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Speaker 1: Guess what will?

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Speaker 2: What's that mango?

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Speaker 1: So? You know I love spicy food, right, and I

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Speaker 1: love chocolate, but I don't really love this trend of

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Speaker 1: spicy and chocolate.

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Speaker 2: I am one hundred percent with you on this because

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Speaker 2: I love spicy food and I love chocolate too, but

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Speaker 2: I don't want any chili powder like in my hot

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Speaker 2: chocolate or chocolate or any of that stuff.

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Speaker 1: I know, why why are people always mixing those flavors?

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Speaker 1: But I was looking into it and I found possibly

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Speaker 1: the worst example of super spicy chocolate.

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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, there's a.

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Speaker 1: Company that spared up in twenty sixteen called pepper bomb

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Speaker 1: your mom.

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Speaker 2: Like an insult?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it was I guess a joke that

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Speaker 1: you could play on people where you'd buy a chocolate

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Speaker 1: coated Carolina Reaper for nine to ninety nine and then

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Speaker 1: send it to a loved one, or I guess the opposite.

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Speaker 2: I was gonna say, that is not something you want

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Speaker 2: to send to a loved one.

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Speaker 1: I know, Carolina reapers are so spicy.

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Speaker 2: Actually, we've talked about these before. Aren't they even spicier

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Speaker 2: than like ghost peppers? Yeah?

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Speaker 1: They are, so I'm not sure if it's like the

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Speaker 1: threat of lawsuits that close this business, or the fact

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Speaker 1: that too many moms complained about it. But uh, pepperbomb,

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Speaker 1: your mom sadly doesn't send out pepper bombs anymore. Sadly,

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Speaker 1: I do want to get into the more tempting part

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Speaker 1: of that recipe, which is the chocolate, why humans are

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Speaker 1: so obsessed with it, whether it's really as healthy as

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Speaker 1: all these reports would have us believe, and why doesn't

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Speaker 1: taste more like tropical custard the way the beans do.

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Speaker 3: Let's dig in.

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Speaker 2: Hey, their podcast listeners, welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm

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Speaker 2: Will Pearson, and as always I'm joined by my good

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Speaker 2: friend mang show Ticketer. And on the other side of

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Speaker 2: the soundproof glass munching his way through a Whitman sampler,

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Speaker 2: that's our friend and producer Tristan McNeil. Actually, by the way,

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Speaker 2: that sampler looks like it's meant for more than one person,

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Speaker 2: wouldn't you say?

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Speaker 3: Mango?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, definitely, it's gotta be.

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Speaker 2: Like thirty forty ounces chocolate sitting there.

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Speaker 3: I know.

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Speaker 1: I actually tried to grab a piece earlier and Tristan

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Speaker 1: slapped my hand away. Apparently he's busy branking all the

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Speaker 1: different chocolates for his blog.

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Speaker 2: Oh really his blog. Well that's at least that's something

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Speaker 2: to look forward too, so I'll leave it be there.

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Speaker 1: So you know what's funny is right before a hurricane Sandy,

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Speaker 1: the night before the storm hit, like Lizzie sent me

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Speaker 1: to a convenience store to get some last minute supplies,

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Speaker 1: and we were pretty stocked up, but just in case,

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Speaker 1: I went to pick up some like extra toilet paper

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Speaker 1: and water and I think batteries. But the weather was bad,

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Speaker 1: so like there were only two other guys in the

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Speaker 1: store in line, and the first guy had the shopping

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Speaker 1: cart filled with beer and condom, that's all. Yeah. And

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Speaker 1: then I was there with like tpee and water in

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Speaker 1: my hands, and and then this other guy had this

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Speaker 1: shopping cart that was just filled with chocolate, just like

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Speaker 1: bags and bags of candy. And I remember like glancing

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Speaker 1: around and like being a little confused and thinking, well,

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Speaker 1: we all have different definitions of being prepared.

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Speaker 2: Like everybody was ready for very different nights. That's pretty great,

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Speaker 2: all right. Well, I know we're going to get into

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Speaker 2: the ancient history of chocolate, but it is kind of

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Speaker 2: amazing that chocolate is the world's favorite candy. In fact,

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Speaker 2: chocolate based candies far out sell fruit based candies in

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Speaker 2: almost every country on the planet. Now, Denmark's love of

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Speaker 2: harribogummies makes it one of the few exceptions to the

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Speaker 2: rule in and I have to respect that they're pretty good.

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Speaker 2: But this year alone, nearly eight million tons of chocolate

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Speaker 2: is expected to be sold and consumed worldwide. Now that

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Speaker 2: amounts to over one hundred billion dollars in revenue for

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Speaker 2: one year.

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Speaker 1: That's crazy. So how much of that as thanks to

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Speaker 1: like American chocoholics.

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Speaker 2: Actually not as much as you might think. So even

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Speaker 2: though the average American eats about ten pounds of chocolate

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Speaker 2: every year, we actually only ranked twentieth in terms of

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Speaker 2: national chocolate consumption. And that's according to data released by

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Speaker 2: euro Monitor. You know euro Monitor, Yeah, I.

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Speaker 3: Get their newsletter.

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Speaker 1: So we consume our own body weight and chocolate every

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Speaker 1: ten years or so, and that's still only good enough

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Speaker 1: for twentieth place. Yep, that's really confusing. How much chocolate

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Speaker 1: are these other countries eating.

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Speaker 2: Well, it's probably no surprise that Switzerland ranks number one,

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Speaker 2: and each person there consumes on average about twenty pounds

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Speaker 2: of chocolate every year, and so that's twice as much

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Speaker 2: as the average American, and then Germany and Austria are

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Speaker 2: tied for second. They have about I don't know, say

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Speaker 2: seventeen to eighteen pounds per year. England and Ireland come

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Speaker 2: in right after those. And then you go to the

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Speaker 2: other end of the spectrum, and these are places where

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Speaker 2: chocolate really doesn't dominate the sweet market, and China is

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Speaker 2: an example of that. So the average Chinese citizen eats

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Speaker 2: less than half a pound of chocolate a year, So

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Speaker 2: that means people in Switzerland eat forty times as much

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Speaker 2: chocolate as those in China. That's amazing.

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Speaker 1: So this is completely off topic, but I can't stop

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Speaker 1: thinking about it. Did you realize that cacao beans are

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Speaker 1: related to okra and actually to durian as well. That's

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Speaker 1: super smelly fruit, Like they're all from the same family.

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Speaker 1: And I kind of want to tell my kids, like,

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Speaker 1: I'm so sorry I couldn't pick you up any chocolate

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Speaker 1: from the store, but I got its cousin a bag

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Speaker 1: of okra for you. But you were talking about chocolate consumption,

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Speaker 1: where do the actual cacau producing countries fall on that list?

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Speaker 2: Actually, just to go back to that, that would mean

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Speaker 2: that chocolate is technically a vegetable then, right, Yeah, that's true.

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Speaker 2: All right, So the actual cacaw producing countries, Africa and

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Speaker 2: South American countries account for the vast majority of the

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Speaker 2: world's cacao production, and that's the type of seed pod

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Speaker 2: that's used to make chocolate. But despite being the first

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Speaker 2: and most crucial link in the chocolate supply chain, these

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Speaker 2: countries actually don't consume very much chocolate at all. In fact,

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Speaker 2: the highest chocolate consumption rate in all of South America

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Speaker 2: is actually in Chili, and the average person there eats

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Speaker 2: less than four pounds of chocolate per year, and the

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Speaker 2: numbers there are even lower in Africa, so the entire

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Speaker 2: continent consumes fewer than four percent of all the chocolate

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Speaker 2: sold worldwide.

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Speaker 1: Wow. And so I'm guessing the low consumption rate in

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Speaker 1: these countries isn't due to like cultural preferences like it

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Speaker 1: is in China, right, I mean, ancient civilizations in South

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Speaker 1: America are pretty much invented chocolate, So it's not like

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Speaker 1: the people there don't have.

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Speaker 2: A taste for it. Yeah, that's that's really not what

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Speaker 2: it is. I mean, it comes down to the low

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Speaker 2: average income of several of these countries, And what do

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Speaker 2: you think about it? If you're living on a few

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Speaker 2: dollars or even less than a dollar a day, then

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Speaker 2: it just doesn't make sense in the budget to spend

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Speaker 2: on a luxury item like chocolate. Sure.

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Speaker 1: So, I actually saw this report from Oxfam about the

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Speaker 1: economics of the chocolate trade and how skewed it is,

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Speaker 1: especially for Cocow farmers.

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Speaker 2: And apparently if you divide up the cost.

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Speaker 1: Of producing a chocolate bar from start to finish, the

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Speaker 1: farmer who cultivated the rock Cocow only gets about three percent. Meanwhile,

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Speaker 1: about forty three percent of the price we pay for

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Speaker 1: a chocolate bar is profit for the retailer.

