Consumption of Cocoa Powder

Consumption has increased more than tenfold since the turn of the twentieth century, commercial cacao cultivation having spread around the world in a belt within twenty degrees of the equator and the varieties of chocolate flavored confections having proliferated worldly.

The cocoa powder is made into a drink and can be added to milk, cakes and ice cream. The beans contain the stimulant alkaloid, theobromine (about 2.5 percent) and about 0.8 percent caffeine, but these quantities are reduced after processing.

Confections such as nougats, pastes and pralines often use coca as a flavoring material.

Cocoa differs from the other common beverages (coffee and tea) in that it has a marked nutritional composition, for example cocoa powder contains about 25 percent fat (saturated), 16 percent protein and 12 percent carbohydrate (about half are sugars).

Natural cocoa powder also known as non-alkalized cocoa powder is the classics American cocoa used of making chocolate cakes and brownies.
Consumption of Cocoa Powder

Cocoa Powder Properties

The word cacao comes from the word kakawa from language of the Olmecs people and was already used around 1000 BC.

Cacao is deliciously rich and bitter. Raw cacao beans can be ground and used in lieu of cocoa powder or chocolate.

Cocoa powder is a valuable flavoring material in baked goods and desserts as well as the basis of hot chocolate drinks. It is made from fermented , roasted and ground cacao beans.

Like chocolate, cocoa powder is made from cocoa beans that have processed into a paste known as chocolate liquor. Using a hydraulic press, produces remove between 50 and 75 percent of the cocoa butter from the chocolate liquor and then pulverize the remaining solids to make cocoa.

The commercial powder varies in color and flavor, dependent upon the quality the beans used, the degree of roasting and precise method.

The good quality cocoa powder has the following characteristics:
*PH: 5.6 to 7,.1 dependent upon whether or not the cocoa beans were processed with alkali.
*Fat: about 24% and not less than 22%
*Moisture: 3-4%

After preliminary treatments such as fermentation process described and drying, beans ready for further processing are composed of 87% cotyledon containing only 4-5% water, 12% shell containing 8-10% water and 1 % germ.
Cocoa Powder Properties