Billet, Felisa (October 23, 2009). "Warming up to real hot chocolate". USA TODAY . Retrieved December 20, 2009. Poncelin, Pamela. "Culinary Ambassadors: Breakfast in France". Serious Eats . Retrieved July 10, 2017. The flavonoids found in the cocoa that makes up hot chocolate also have a positive effect on arterial health. A particular study performed by the National Institutes of Health partially supported by Mars Chocolate company showed high amounts of improvement in blood flow after drinking a flavanol-rich cocoa drink. [45] In the study, the subjects (27 people ages 18 to 72) drank a cocoa drink containing 900 milligrams of flavonols every day, which resulted in an improvement in blood flow and the function of endothelial cells that line blood vessels. [45] Bakshani, Nikkitha (March 4, 2015). "Colombian Hot Chocolate: Just Add Cheese". The Daily Meal . Retrieved July 9, 2017. a b Moncayo, Jennifer (January 28, 2013). "Mexican Chocolate: A Short History & Recipe". The Latin Kitchen . Retrieved July 15, 2017.

The Fairtrade Foundation assures farmers of a guaranteed minimum price for their cocoa beans, to ensure all costs of production are covered. The first chocolate drink is believed to have been created by the Maya around 2,500–3,000 years ago, and a cocoa drink was an essential part of Aztec culture by 1400AD, by which they referred to as xocōlātl. [2] The drink became popular in Europe after being introduced from Mexico in the New World and has undergone multiple changes since then. Until the 19th century, hot chocolate was used medicinally to treat ailments such as liver and stomach diseases. The margins on the crop are tiny, and most of West Africa’s 2.5 million smallholder cocoa farmers live in abject poverty, meaning they are often unable to put food on the table or buy medicine, according to the Fairtrade Foundation. Cuestión moral: si el chocolate quebranta el ayuno eclesiástico ( Whether chocolate breaks ecclesiastical fast: a moral question)Pearce, David (2008). "Cacao and Chocolate Timeline". David Pearce. Archived from the original on February 19, 2005 . Retrieved June 27, 2008. In Mexico, hot chocolate remains a popular national drink, often including semi-sweet chocolate, cinnamon, sugar, and vanilla. [35] Hot chocolate of this type is commonly sold in circular or hexagonal tablets [35] which can be dissolved into hot milk, water, or cream, and then blended until the mixture develops a creamy froth. A 1942 article in the Chicago Tribune describes Mexican cinnamon hot chocolate as being traditionally served alongside a variety of sweet Mexican pastries, [36] such as pan dulce or churros. This means that farmers are not benefiting from the price of the entire product, as consumers would think they are. Chocolate History". Middleborough Public Schools. 2008. Archived from the original on July 2, 2008 . Retrieved June 26, 2008. A great first step when figuring out if your chocolate was ethically produced is to see if it's fair-trade. Fair trade chocolate is produced in a way that adheres to certain ethical standards. Fair trade is a safeguard against exploitation and child labor. It guarantees that farmers are paid a fair and living wage, regardless of the market price of cocoa. Farmers are also given higher wages if they produce organic chocolate and an additional premium wage to reinvest in their business.

Sciscenti, Mark J. (February 7, 2015). "Why We Drink Hot Chocolate in the Winter". The Guardian . Retrieved February 17, 2015. Baggott, MJ; Childs, E; Hart, AB; de Bruin, E; Palmer, AA; Wilkinson, JE; de Wit, H (July 2013). "Psychopharmacology of theobromine in healthy volunteers". Psychopharmacology. 228 (1): 109–18. doi: 10.1007/s00213-013-3021-0. PMC 3672386. PMID 23420115.Cocoa usually refers to a drink made with cocoa powder, hot milk or water, and sweetened to taste with sugar (or not sweetened at all). [23] a b Cabrera, Maryanne (January 27, 2018). "sokolate (Filipino Hot Chocolate)". The Little Epicurean . Retrieved December 13, 2018. Hot chocolate can be made with dark, semisweet, or bittersweet chocolate grated or chopped into small pieces and stirred into milk with the addition of sugar. And now you know why you should eat Fairtrade chocolate, here are the best Fairtrade chocolate brands to buy from – and the bars you need to try. 5 Fairtrade chocolate brands you should buy from Divine Chocolate They’re so nice we wouldn’t mind using them as wallpaper, you know. And, even better, the outer wrappers are made of FSC-certified paper from responsibly managed forests, and the silver inner wrappers are biodegradable and will dissolve in a couple of months if you put it in your compost heap. Elsewhere, six of the nine flavours are suitable for vegans. Chocolate and Love, we love you.

