
But by the early 1800s, the chocolate beverage started losing ground in Europe – it was “greasy” and Europeans were moving on to tea and coffee, more refined stuff.
The problem was the cacao butter but it was expensive to remove, till cocoa press was invented that could squeeze out the butter from the beans easily.
This easily-squeezed butter (this so-far-useless-byproduct could now be mixed with sugar and other ingredients to create confectionery) became the main reason for the birth of solid, affordable chocolate bars in 1847 in England (till then, chocolate was consumed as a drink).
Meanwhile, Valentine’s Day, which had now been associated with ‘romantic’ love for around 500 yearsThe origin of Valentine’s Day is attributed to various early Christian martyrs named Valentine, but its linkage to romantic love seems to appear first in Chaucer’s 1382 poem, Parlement of Foules. Chaucer here describes the nature of love when “every bird cometh to choose his mate” on “seynt Voantynes day.” Source: Smithsonian Magazine, had become very popular in England.
On this day, people expressed their affection by exchanging lavish cards decorated with lace, and Cupids.
In 1861, Richard Cadbury, one of the pioneers in the solid chocolate industry, seeing Valentine’s Day as a great marketing opportunity started selling his chocolates in beautifully decorated Valentine-themed boxes that he himself designed.
From that point, because of the ‘romantic’ packaging, symbols of love such as Cupids, roses, and the heart-shape became linked to chocolates.
American chocolatier Milton Hershey took the commercialization of Valentine’s day further when he launched tear-dropped shaped “kisses,” so-called because of the smooching noise the chocolate made as it was manufactured.
Gradually, Cupids, heart-shapes, etc. moved on from being the shape of the packaging to being the shape of the chocolates.