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Speaker 2: Wow. All right, So so three percent of the people

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Speaker 2: who actually grow it and harvest it and you know,

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Speaker 2: kind of provide that main ingredient for chocolate, and then

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Speaker 2: forty three percent to those who sell the final product.

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Speaker 2: Is that what you're saying? Wow, that does seem pretty skewed.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. So, I actually remember this video that made the

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Speaker 1: rounds a few years ago where this reporter for this

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Speaker 1: international news site visits some Cocow farmers on the Ivory Coast,

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Speaker 1: and the Ivory Coast is the world's largest producer of

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Speaker 1: coco beans. It turns out roughly, I want to say,

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Speaker 1: like one point five million tons of it every year.

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Speaker 1: But processed chocolate isn't really available, so when you do

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Speaker 1: find it, it's really exorbitant. Like I think a bar

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Speaker 1: costs about a third of what the average worker makes

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Speaker 1: in a single day. Wow, which means that many farmers

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Speaker 1: who cultivate cocao have actually never tasted the final product.

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Speaker 2: I mean it kind of makes you want to go

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Speaker 2: there and give them a taste of this stuff. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: And so the video right, like this reporter gives a

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Speaker 1: chocolate bar to a local farmer named Alphons, and he

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Speaker 1: takes his first bite and you see his face just

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Speaker 1: light up. He's like, I didn't know cacao was so yummy.

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Speaker 1: And then he and the reporter hop on a motorbike

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Speaker 1: to share the chocolate with other farmers, and when he

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Speaker 1: passes the chocolate bar around, Alphons tells the other farmers,

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Speaker 1: this is why white people are so healthy.

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Speaker 2: Wow. Well, I know there's more we wanted to cover

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Speaker 2: about cacao production and some of the other challenges that

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Speaker 2: it involves, But since you brought up these health benefits

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Speaker 2: of chocolate, I do think we should take a few

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Speaker 2: minutes to do I don't know, some kind of a

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Speaker 2: true false breakdown of what there it actually is good

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Speaker 2: for your health.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, chocolate's one of those things like red wine,

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Speaker 1: that you always hear about has all these surprising health benefits,

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Speaker 1: but then you never get good sense of how much

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Speaker 1: of that is backed by science and how much is

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Speaker 1: just wishful thinking by people who really want to eat

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Speaker 1: a lot of chocolate. I mean, like, I feel like

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Speaker 1: I usually hear that dark chocolate is healthier because it

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Speaker 1: has less sugar and more caca than milk chocolate, and

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Speaker 1: you know, that makes a lot of sense, but at

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Speaker 1: the end of the day, it's still just a comparison

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Speaker 1: between two kinds of chocolate, so you're still kind of

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Speaker 1: left wondering.

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Speaker 2: Is chocolate itself healthy. Well, I'm glad you mentioned that

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Speaker 2: distinction between dark and milk chocolate, because that difference in

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Speaker 2: sugar and cacaws is really where these claims about chocolate's

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Speaker 2: health benefits kind of live or die. And that's because

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Speaker 2: cacao products contain a high amount of plant derived flavonols.

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Speaker 1: So I think you should explain what flavanols are.

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Speaker 2: It's just a word I made up, just sound good

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Speaker 2: of it. Now for real that they're actually the biological

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Speaker 2: compounds that occur in some foods. It's not not just chocolate,

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Speaker 2: but unprocessed cacao is an example of that. And since

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Speaker 2: flavonol's possess you know, antioxidant and blood vessel relaxing and

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Speaker 2: these anti inflammatory qualities, they're they're often associated with markers

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Speaker 2: of good health like you know, balance cholesterol or blood

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Speaker 2: pressure or various other measures like this.

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Speaker 1: So all those reports about how eating chocolate promotes heart health,

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Speaker 1: that's basically because of the flavonols.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's where that comes from. But again, the blanket

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Speaker 2: statement that chocolate is good for your health is a

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Speaker 2: little misleading, you know. But because of his higher flavon

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Speaker 2: all count cacow has a much better case for being

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Speaker 2: healthy than chocolate does, I guess. But you know, even then,

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Speaker 2: it's not like a cow is the only source of

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Speaker 2: plant derived flavonols or even the best one really. In fact,

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Speaker 2: you can usually find more flavonols in tea or grape

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Speaker 2: juice or wine, and you know, several other fruits than

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Speaker 2: you would and say cacal say cocw.

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Speaker 1: Have you seen the Brooklyn nine nine where that guy

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Speaker 1: Terry starts eating CaCO nibs now and because there's so

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Speaker 1: much healthier for you than chocolate, And then he keeps

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Speaker 1: heatium keeps he um, and suddenly he's like floated by

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Speaker 1: the middle from the cacw. Okay, So there may be

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Speaker 1: some indirect health benefits for eating chocolate, but you'd basically

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Speaker 1: get the same or better results from other foods.

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Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, And in most cases the results probably would

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Speaker 2: be better with tea or berries than it would with chocolate.

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Speaker 2: And that's largely because the heating process involved in standard

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Speaker 2: chocolate manufacturing it actually burns away much of the flavonol

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Speaker 2: concentration that you would find in those fresh cacao seeds.

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Speaker 2: So you know, if you want to eat the healthiest

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Speaker 2: chocolate that you can find, you should go for the

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Speaker 2: dark chocolate with at least seventy or eighty percent cacal,

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Speaker 2: and the flavanol concentration will be much higher than in

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Speaker 2: any milk chocolate bar, which contains about fifteen percent cacao

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Speaker 2: or less, but twenty to twenty five percent fat and

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Speaker 2: forty to fifty percent sugar.

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Speaker 1: Well, I usually prefer the bitter taste of dark chocolate

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Speaker 1: to like the overly sweet taste of milk chocolate. But

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Speaker 1: I'm kind of surprised there isn't more of a middle ground,

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Speaker 1: like something that melts in your mouth like milk chocolate does,

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Speaker 1: but also tastes less sugary.

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Speaker 2: Well, I have to say, as a fan of milk chocolate,

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Speaker 2: all of this kind of disappointing to me. But I

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Speaker 2: do have good news for you, though, Mango, because researchers

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Speaker 2: out of Temple University in Philly have actually found a

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Speaker 2: new way to cut the fat content from chocolate by

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Speaker 2: using nothing other than electricity, Like.

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Speaker 1: They shock the fat away with one of those crazy

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Speaker 1: exercise belts.

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Speaker 2: I kind of wish that that was what they were doing,

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Speaker 2: but now it's not not exactly that. So you do

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Speaker 2: remember Willy Wonka and the chocolate factory and they're walking

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Speaker 2: alongside the chocolate river and they're all those industrial pipes

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Speaker 2: sucking up the chocolate.

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Speaker 1: Right, Definitely, Augustus Gloop falls in.

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Speaker 2: It's pretty funny. You like that movie, right, Yeah? I

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Speaker 2: loved it, man, It's such a great movie. Well, it's

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Speaker 2: actually there's something we can learn from that because the

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Speaker 2: chocolate makers really are dependent on this pipe system to

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Speaker 2: move liquid chocolate from one stage of production to the next.

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Speaker 2: And the problem is that the thicker and more viscous

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Speaker 2: a liquid is, the higher the chance it'll clog up

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Speaker 2: the pipes a la Augustus gloop. And since cutting the

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Speaker 2: fat content results in a denser and less smooth chocolate,

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Speaker 2: producing low fat chocolate typically leads to a lot of blockages.

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Speaker 1: So explain how electricity helps with that.

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Speaker 2: Well, there's this phenomenon called electroreology, and it's basically when

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Speaker 2: an electric field is used to turn a semi solid

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Speaker 2: like jello into a liquid state or vice versa. So

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Speaker 2: in the case of chocolate, the field from the electrified

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Speaker 2: pipes causes its chunky CaCO particles and milk solids to

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Speaker 2: really to line up in these chains and this makes

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Speaker 2: the chocolate flow through the pipes much more easily. So

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Speaker 2: not only will the new process lead to fewer clogs,

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Speaker 2: it'll actually allow chocolate tears to use ten to twenty

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Speaker 2: percent less butter per batch. And the best part is that,

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Speaker 2: according to the authors of the study, the resulting chocolate

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Speaker 2: delivers a stronger cacal flavor and significantly less.

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Speaker 1: Fat, which sounds like a dream come true.

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Speaker 2: Not to me, to be honest with you, I kind

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Speaker 2: of want the more butter.