For this piece, we consulted with Mark Lundy, the Sustainable Food Systems leader at the International Center for Tropical Agriculture, for expert information on fair trade chocolate. We also looked into numerous fair trade certifications to see what the process involves and what is required of businesses getting certified. The sugar, cocoa butter, cocoa mass (actual chocolate) and honey are all Fairtrade and all comes from one of the five cooperatives on Ghana’s Ivory Coast. The brand pays farmers a living wage that is relevant to the size of their farms and families and is made up of the “Tony’s premium” combined with the Fairtrade price. When you open the bar, you’ll notice the pieces of chocolate are not in perfectly formed squares, and this is to represent how the money made from cocoa is unevenly divided. The milk chocolate bar is creamy and a substantial size that warrents sharing.This is set by Hotjar to identify a new user’s first session. It stores a true/false value, indicating whether this was the first time Hotjar saw this user. It is used by Recording filters to identify new user sessions. Hall, Christopher (November–December 2010). "Where to Find the Best Hot Chocolate and Churros in Spain". National Geographic Traveler. Archived from the original on October 3, 2011 . Retrieved July 9, 2017. Kperogi, Farooq (January 26, 2014). "Q and A on the grammar of food, usage and Nigerian English". Daily Trust. Archived from the original on February 23, 2017 . Retrieved February 23, 2017. We call everything we drink in the morning "tea" even if it's not.[...]"Daddy, why do Nigerians call hot cocoa 'tea'?" she asked me. Morton, Frederic; Morton, Marcia (1986). Chocolate, an Illustrated History. Crown Publishers. ISBN 0-517-55765-7.

In further studies conducted by Dr. Norman K. Hollenberg, professor of medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School found that flavonols may also help vessels dilate and help keep platelets from clustering on the blood vessel walls. [45] Flavonoids found in hot chocolate are beneficial to health mainly because they shield the walls of blood vessels from free radical damage. [46] Flavanols are also thought to help reduce blood platelet buildup and can balance levels of compounds called eicosanoids, which may be beneficial to cardiovascular health. [46] See also [ edit ] Klein, Christopher (February 13, 2014). "The Sweet History of Chocolate". The History Channel . Retrieved July 15, 2017. Until very recently, in money terms, male cocoa farmers earned around 75p a day on average, less than the extreme poverty line. Female farmers earned around 23p per day. That’s a hell of a lot less than that bar of chocolate you’ve got hidden in your cupboard.This brand burst onto the UK scene to huge fanfare because the ethos behind the Dutch company is to fully eradicate child slavery in chocolate production. It sees itself as an “impact” company that makes chocolate, rather than just simply a chocolate producer. It openly shares the details of its supply chain and follows these five main principles: being able to trace where all its ingredients come from, paying higher prices to farmers, improving farmers’ productivity and encouraging them to adopt modern practices and diversify their crops, and investing in long-term commitment and farm cooperatives to empower farmers to work together. Tsokolate is also known as suklati in Kapampangan; sikulate in Maguindanao; and sikwate or sikuwate in Visayan languages. All are derived from Spanish chocolate ('chocolate'). [40] Lee, KW; Kim, YJ; Lee, HJ; Lee, CY (December 3, 2003). "Cocoa has more phenolic phytochemicals and a higher antioxidant capacity than teas and red wine". Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry. 51 (25): 7292–5. doi: 10.1021/jf0344385. PMID 14640573.