The Chocolate Tree :: Botany

The Chocolate TreeFossil records are unable to provide nurture of on the center of origins of the chocolate head guide. The cacao tree is in the sterculia family family. The first growers of the cacao pods were probably the people who entered the lowland rain forests of the virago Basin between 10,000 and 200 B.P. The full name of the cacao tree is Theobroma cacao. Most of the information of the cacao have been derived from the cultivated crop. The sprightliness and reproduction life cycle of Theobroma cacao is identical to a tropical rain forest tree species. Cacao grows optimally in minimal moisture and shade. Cacao is dispersed in small, medium and huge areas. This is probably the result of animal dropping the spills after eating the ambrosial inside of the pods. Cacao pods are very diverse in morphology. These structural difference suggests genetic differentiation.The Amazon region is considered the birthplace of the wild cacao tree. T. cacao appeared with the arrival o f human species in South American. It have been suggested that T. cacao is the result of a cross between T. pentagona and T. leiocarpa. Cacao was not been selected for its seeds, merely instead for the pulp surrounding them. Selection for the seeds begin in Mesoamerica. The seed pulp was used as a beverage. Cacao cultivation by the Indians, notably the Aztecs of Mexico and Mayas in Central America was established before the impudently World was discovered. The next question would have to be how did the cacao tree cross the sea. Christopher Columbus brought a cacao beans back to Europe from the disconnect of Honduras. This cargo of cacao beans were the first specimens to enter Europe. The Aztecs settled in Mexico dickens hundred years before Cortes conquest of Mexico.When the Spaniards invaded the palaces of Montezuma they found a too large number of cacao beans. The cacao beans were used in a confuse called chocolatl. The was typically the drink for the most elite in the societ y. This is the treatment that was make on the cacao prior to storage. Sun dried beans that had been roast in pots. The husk were removed, the nibs were placed on flat or concave stone, thus ground and shaped with a roller. The fluid mass is then tangled with corn and spices and made into measures. The chocolatl drink is made from a piece of the cake mixed with water and mixed with a molinet.