Esther Aguirre

Welcome to our chocolate shop: Xocolatl which means bitter water or bitter drink in Mayan, but now let me introduce myself, I'm Esther, wife, and mother of an unstopable 2 year old boy Alex, we live in upstate NY. I love the countryside, love my chickens and our little chocolate shop. There can’t be many people who can resist the temptation of a delicious bar of chocolate. It’s one of life’s great pleasures and, if you ask me, it should be given out free of charge just to make people’s lives that little bit more enjoyable. Sadly, we have to pay for it, but it’s worth every penny. The cocoa bean, from which we derive this delectable treat, has a long and wonderfully romantic history, stretching back over 2,000 years. It has featured prominently in every era since, as people have sought, craved and devoured this delicacy. The mighty Aztecs and Mayans reined supreme over vast tracts of Mesoamerica and cocoa can take at least some of the praise for the later success of these great civilisations. In these days before bank accounts and dollar bills, cocoa was actually used as a form of currency. I don’t think I would have been a particularly good banker if I’d been around in those days; I’d have eaten all the cash before it could be exchanged for anything else. However, it seems I’m not the only one with a soft spot for chocolate. One of the Aztec Emperors of the time – Montezuma – was said to get through a fair few cups of chocolate every day. Still, I suppose he had a ready enough supply of the stuff that he could keep a stash for his own consumption and still made a good profit with the remainder. Most people could only dream of enjoying chocolate as a luxury drink. The seeds were so valuable that they would have been used for trading. Still, I suppose an Emperor has to have a few perks. Chocolate in those days wouldn’t be easily recognisable as the bars we enjoy today. It was mainly taken as a drink and, bearing in mind there wasn’t any sugar around, it was more of a bitter brew than the sweet beverage we think of today. The cocoa seeds were roasted and ground to a powder that was made into a drink. They did add flavourings but these would have been spices such as pepper or chilli. It was even occasionally dyed a dark red colour and used as part of rituals and special celebrations. The cocoa bean was first discovered in the sultry forests of Central and South America. Like many of these things, I wonder how on earth anyone realised that these strange look