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Speaker 1: But you know, there are a few health benefits to

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Speaker 1: chocolate that go beyond the physicals. So, for one thing,

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Speaker 1: chocolate contains caffeine, which obviously has a stimulating effect on

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Speaker 1: the brain, but there are also these other feel good

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Speaker 1: chemicals in there too. There's phenol ethylemium, which is a

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Speaker 1: stimulant that raises the endorphin level in the brain. And

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Speaker 1: there's also something called nandimide, which is similar to one

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Speaker 1: of the active chemicals in marijuana.

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Speaker 2: All right, So between its caffeine and those other feel

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Speaker 2: good chemicals you mentioned, chocolate is clearly a mood enhancer,

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Speaker 2: and this is real. There's even a study from Oxford

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Speaker 2: that found that even just looking at a picture of

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Speaker 2: chocolate was enough to trigger cravings and mood boost in

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Speaker 2: some chocolate fiends.

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Speaker 1: And don't forget, eating chocolate is also a surefire way

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Speaker 1: to restore a little happiness after about with the dementia,

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Speaker 1: which is you know, at least the case in Harry Potter, I.

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Speaker 2: Thought you might figure out a way to put in

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Speaker 2: a Harry Potter reference. That's a really helpful tip, though

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Speaker 2: chocolate frogs. Well. Now that we've covered the health benefits

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Speaker 2: of chocolate, both real and imaginary, I do feel like

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Speaker 2: we should take a closer look at how humans became

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Speaker 2: obsessed with the sweet stuff in the first place.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely, But before we dive in, let's take a quick break.

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Speaker 2: You're listening to part Time Genius and we're talking about

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Speaker 2: the origins of mankind's love affair with chocolate. All right, Mengo,

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Speaker 2: So I know you did some digging into the early

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Speaker 2: years of chocolate. So do you want to walk us

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Speaker 2: through what you found in the process.

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Speaker 1: Sure, So the best place to start is with the

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Speaker 1: cacao tree and its beans. And for anyone who's wondering,

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Speaker 1: cacao and cocoa are the same thing. You can use

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Speaker 1: the terms interchangeably because they both refer to the same

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Speaker 1: exact bean. But even though Africa is now the world's

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Speaker 1: largest cocoa producer, the trees aren't native to the region.

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Speaker 1: They were actually brought over as a cash crop to

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Speaker 1: aid the struggling region. And the true starting point of

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Speaker 1: chocolate's long history is in Mexico, Central and South America.

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Speaker 1: And that's where the equatorial climate provide the best place

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Speaker 1: for the native cacao tree to thrive.

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Speaker 2: Or is it just another quick note on the terminology here.

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Speaker 2: So the cacao beans that these trees produce, they're really

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Speaker 2: seeds though, right, Yeah.

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Speaker 1: They're not actually beans in the same way that like

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Speaker 1: coconut milk is in milk, So we're just gonna go

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Speaker 1: with it. Yeah, But the trees produce these big yellowish

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Speaker 1: seed pods that kind of look like nerf footballs, and

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Speaker 1: each pod contains about forty beans, which are what's actually

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Speaker 1: used to make chocolate. So once you crack open the

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Speaker 1: pods they husk, the beans are released, along with this sweet,

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Speaker 1: sticky pulp that supposedly tastes something between like a cross

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Speaker 1: of lemonade and apple custard.

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Speaker 2: Actually sounds pretty good.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, But the beans and the pulp are left to

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Speaker 1: ferment for a few days before being dried and roasted,

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Speaker 1: and from there the cocoa beans can be ground up

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Speaker 1: and then made into.

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Speaker 2: A chocolate beverage. All right, So if that's what was

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Speaker 2: done first, who were the very first people to drink chocolate?

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Speaker 1: So most of the evidence points to the ancient Olemecs.

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Speaker 1: They were actually the earliest known civilization to appear in Mexico,

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Speaker 1: and archaeologists have found pieces of olemeck pots and vessels

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Speaker 1: from around fifteen hundred BCE that contain traces of theobromine.

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Speaker 1: This is a stimulant found in chocolate, and in fact,

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Speaker 1: the Latin name for the cacao tree is theobromine cacao,

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Speaker 1: which translates to chocolate food of the gods, which actually

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Speaker 1: ends up being a pretty fitting names since it's believed

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Speaker 1: that the Omes use the ground beans to make a

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Speaker 1: special drink for religious ceremonies.

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Speaker 2: It's always funny to think about the first people to

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Speaker 2: discover something like chocolate, like, oh my god, this tastes

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Speaker 2: so good. I gotta go tell everybody about this thing

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Speaker 2: that I don't have a name for. But why is

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Speaker 2: there uncertaint about who invented drinking chocolate? I mean, from

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Speaker 2: what you've said, it sounds like the Olemes kind of

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Speaker 2: have this wrapped up.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, But pottery with traces of cacao have been found

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Speaker 1: in southern Ecuador as well, so those are believed to

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Speaker 1: date back at least fifty five hundred years. So the

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Speaker 1: Shuar Indians who lived in the region also have a

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Speaker 1: potential claim to this chocolate drinking. The truth is there's

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Speaker 1: tinted pottery in a lot of places, and that leaves

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Speaker 1: a lot of room for interpretation, And since the Omes

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Speaker 1: don't actually have any written history to go on, some

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Speaker 1: of the theories surrounding them could be off. For instance,

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Speaker 1: some researchers think that the Olemes used only the tropical

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Speaker 1: flavorcaw pulp to make the drink rather than the bitter beans.

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Speaker 2: Well, I can't say I blame I mean, when you

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Speaker 2: say it tasted like what did you say, apple custard,

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Speaker 2: lemonade or something like that, that sounds a lot better

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Speaker 2: than like bitter bean water something.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, but bitter bean water. The gods right, right, right.

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Speaker 1: But regardless of who came up with the idea, first,

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Speaker 1: we do know for certain that the Mayans ran with it,

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Speaker 1: like their written history includes numerous mentions of chocolate based

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Speaker 1: drink made from the cacao seeds, and because Mayans had

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Speaker 1: yet to develop a good roasting technique to mellow the flavors,

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Speaker 1: it was probably pretty bitter.

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Speaker 2: So what was in it exactly was just ground beans

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Speaker 2: and water or what.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, Or sometimes seasonings would be outed, like vanilla or

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Speaker 1: honey or chili pepper.

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Speaker 2: So how did the Mayans think about chocolate? They did

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Speaker 2: they consider it the food of the gods or were

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Speaker 2: they a little more level headed about the way they

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Speaker 2: approached it?

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Speaker 1: No, I mean they were full on crazy for chocolate.

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Speaker 1: They leave the drink as offerings to their gods, and

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Speaker 1: there are also paintings recovered from the time that show

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Speaker 1: cacao and mythological scenes. It was also kind of a

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Speaker 1: way to settle important legal matters or even seal the

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Speaker 1: deal on a marriage wow for example, like early records

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Speaker 1: of Mayan marriages show that in some places a woman

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Speaker 1: had to prepare a cacao drink to prove that you

396
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Speaker 1: can get that thick, frothy consistency just right. I mean,

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Speaker 1: it does kind of make sense, because could you ever

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Speaker 1: see yourself loving somebody who can't properly froth a pot

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Speaker 1: of chocolate.

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Speaker 2: I don't even know what that means, but I can't

401
00:18:11,320 --> 00:18:11,840
Speaker 2: imagine it.

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00:18:13,359 --> 00:18:16,760
Speaker 1: But caca wasn't actually restricted to just the loftier sides

403
00:18:16,760 --> 00:18:20,320
Speaker 1: of life. There were ceremonies and celebrations that used it,

404
00:18:20,359 --> 00:18:22,960
Speaker 1: and it was also an early form of currency.

405
00:18:23,040 --> 00:18:23,440
Speaker 2: Oh wow.

406
00:18:23,560 --> 00:18:27,560
Speaker 1: Yeah, so in the fifth century CE, the Aztecs used

407
00:18:27,560 --> 00:18:30,199
Speaker 1: it to buy food and other goods. For example, you

408
00:18:30,200 --> 00:18:32,320
Speaker 1: can actually get a whole turkey for about one hundred

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Speaker 1: cacao beans.

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Speaker 2: It feels like a pretty good deal. I don't know

411
00:18:35,720 --> 00:18:38,200
Speaker 2: what the exchange rate is and coco beans, but I'd

412
00:18:38,200 --> 00:18:38,720
Speaker 2: buy it.

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00:18:39,440 --> 00:18:41,760
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, what's amazing is that it bread some early

414
00:18:41,840 --> 00:18:43,359
Speaker 1: counterfeiting schemes as well.

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Speaker 2: Counterfeiting of beans, is that what you're talking about. How

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Speaker 2: do you counterfeit a bean? You just like take a

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Speaker 2: rock and paint it or something.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, well, if you want a turkey bad enough anything. Yeah. So,

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Speaker 1: researchers have actually found these counterfeit beans at multiple dig

420
00:18:56,480 --> 00:19:00,000
Speaker 1: sites in both Mexico and Guatemala, and at first glances,

421
00:19:00,119 --> 00:19:03,399
Speaker 1: they just looked like these incredibly well preserved cacao beans.

