10 



THE CHOCOLATE-PLANT: 



The same writer gives us an interesting account of the native 

 method of preparing the drink. From the extract, which is 

 copied without -change of the quaint spelling, it will be seen how 



wide the use of chocolate 

 was in Europe towards the 

 middle of the seventeenth 

 century : 



" Now, for the making or 

 compounding of this drink, I 

 shall set down here the method. 

 The cacao and the other in- 

 gredients must be beaten in a 

 morter of stone, or (as the 

 Indians use) ground upon a 

 broad stone, which they call 

 Metate, and is only made for 

 that use. But first the ingre- 

 dients are all to be dried, ex- 

 cept the Achiotte, with care 

 that they be beaten to powder, 

 keeping them still in stirring 

 that they be not burnt, or be- 

 come black ; for if they be 

 overdried, they will be bitter 

 and lose their virtue. The cin- 

 namon and the long red pep- 

 per are to be first beaten with 

 the anniseed, and then the ca- 

 cao, which must be beaten by 



little and little till it be all powdered, and in the beating it must be 

 turned round that it may mix the better. Every one of these ingredients 

 must be beaten by itself, and then all be put into the vessel where the 

 cacao is, which you must stir together with a spoon, and then take out 

 that paste, and put it into the morter, under which there must be a 



SOME OF THE FORMS OF CHOCOLATE STIRRERS 

 ("MOLINETS"). 



From a treatise published in the Seventeenth Century. 



