Do the English put blood in chocolate to give it a rich color?
Dear Straight Dope: We recently had a discussion with some German friends about the relative merits of American vs. European chocolate. While I happen to agree with them that German chocolate is far superior to American chocolate, they also tried to convince us that the English put blood in their chocolate to make it a richer color. Does this mean I can get mad cow disease from eating Cadbury Easter eggs? — kathyh in honolulu Oh, those zany blutwurst-eating Germans, always quick to pull your leg. The British may eat blood pudding, but they’ve never added blood to their chocolate. Cocoa is what gives chocolate its rich color. The cocoa bean is the seed pod of the theobroma cacao tree from the Amazon forest. These trees are now cultivated in Africa and Southeast Asia as well as Latin America. Europeans may brag that their chocolate is the best, but the bitter version was popular in the Americas for thousands of years. The Mayans had cocoa plantations in the Yucatan at least as far back a