422
00:19:03,440 --> 00:19:06,760
Speaker 1: But once they actually touched them, the researchers realized that

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Speaker 1: they were just made of clay, which.

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Speaker 2: Is pretty ridiculous. I mean, but if kakau was that valuable,

425
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Speaker 2: I would have to think that it was a delicacy

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Speaker 2: that was reserved for the super wealthy. I mean, if

427
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Speaker 2: people were going through the trouble of making these phony

428
00:19:19,280 --> 00:19:22,040
Speaker 2: clay beans. What was it really hard to come by

429
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Speaker 2: them or what?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it seems like the Mayans had taken

431
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Speaker 1: a really generous approach to cacao.

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Speaker 3: In their day.

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Speaker 1: They thought of it as food from the gods, as

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Speaker 1: we mentioned, so they thought it was meant for everyone

435
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Speaker 1: to eat. So Mayan families, even the ones who weren't

436
00:19:35,080 --> 00:19:37,280
Speaker 1: well off, would prepare batches of their favorite drink ahead

437
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Speaker 1: of time, and then they'd enjoy it at every meal.

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Speaker 1: And the Aztecs, on the other hand, considered cacau to

439
00:19:42,240 --> 00:19:45,199
Speaker 1: be this upper class luxury and almost a status symbol.

440
00:19:45,680 --> 00:19:47,399
Speaker 2: And I mean that's partially because they were using it

441
00:19:47,400 --> 00:19:48,200
Speaker 2: as money.

442
00:19:47,920 --> 00:19:51,080
Speaker 1: Too, right, But as a result, the lower classes would

443
00:19:51,160 --> 00:19:53,520
Speaker 1: really only get a taste of stuff at weddings or

444
00:19:53,600 --> 00:19:57,280
Speaker 1: sometimes at community celebrations. But what is clear is that

445
00:19:57,320 --> 00:20:01,080
Speaker 1: Aztec rulers really loved their cacau, and probably the most

446
00:20:01,119 --> 00:20:05,159
Speaker 1: famous was Montezuma. He supposedly drank I think it's like

447
00:20:05,400 --> 00:20:07,040
Speaker 1: gallons of hot chocolate every day.

448
00:20:07,280 --> 00:20:10,760
Speaker 2: See gallons. I can't imagine drinking gallons of anything.

449
00:20:11,800 --> 00:20:14,600
Speaker 1: Yeah. So the Spanish explorer Cortez claimed to have witnessed

450
00:20:14,600 --> 00:20:17,320
Speaker 1: Montezuma consuming more than fifty cups of chocolate in a

451
00:20:17,359 --> 00:20:21,280
Speaker 1: single day. I should mention, though, that some researchers think

452
00:20:21,359 --> 00:20:22,720
Speaker 1: Cortez was exaggerating.

453
00:20:23,200 --> 00:20:25,679
Speaker 2: All right, So just as a reminder, we remember that

454
00:20:25,720 --> 00:20:28,639
Speaker 2: Cortes was the conquista or who conquered the Aztec. So

455
00:20:29,119 --> 00:20:31,320
Speaker 2: was he the first to bring chocolate back to Europe?

456
00:20:31,800 --> 00:20:34,000
Speaker 1: Yeah, so this is fuzzy too, just like with the

457
00:20:34,040 --> 00:20:36,320
Speaker 1: Olmex and the shoe are It kind of depends on

458
00:20:36,359 --> 00:20:39,800
Speaker 1: who you ask. So some historians claim Christopher Columbus was

459
00:20:39,840 --> 00:20:42,720
Speaker 1: responsible for it. I'll say it was Cortes who returned

460
00:20:42,760 --> 00:20:45,879
Speaker 1: to Spain bearing cacao and also the chocolate making apparatus

461
00:20:45,880 --> 00:20:49,600
Speaker 1: from Montezuma's court. And whether or not Cortez was the first,

462
00:20:49,920 --> 00:20:52,919
Speaker 1: he was definitely obsessed with this concoction. So in a

463
00:20:53,000 --> 00:20:55,800
Speaker 1: letter to King Carlos the First of Spain in fifteen nineteen,

464
00:20:56,040 --> 00:20:59,280
Speaker 1: Cortez wrote, the divine drink which builds up resistance and

465
00:20:59,320 --> 00:21:02,359
Speaker 1: fights fatigue. A cop of this precious drink permits a

466
00:21:02,359 --> 00:21:04,439
Speaker 1: man to walk for a whole day without food.

467
00:21:05,280 --> 00:21:07,200
Speaker 2: I mean he might have oversold it. Just the tad

468
00:21:07,560 --> 00:21:09,960
Speaker 2: chumming chocolate is really good but all right, so it

469
00:21:10,040 --> 00:21:12,280
Speaker 2: might have been Columbus, or it might have been Cortes,

470
00:21:12,359 --> 00:21:14,720
Speaker 2: but either way, it sounds like Spain was definitely the

471
00:21:14,760 --> 00:21:17,720
Speaker 2: first in Europe to experience chocolate though right, yeah, I.

472
00:21:17,640 --> 00:21:19,720
Speaker 1: Mean that seems pretty clear. And there's even a third

473
00:21:19,800 --> 00:21:22,639
Speaker 1: version of the story that attributes chocolate's European introduction to

474
00:21:22,640 --> 00:21:26,479
Speaker 1: the Spanish, albeit to clergymen rather than conquistadors. So this

475
00:21:26,520 --> 00:21:29,000
Speaker 1: is according to the True History of Chocolate by Sophie

476
00:21:29,000 --> 00:21:31,800
Speaker 1: and Michael co and they say it was a Spanish

477
00:21:31,840 --> 00:21:34,679
Speaker 1: friar who brought cacao beans as a gift. Apparently he

478
00:21:34,720 --> 00:21:37,200
Speaker 1: did this while introducing minds to the core to Philip

479
00:21:37,240 --> 00:21:40,040
Speaker 1: the Second. But no matter how chocolate made its way

480
00:21:40,080 --> 00:21:42,879
Speaker 1: to Spain, it quickly caught on all over Europe, and

481
00:21:43,000 --> 00:21:46,240
Speaker 1: of course European palates weren't accustomed to that bitter, spicy

482
00:21:46,280 --> 00:21:48,959
Speaker 1: brew enjoyed by the Aztecs, so they started making their

483
00:21:49,000 --> 00:21:52,040
Speaker 1: own version of hot chocolate with cane sugar and cinnamon

484
00:21:52,160 --> 00:21:55,880
Speaker 1: and other common spices, and by the sixteen fifties, these

485
00:21:55,920 --> 00:21:59,280
Speaker 1: super trendy chocolate houses popped up in London and Amsterdam

486
00:21:59,359 --> 00:22:02,480
Speaker 1: and even a few other cities, and it wasn't long

487
00:22:02,520 --> 00:22:04,760
Speaker 1: after that that chocolate actually made its way back across

488
00:22:04,800 --> 00:22:05,400
Speaker 1: the Pond.

489
00:22:05,160 --> 00:22:08,080
Speaker 2: To American colonies. Wait, did you say chocolate houses or

490
00:22:08,119 --> 00:22:09,360
Speaker 2: these like coffee houses or what.

491
00:22:09,480 --> 00:22:12,800
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly, they were kind of these posh establishments. But

492
00:22:13,280 --> 00:22:16,159
Speaker 1: drinking chocolate actually predates both coffee and tea as a

493
00:22:16,160 --> 00:22:19,800
Speaker 1: stimulant beverage in Europe. So it's actually more accurate to

494
00:22:19,800 --> 00:22:22,479
Speaker 1: say that coffee houses are like chocolate houses rather than

495
00:22:22,520 --> 00:22:23,280
Speaker 1: the other way around.

496
00:22:23,960 --> 00:22:26,200
Speaker 2: I mean, it's still crazy to you that drinking chocolate

497
00:22:26,280 --> 00:22:29,159
Speaker 2: was the norm for so long. Yeah, fairly.

498
00:22:29,200 --> 00:22:31,320
Speaker 1: The eating chocolate that we used to really didn't come

499
00:22:31,359 --> 00:22:34,919
Speaker 1: about until like the nineteenth century. That's when these British

500
00:22:35,000 --> 00:22:37,480
Speaker 1: chocolate tears frying sons hit upon the idea of adding

501
00:22:37,520 --> 00:22:39,680
Speaker 1: sugar and cocoa butter to make a paste that could

502
00:22:39,720 --> 00:22:41,680
Speaker 1: be molded into the world's first chocolate bar.

