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Manufacturing Chocolate
The first stages of the manufacturing are common to the chocolate manufactures; in other words, the grains are cleaned conscientiously and are then toasted in big rotating machines until they have acquired a uniform color. Usually a mix of forastero and Creole grains are mixed, increasing the quality of the final product directly with the increase of the proportion of Creole; in the commerce there are some high quality chocolates that are uniquely made with Creole grains.
After getting toasted, the grains are slightly squished and a machine of artificial wind takes, or lifts up, all the fragments of dry shell and the dust. What are now left are the partially toasted squished grains.
These grains are then taken very finely crushed with rollers, turning it into a thick liquid known as dough, with a high content of cocoa butter. If this dough is left to solidify, the chocolate will have to be used to cook, without sweetener and with a bitter taste. In general a part of it is submitted to pressure to liberate it approximately a fifty percent of its butter content, depending on the exact quantity of the manufacturer. The imprisoned dough dries and turns into a hard paste that is then ground and ground again until it turns into cocoa powder.
However it is after the imprisonment process that the authentic ability of the chocolate manufacturer is put the test. And naturally they are unwilling to tell the precise way in which the final product is obtained! – However all of them basically use the same methods, adding to the liquid mass the cocoa butter that was extracted during the process of the powder manufacturing. The amount varies considerably from country to country with the end that the chocolate can be called or defined as chocolate and not just a chocolate flavor. The regulations in the United Kingdom say that pure chocolate must contain a minimum of thirty percent of solid cacao and in chocolate with milk, a twenty percent.
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