503
00:22:42,000 --> 00:22:44,240
Speaker 2: Well, you know, the addition of sugar and fat, whether

504
00:22:44,240 --> 00:22:46,439
Speaker 2: it was cocoa butter or milk. I mean, that was

505
00:22:46,480 --> 00:22:49,199
Speaker 2: definitely a turning point for chocolate, and I do want

506
00:22:49,240 --> 00:22:51,320
Speaker 2: to talk a little bit about why that is exactly,

507
00:22:51,520 --> 00:23:05,560
Speaker 2: But first let's take a quick break.

508
00:23:07,359 --> 00:23:09,679
Speaker 1: Okay, Well, so I feel like I might know the

509
00:23:09,720 --> 00:23:11,800
Speaker 1: answer to this one already. But why do you think

510
00:23:11,840 --> 00:23:14,080
Speaker 1: adding sugar and fat to chocolate is such a great idea?

511
00:23:14,920 --> 00:23:16,960
Speaker 2: I mean, in terms of taste, I think you could

512
00:23:16,960 --> 00:23:20,119
Speaker 2: pretty much ask anyone in the world why adding sugar

513
00:23:20,119 --> 00:23:22,679
Speaker 2: and fat might be good. So I think it helps

514
00:23:22,680 --> 00:23:24,879
Speaker 2: on the taste front, for sure. But sure the biggest

515
00:23:24,920 --> 00:23:27,040
Speaker 2: boon that sugar in fat gave to chocolate was actually

516
00:23:27,119 --> 00:23:29,879
Speaker 2: this added sensory quality, you know, being something that melts

517
00:23:29,880 --> 00:23:32,520
Speaker 2: in your mouth. I think it's actually pretty important.

518
00:23:32,520 --> 00:23:34,800
Speaker 1: And that's something that didn't happen until sugar and fat

519
00:23:34,800 --> 00:23:35,240
Speaker 1: were added.

520
00:23:35,359 --> 00:23:37,639
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right, So you know the old Eminem slogan

521
00:23:37,640 --> 00:23:39,639
Speaker 2: about melts in your mouth, not in your hand. But

522
00:23:39,960 --> 00:23:42,720
Speaker 2: we actually should be more impressed with what Eminem's pulled

523
00:23:42,760 --> 00:23:45,320
Speaker 2: off with that, because, as it turns out, getting chocolate

524
00:23:45,359 --> 00:23:47,720
Speaker 2: to melt where and when you want it is not

525
00:23:47,880 --> 00:23:49,000
Speaker 2: at all an easy task.

526
00:23:49,359 --> 00:23:50,040
Speaker 1: So why is that?

527
00:23:50,720 --> 00:23:53,719
Speaker 2: Well, because cocoa butter contains fatty triglycerized and they can

528
00:23:53,840 --> 00:23:57,200
Speaker 2: arrange themselves in six different ways, and each of those

529
00:23:57,200 --> 00:24:00,920
Speaker 2: combinations results in its own unique melting point. But here's

530
00:24:00,920 --> 00:24:03,640
Speaker 2: the cash to that, there's only one of those arrangements

531
00:24:03,680 --> 00:24:06,240
Speaker 2: that actually has the proper melting point to melt in

532
00:24:06,240 --> 00:24:08,000
Speaker 2: your mouth, but not outside it.

533
00:24:09,080 --> 00:24:11,159
Speaker 1: So how do you get to the ideal melting point.

534
00:24:11,320 --> 00:24:14,040
Speaker 2: Well, the trick is to nail that ratio between milk

535
00:24:14,080 --> 00:24:17,040
Speaker 2: fat and cocoa. So, for example, you know, dark chocolate

536
00:24:17,080 --> 00:24:20,160
Speaker 2: has this higher percentage of cocoa and proportion to milk fat,

537
00:24:20,240 --> 00:24:23,600
Speaker 2: and that gives it a higher melting point. But milk chocolate,

538
00:24:23,680 --> 00:24:25,600
Speaker 2: on the other end, has much less cocoa than it

539
00:24:25,640 --> 00:24:28,080
Speaker 2: does milk fat, which that's why it'll melt in your

540
00:24:28,080 --> 00:24:29,919
Speaker 2: hand if you don't eat it quickly enough, which is

541
00:24:29,920 --> 00:24:31,920
Speaker 2: why I tend to just shovel it into my mouth.

542
00:24:32,480 --> 00:24:34,840
Speaker 2: But the thing is, even for a talented chocolate tear,

543
00:24:35,160 --> 00:24:38,320
Speaker 2: it's actually pretty difficult to get those fatty triglycerites to

544
00:24:38,359 --> 00:24:41,439
Speaker 2: crystallize just the way you want them to, and so

545
00:24:41,480 --> 00:24:43,600
Speaker 2: it takes a lot of patience, takes a lot of skill,

546
00:24:43,640 --> 00:24:47,080
Speaker 2: you know, to perfectly control the chocolates temperature during this

547
00:24:47,119 --> 00:24:50,000
Speaker 2: whole tempering process, you know, just so you don't throw

548
00:24:50,040 --> 00:24:52,720
Speaker 2: your proportions out of whack in the process of doing this.

549
00:24:53,440 --> 00:24:55,680
Speaker 1: You know, what's funny is that, I mean, I love

550
00:24:55,720 --> 00:24:58,000
Speaker 1: that there's an art taking chocolate and how it melts.

551
00:24:58,080 --> 00:25:00,240
Speaker 1: But I met this editor a long time ago, really

552
00:25:00,280 --> 00:25:02,280
Speaker 1: good book editor, and I was asking him how he

553
00:25:02,280 --> 00:25:04,480
Speaker 1: got into the business, and he said he really wanted

554
00:25:04,480 --> 00:25:07,119
Speaker 1: to be a chocolate maker. But so he went to

555
00:25:07,240 --> 00:25:10,719
Speaker 1: like this famous chocolate maker in town and Vermont or something,

556
00:25:10,800 --> 00:25:13,359
Speaker 1: and he shook hands with a lady and she said,

557
00:25:13,760 --> 00:25:15,439
Speaker 1: your hands are too warm. You'll never be good at this.

558
00:25:15,520 --> 00:25:17,960
Speaker 1: Oh wow, crazy, And you walk across the street to

559
00:25:18,000 --> 00:25:19,000
Speaker 1: a bookstore. And that's how I got.

560
00:25:18,960 --> 00:25:22,200
Speaker 2: Into Yeah, like, you're not tall enough to be a quarterback, but.

561
00:25:22,200 --> 00:25:24,480
Speaker 1: I mean I get why it's worth the effort, Like,

562
00:25:24,680 --> 00:25:27,080
Speaker 1: you know, making this creamy piece of chocolate that melts

563
00:25:27,119 --> 00:25:30,000
Speaker 1: away and coats your tongue. That's a fantastic feeling.

564
00:25:29,800 --> 00:25:31,879
Speaker 2: It really is. In fact, I was reading about this

565
00:25:31,920 --> 00:25:34,360
Speaker 2: study from a group called mind Lab, and they tried

566
00:25:34,400 --> 00:25:37,959
Speaker 2: to determine just how important that melting sensation is in

567
00:25:38,119 --> 00:25:41,320
Speaker 2: our enjoyment of chocolate. So the researchers gathered a bunch

568
00:25:41,359 --> 00:25:44,360
Speaker 2: of volunteer couples in their twenties. They monitored their heart

569
00:25:44,440 --> 00:25:47,520
Speaker 2: rates and brain activity while they first melted chocolate in

570
00:25:47,560 --> 00:25:50,440
Speaker 2: their mouths, and then again while they were kissing each other.

571
00:25:51,160 --> 00:25:53,080
Speaker 1: That's pretty great. So all these couples are just like

572
00:25:53,160 --> 00:25:55,920
Speaker 1: standing around the lab eating chocolate and then making out

573
00:25:56,280 --> 00:25:58,960
Speaker 1: while wearing heart markers and things strapped to their heads.

574
00:25:58,760 --> 00:26:00,840
Speaker 2: I guess, and they were proud, probably paid to do

575
00:26:00,920 --> 00:26:03,080
Speaker 2: this as well. I guess. Sounds like not a bad gig.

576
00:26:03,119 --> 00:26:05,640
Speaker 2: But the crazy thing they discovered was that the melting

577
00:26:05,720 --> 00:26:08,760
Speaker 2: chocolate caused a more intense reaction than the kissing did.

578
00:26:09,280 --> 00:26:11,680
Speaker 2: And I mean, the kissing did cause the volunteer's heart

579
00:26:11,840 --> 00:26:14,640
Speaker 2: to race, and I guess that's good for their relationships,

580
00:26:14,640 --> 00:26:17,160
Speaker 2: but you know, the chocolate made the effect last four

581
00:26:17,280 --> 00:26:21,280
Speaker 2: times longer. It actually more than double volunteers resting heart

582
00:26:21,359 --> 00:26:24,240
Speaker 2: rates from about sixty beats per minute to one hundred

583
00:26:24,280 --> 00:26:26,760
Speaker 2: and forty. And the same kind of thing happened in

584
00:26:26,800 --> 00:26:29,560
Speaker 2: the brain as well. So once this chocolate started to melt,

585
00:26:29,960 --> 00:26:32,400
Speaker 2: the pleasure centers in the brain lit up more strongly

586
00:26:32,440 --> 00:26:34,919
Speaker 2: and for a longer period than they did during the kissing.

587
00:26:35,280 --> 00:26:37,560
Speaker 1: That's pretty nuts, and it kind of makes me think

588
00:26:37,600 --> 00:26:40,000
Speaker 1: of how it chocolate has his reputation as an aphrodisiac,

589
00:26:40,080 --> 00:26:43,520
Speaker 1: and how it's so strongly associated with love Valentine's Day.

590
00:26:44,040 --> 00:26:46,360
Speaker 1: It almost seems like that mouthfeel could be a big

591
00:26:46,400 --> 00:26:47,040
Speaker 1: reason why.

592
00:26:47,240 --> 00:26:49,359
Speaker 2: Oh, it definitely is. And I was reading up on

593
00:26:49,400 --> 00:26:51,359
Speaker 2: this a little and it turns out that we actually

594
00:26:51,440 --> 00:26:55,000
Speaker 2: have special touch receptors on our tongues and they respond

595
00:26:55,040 --> 00:26:57,800
Speaker 2: to this change in texture of a melting piece of chocolate.

596
00:26:58,280 --> 00:27:01,080
Speaker 2: So once our tongues detect this melt, we have these

597
00:27:01,119 --> 00:27:03,679
Speaker 2: receptors that send the message to the brain and that

598
00:27:03,840 --> 00:27:07,439
Speaker 2: stimulates these feelings of pleasure. And the smell of chocolate

599
00:27:07,480 --> 00:27:10,000
Speaker 2: has a similar effect, right, Yeah, that's right. And cacal

600
00:27:10,080 --> 00:27:13,760
Speaker 2: beans are roasted and fermented during chocolate production, and these

601
00:27:13,800 --> 00:27:17,000
Speaker 2: processes cause chemical changes in the beans which ensure the

602
00:27:17,080 --> 00:27:20,720
Speaker 2: chocolate has its own distinct aroma. There's actually over six

603
00:27:20,800 --> 00:27:24,119
Speaker 2: hundred flavor compounds produced at all, and they include everything

604
00:27:24,119 --> 00:27:27,760
Speaker 2: from overcooked cabbage to human sweat to rob be fat,

605
00:27:28,000 --> 00:27:28,880
Speaker 2: this all making one.

606
00:27:28,800 --> 00:27:30,040
Speaker 1: Hundred mouths water.

607
00:27:30,119 --> 00:27:30,520
Speaker 3: That's right.

608
00:27:31,080 --> 00:27:33,440
Speaker 2: And you know, of course, none of these compounds smell

609
00:27:33,560 --> 00:27:37,040
Speaker 2: anything close to chocolate on their own, thankfully, but they're

610
00:27:37,119 --> 00:27:40,439
Speaker 2: unmistakable when joined together. It's such a strange thing, But

611
00:27:41,080 --> 00:27:43,120
Speaker 2: in fact, these studies have shown that even just smelling

612
00:27:43,200 --> 00:27:46,080
Speaker 2: chocolate stimulates the emotional what you would call feel good

613
00:27:46,160 --> 00:27:47,080
Speaker 2: centers of the brain.

614
00:27:47,720 --> 00:27:49,560
Speaker 1: Well, I know we talked earlier about some of the

615
00:27:49,600 --> 00:27:52,800
Speaker 1: mood altering chemicals that chocolate contains, but you're actually saying

616
00:27:52,840 --> 00:27:55,960
Speaker 1: that your brain lights up from just the smell alone.

617
00:27:56,359 --> 00:27:59,320
Speaker 2: Yeah, So the mood enhancing substances we mentioned are only

618
00:27:59,359 --> 00:28:02,200
Speaker 2: found in trace somemounts in chocolate, so you're not really

619
00:28:02,200 --> 00:28:04,159
Speaker 2: gonna feel much of an effect from them unless you

620
00:28:04,160 --> 00:28:07,360
Speaker 2: eat way more chocolate than you probably should. But what's

621
00:28:07,359 --> 00:28:10,119
Speaker 2: going on a smell is it's a little bit more psychological,

622
00:28:10,560 --> 00:28:14,000
Speaker 2: and chocolate has this uniquely pleasurable smell and taste and

623
00:28:14,080 --> 00:28:16,480
Speaker 2: texture to humans. So you know, if we detect any

624
00:28:16,520 --> 00:28:19,320
Speaker 2: of those sensations, we actually just get excited because we

625
00:28:19,320 --> 00:28:21,000
Speaker 2: know we're about to eat some chocolate.

626
00:28:21,720 --> 00:28:23,280
Speaker 1: Yeah, And it kind of makes you wonder if the

627
00:28:23,320 --> 00:28:26,359
Speaker 1: whole idea of chocolate as an afrodisiac is also just

628
00:28:26,400 --> 00:28:28,840
Speaker 1: in our heads. Like, we live in a world where

629
00:28:28,920 --> 00:28:32,359
Speaker 1: chocolate hearts are already symbols of affection and where chocolate

630
00:28:32,400 --> 00:28:35,919
Speaker 1: has been viewed as decadend or indulgent for almost hundreds

631
00:28:35,960 --> 00:28:39,080
Speaker 1: of years now, So whether or not chocolate spurs these

632
00:28:39,160 --> 00:28:42,040
Speaker 1: romantic feelings, we've all kind of been conditioned to make

633
00:28:42,080 --> 00:28:43,240
Speaker 1: these connections ourselves.

634
00:28:43,480 --> 00:28:45,479
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's right. And you know, for example,

635
00:28:45,480 --> 00:28:48,240
Speaker 2: you mentioned Mona Zoomer earlier, and that story I always

636
00:28:48,280 --> 00:28:51,160
Speaker 2: remember about him is that he supposedly downed a bunch

637
00:28:51,200 --> 00:28:54,240
Speaker 2: of drinking chocolate just before visiting his hairm at night.

638
00:28:54,640 --> 00:28:56,800
Speaker 2: And you know, along with this story spread this idea

639
00:28:56,840 --> 00:29:00,160
Speaker 2: that a daily dose of chocolate could enhance virility. But

640
00:29:00,440 --> 00:29:02,040
Speaker 2: you've got to remember, this is the guy who reportedly

641
00:29:02,080 --> 00:29:04,720
Speaker 2: drank what did you say, fifty cups of chocolate every

642
00:29:04,760 --> 00:29:08,800
Speaker 2: single day, So drink it before bed was probably just coincidence, right?

643
00:29:09,000 --> 00:29:09,920
Speaker 2: Or have it right?

644
00:29:11,240 --> 00:29:14,320
Speaker 1: So let me just recap things a little bit. Chocolate

645
00:29:14,320 --> 00:29:17,440
Speaker 1: contains psychoactive chemicals, but not enough to have more than

646
00:29:17,520 --> 00:29:21,480
Speaker 1: a slight effect on our senses. Its reputation as afrodijiak

647
00:29:21,600 --> 00:29:24,560
Speaker 1: is way overflown and mostly due to sort of this

648
00:29:24,680 --> 00:29:29,560
Speaker 1: widespread placebo effect. And while it does have a unique smell, taste,

649
00:29:29,600 --> 00:29:32,080
Speaker 1: and texture, we don't really know why the majority of

650
00:29:32,120 --> 00:29:34,600
Speaker 1: humans respond as strongly to these qualities as we do.

651
00:29:35,080 --> 00:29:38,160
Speaker 1: So I guess I'm wondering, like where does that leave us?

652
00:29:38,200 --> 00:29:38,280
Speaker 3: Like?

653
00:29:38,440 --> 00:29:41,280
Speaker 1: Is there an answer for why we love chocolate so much?

654
00:29:41,440 --> 00:29:43,840
Speaker 1: Because somehow it tastes good isn't good enough?

655
00:29:44,480 --> 00:29:47,400
Speaker 2: Well, I was reading this interesting BBC News article by

656
00:29:47,440 --> 00:29:50,040
Speaker 2: a doctor's name is Michael Moseley, and so he's a

657
00:29:50,080 --> 00:29:52,160
Speaker 2: TV journalist and he's worked on a bunch of different

658
00:29:52,200 --> 00:29:55,040
Speaker 2: science programs, and there's one called The Secrets of Your

659
00:29:55,080 --> 00:29:57,280
Speaker 2: Food and it sounds like a pretty interesting show. But

660
00:29:57,840 --> 00:30:00,240
Speaker 2: his idea for the unique appeal of chocolate goes back

661
00:30:00,280 --> 00:30:03,160
Speaker 2: to that all important addition of sugar and fat that

662
00:30:03,200 --> 00:30:06,760
Speaker 2: we talked about earlier, namely, that chocolate contains a combination

663
00:30:06,840 --> 00:30:10,560
Speaker 2: of sugar and fat that you rarely find in nature. Now, separately,

664
00:30:10,600 --> 00:30:12,600
Speaker 2: we obviously know that there are plenty of fruits that

665
00:30:12,640 --> 00:30:15,920
Speaker 2: contain natural sugars, and then you've got nuts and fish,

666
00:30:15,960 --> 00:30:18,560
Speaker 2: which are chok full of fat. But both of these

667
00:30:18,600 --> 00:30:21,600
Speaker 2: together is a pretty rare thing. And in fact, one

668
00:30:21,600 --> 00:30:24,040
Speaker 2: of the few natural sources where you'll find high levels

669
00:30:24,040 --> 00:30:27,880
Speaker 2: of both sugar and fat is in milk. But even then,

670
00:30:27,960 --> 00:30:30,920
Speaker 2: chocolate generally has a fat to sugar ratio of about

671
00:30:30,960 --> 00:30:34,240
Speaker 2: one to two, which is higher than almost any kinds

672
00:30:34,240 --> 00:30:37,680
Speaker 2: of milk except for one, and that's human breast milk.

673
00:30:37,840 --> 00:30:38,040
Speaker 1: Huh.

674
00:30:38,120 --> 00:30:40,480
Speaker 2: So, doctor Moseley talks about this. He explains that human

675
00:30:40,520 --> 00:30:44,400
Speaker 2: breast milk is particularly rich in natural sugars, mainly lactose.

676
00:30:44,920 --> 00:30:47,440
Speaker 2: Roughly four percent of human breast milk is fat, while

677
00:30:47,480 --> 00:30:50,880
Speaker 2: about eight percent is made up of sugars. Formula milk,

678
00:30:50,920 --> 00:30:53,520
Speaker 2: which is fed to babies, contains a similar ratio of

679
00:30:53,520 --> 00:30:56,600
Speaker 2: fats to sugars. This ratio one gram of fat to

680
00:30:56,640 --> 00:30:59,360
Speaker 2: two grams of sugars. That's the same ratio of fats

681
00:30:59,360 --> 00:31:02,120
Speaker 2: to sugars that you find in milk, chocolate, and of

682
00:31:02,120 --> 00:31:04,960
Speaker 2: course in biscuits and doughnuts and ice cream. In fact,

683
00:31:04,960 --> 00:31:07,560
Speaker 2: this particular ratio is reflected in many of the foods

684
00:31:07,560 --> 00:31:09,200
Speaker 2: that we find hard to resist.

685
00:31:10,120 --> 00:31:12,320
Speaker 1: So the reason we love chocolate is because they're reminds

686
00:31:12,400 --> 00:31:16,080
Speaker 1: us of breast milk. I mean, that's more appropriate for

687
00:31:16,200 --> 00:31:18,480
Speaker 1: Mother's Day, right.

688
00:31:18,040 --> 00:31:20,080
Speaker 2: Well, that's the idea though, I mean that that humans

689
00:31:20,120 --> 00:31:23,360
Speaker 2: have a preference for the particular fat to carbohydrate balance

690
00:31:23,400 --> 00:31:25,520
Speaker 2: that we've been conditioned to like from the start of

691
00:31:25,560 --> 00:31:28,720
Speaker 2: our lives. And Mosley describes this chocolate obsession as an

692
00:31:28,720 --> 00:31:32,280
Speaker 2: effort to quote recapture the taste and sense of closeness

693
00:31:32,320 --> 00:31:34,840
Speaker 2: we got from the first food we ever sampled.

694
00:31:34,960 --> 00:31:38,400
Speaker 1: Well I definitely wasn't expecting that, but it does remind

695
00:31:38,400 --> 00:31:40,880
Speaker 1: me of this chocolate quote I read from this Portuguese

696
00:31:40,920 --> 00:31:45,160
Speaker 1: poet named Fernando Pesoa. So you know how metaphysics is

697
00:31:45,160 --> 00:31:48,120
Speaker 1: the branch of philosophy that deals with questions and about

698
00:31:48,200 --> 00:31:50,720
Speaker 1: really plowing existence and the first.

699
00:31:50,440 --> 00:31:51,400
Speaker 2: Causes and all that.

700
00:31:51,520 --> 00:31:56,280
Speaker 1: Right, So Pasoa said there's no metaphysics on Earth like chocolate,

701
00:31:56,880 --> 00:31:59,600
Speaker 1: and he's right. So, I mean, there's so much history

702
00:31:59,760 --> 00:32:02,480
Speaker 1: and lore and science wrapped up in chocolate that you

703
00:32:02,480 --> 00:32:04,880
Speaker 1: can almost never really get your head around it or

704
00:32:05,000 --> 00:32:07,000
Speaker 1: get to the beginning of it, and in the end,

705
00:32:07,160 --> 00:32:08,440
Speaker 1: it's probably just best to eat it.

706
00:32:08,640 --> 00:32:10,880
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well, I know Tristan agrees with that, because he's

707
00:32:10,880 --> 00:32:13,320
Speaker 2: eaten like forty five more pieces of this stuff since

708
00:32:13,320 --> 00:32:15,520
Speaker 2: the beginning of the episode. But all right, before we

709
00:32:15,600 --> 00:32:17,320
Speaker 2: let him finish the rest of that box off, why

710
00:32:17,320 --> 00:32:19,400
Speaker 2: don't we share a few more stories about chocolate in

711
00:32:19,480 --> 00:32:29,920
Speaker 2: today's backt off? All right, Well, I'll kick us off here,

712
00:32:29,960 --> 00:32:33,600
Speaker 2: so we know there's obviously brown chocolate and white chocolate,

713
00:32:33,640 --> 00:32:35,640
Speaker 2: which we weren't allowed to talk about today even though

714
00:32:35,640 --> 00:32:38,920
Speaker 2: I love because it's not technically chocolate. But the good

715
00:32:38,960 --> 00:32:41,560
Speaker 2: news is there will now soon be pink chocolate. And

716
00:32:41,600 --> 00:32:43,800
Speaker 2: this is because, as we may have talked about earlier,

717
00:32:44,000 --> 00:32:46,720
Speaker 2: you know, cocoa beans are actually kind of pinkish or

718
00:32:46,720 --> 00:32:50,440
Speaker 2: reddish in their natural state, and so it's taken about

719
00:32:50,480 --> 00:32:53,440
Speaker 2: a decade or so for food scientists in Switzerland to

720
00:32:53,840 --> 00:32:57,440
Speaker 2: figure this out. But soon we will actually have pink chocolate,

721
00:32:57,480 --> 00:33:00,600
Speaker 2: which will maintain that fruity or flavor, be a little sweet.

722
00:33:00,840 --> 00:33:02,000
Speaker 2: But I'm pretty eager to try some.

723
00:33:02,160 --> 00:33:05,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm excited about that. So I've got a different

724
00:33:05,520 --> 00:33:07,680
Speaker 1: type of good news. If you actually want to increase

725
00:33:07,680 --> 00:33:10,200
Speaker 1: your odds of winning a Nobel prize, you should eat

726
00:33:10,240 --> 00:33:10,920
Speaker 1: more chocolate.

727
00:33:11,440 --> 00:33:12,600
Speaker 2: So Tristan's in luck.

728
00:33:13,280 --> 00:33:15,120
Speaker 1: He's gonna have so many Nobells by the end of

729
00:33:15,160 --> 00:33:17,840
Speaker 1: this year. A few years ago, a survey was taken

730
00:33:17,880 --> 00:33:20,280
Speaker 1: of twenty three Nobel laureates during the time of their

731
00:33:20,320 --> 00:33:22,800
Speaker 1: prize winning work, and it found that forty three percent

732
00:33:22,840 --> 00:33:25,680
Speaker 1: of those reported eating chocolate at least twice a week,

733
00:33:26,200 --> 00:33:28,320
Speaker 1: and that was higher than the twenty five percent of

734
00:33:28,320 --> 00:33:30,920
Speaker 1: people who were at a similar age and education level

735
00:33:30,920 --> 00:33:33,880
Speaker 1: but who had not won a Nobel. Wow. So this

736
00:33:34,000 --> 00:33:37,360
Speaker 1: really scientifically solid finding also came after a correlation that

737
00:33:37,400 --> 00:33:40,360
Speaker 1: was found between national chocolate consumption and the rate of

738
00:33:40,360 --> 00:33:43,400
Speaker 1: Nobel prizes. I mean, that seems like pretty solid science

739
00:33:43,440 --> 00:33:43,600
Speaker 1: to me.

740
00:33:43,680 --> 00:33:45,280
Speaker 2: What do you think? Yeah, I mean, let's just forget

741
00:33:45,280 --> 00:33:48,200
Speaker 2: that whole correlation causation thing and just go with it.

742
00:33:48,240 --> 00:33:50,440
Speaker 2: That's that's some good science there. That is pretty funny though,

743
00:33:50,480 --> 00:33:54,080
Speaker 2: that forty three percent of those Nobel winners were eating chocolate.

744
00:33:54,080 --> 00:33:57,000
Speaker 2: What did you say, twice a week? Okay, that's still

745
00:33:57,040 --> 00:33:59,680
Speaker 2: that's still pretty big. All right. Well, how weird is

746
00:33:59,680 --> 00:34:03,000
Speaker 2: it that Quaker Oats finance the production of Willy Wonka

747
00:34:03,080 --> 00:34:05,640
Speaker 2: and the Chocolate Factory. Did you know about that? And

748
00:34:05,680 --> 00:34:08,160
Speaker 2: that's actually why the name was changed from Charlie and

749
00:34:08,200 --> 00:34:10,880
Speaker 2: the Chocolate Factory to Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

750
00:34:10,880 --> 00:34:12,919
Speaker 2: for the movie, And that's because they wanted to push

751
00:34:12,960 --> 00:34:17,320
Speaker 2: their new Wonka candies and specifically the Wonka Bar. Now, weirdly,

752
00:34:17,360 --> 00:34:19,359
Speaker 2: they couldn't seem to get the formula for the bar

753
00:34:19,560 --> 00:34:21,880
Speaker 2: just right, so they actually didn't even release a Wanka

754
00:34:21,920 --> 00:34:25,000
Speaker 2: Bar for a few years after the film. But the

755
00:34:25,000 --> 00:34:28,040
Speaker 2: film did help launch several other of their popular candies,

756
00:34:28,080 --> 00:34:30,320
Speaker 2: and thankfully it's still a pretty great movie.

757
00:34:30,440 --> 00:34:33,800
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I think We've talked about this German chemist

758
00:34:33,840 --> 00:34:36,000
Speaker 1: who made those fart pills that make your tooth smell

759
00:34:36,040 --> 00:34:39,279
Speaker 1: like chocolate, right, But I don't know why chocolate is

760
00:34:39,280 --> 00:34:41,480
Speaker 1: always the go to answer for this type of thing.

761
00:34:41,600 --> 00:34:44,520
Speaker 1: But this is like that story on steroids. So in

762
00:34:44,800 --> 00:34:48,960
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen, Japan sewage companies used a chocolate oil to

763
00:34:49,040 --> 00:34:52,480
Speaker 1: mass the scent of their sewage trucks, which I guess

764
00:34:52,560 --> 00:34:54,239
Speaker 1: you know, you'd have your kids running to meet the

765
00:34:54,280 --> 00:34:56,359
Speaker 1: chocolate truck and suddenly they.

766
00:34:58,000 --> 00:35:00,000
Speaker 2: That seems like I would ruin the taste for chocolate.

767
00:35:00,200 --> 00:35:03,240
Speaker 2: So they're smelling chocolate in the air and that's the sewage.

768
00:35:03,520 --> 00:35:05,680
Speaker 1: Yeah it well, it covers up the sewage.

769
00:35:05,760 --> 00:35:09,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, crazy. Wow, that's pretty interesting. All right. Well,

770
00:35:09,120 --> 00:35:11,720
Speaker 2: my kids were asking not too long ago why dogs

771
00:35:11,760 --> 00:35:15,200
Speaker 2: can't eat chocolate, and that's because chocolate contains this chemical

772
00:35:15,200 --> 00:35:18,040
Speaker 2: that we actually talked about earlier, theobromine, which is a

773
00:35:18,080 --> 00:35:21,120
Speaker 2: little bit like caffeine, and it's actually toxic to both

774
00:35:21,239 --> 00:35:24,280
Speaker 2: dogs and cats. And so this is the main reason,

775
00:35:24,520 --> 00:35:27,000
Speaker 2: and that's because their bodies aren't able to metabolize the

776
00:35:27,040 --> 00:35:29,839
Speaker 2: chemical at the same rate that we can. So if

777
00:35:29,840 --> 00:35:32,320
Speaker 2: they have a little too much chocolate. It just causes

778
00:35:32,360 --> 00:35:34,759
Speaker 2: them to get sick or very sick. But if they

779
00:35:34,800 --> 00:35:37,760
Speaker 2: have high doses of theobromine, it can actually have tragic

780
00:35:37,800 --> 00:35:38,640
Speaker 2: results as we know.

781
00:35:39,200 --> 00:35:41,360
Speaker 1: Man, well, I feel like we need to bring this

782
00:35:41,440 --> 00:35:43,880
Speaker 1: back to a slightly happier note. So did you know

783
00:35:43,920 --> 00:35:46,800
Speaker 1: that Ruth Wakefield, the inventor of the chocolate chip cookies,

784
00:35:46,880 --> 00:35:49,600
Speaker 1: sold her cookie idea to Neslie Tolehouse and you know

785
00:35:49,640 --> 00:35:53,120
Speaker 1: how she was compensated with a lifetime supply of chocolate.

786
00:35:53,239 --> 00:35:56,480
Speaker 2: No way, Again, it's still so weird to me to

787
00:35:56,480 --> 00:35:58,840
Speaker 2: think of somebody like as the inventor of the chocolate

788
00:35:58,960 --> 00:36:01,880
Speaker 2: chip cookiels like that stuff that should have just always

789
00:36:01,880 --> 00:36:02,239
Speaker 2: been there.

790
00:36:02,239 --> 00:36:03,680
Speaker 1: Pray that in for so many turkeys.

791
00:36:03,800 --> 00:36:07,320
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I have to say that is a great

792
00:36:07,400 --> 00:36:11,240
Speaker 2: fact and worthy of today's Fact Off Trophy. So congratulations, mana.

793
00:36:11,040 --> 00:36:11,839
Speaker 1: Thank you so much.

794
00:36:12,120 --> 00:36:14,399
Speaker 2: Thank you guys for listening. If we've forgotten any great

795
00:36:14,440 --> 00:36:16,440
Speaker 2: chocolate facts, we would love to hear from you, guys,

796
00:36:16,480 --> 00:36:19,080
Speaker 2: you can always email us part time genius at HowStuffWorks

797
00:36:19,080 --> 00:36:21,160
Speaker 2: dot com or call us on our twenty four to

798
00:36:21,200 --> 00:36:24,520
Speaker 2: seven fact hotline. That's one eight four four pt genius.

799
00:36:24,680 --> 00:36:27,240
Speaker 2: We've gotten so many great comments on Facebook and Twitter,

800
00:36:27,280 --> 00:36:29,279
Speaker 2: so you can always hit us up there. But thanks

801
00:36:29,320 --> 00:36:45,080
Speaker 2: so much for listening. Thanks again for listening. Part Time

802
00:36:45,120 --> 00:36:47,320
Speaker 2: Genius is a production of how stuff works and wouldn't

803
00:36:47,320 --> 00:36:50,120
Speaker 2: be possible without several brilliant people who do the important

804
00:36:50,120 --> 00:36:52,080
Speaker 2: things we couldn't even begin to understand.

805
00:36:52,320 --> 00:36:53,920
Speaker 4: Tristan McNeil does the editing thing.

806
00:36:54,160 --> 00:36:56,160
Speaker 2: Noel Brown made the theme song and does the mixy

807
00:36:56,200 --> 00:36:56,960
Speaker 2: mixy sound thing.

808
00:36:57,520 --> 00:36:59,560
Speaker 4: Harry Rowland does the exact producer thing.

809
00:37:00,000 --> 00:37:02,239
Speaker 2: Abe Lozier is our lead researcher, with support from the

810
00:37:02,280 --> 00:37:05,680
Speaker 2: Research Army including Austin Thompson, Nolan Brown and Lucas Adams.

811
00:37:05,719 --> 00:37:08,000
Speaker 4: If Jeff go gets the show to your ears, good.

812
00:37:07,920 --> 00:37:08,480
Speaker 1: Job, Eves.

813
00:37:08,640 --> 00:37:10,520
Speaker 2: If you like what you heard, we hope you'll subscribe,

814
00:37:10,560 --> 00:37:12,399
Speaker 2: And if you really really like what you've heard, maybe

815
00:37:12,440 --> 00:37:16,200
Speaker 2: you could leave a good review for us. Jason who