New York City got a new tourist attraction in March, a museum a lot more savory than one for modern art or natural history.
Pastry chef and chocolatier Jacques Torres has opened a chocolate museum.
“I love to teach, I love to transfer the love that I have for chocolate and the knowledge that I have for chocolates to whoever wants to learn about it,” Torres explains. “So a museum makes the perfect sense, to bring a museum here around the store.”
The museum traces chocolate’s history through 5,000 years. Chocolate got its start as a beverage in Mayan Mexico.
These artifacts are from coffee’s early days show how much Mayans loved a cup of cocoa.
Hot chocolate became sophisticated beverage by Victorian times.
The museum has several ornate “mustache cups” designed so hot chocolate drinkers wouldn’t get foam on their facial hair.
Europeans also figured out how to stabilize chocolate in a solid form at room temperature—giving rise to chocolate bars and bonbons.
Torres notes that though the basic process hasn’t changed—the fruit is fermented, the nibs removed and roasted and ground—the flavor of chocolate has changed markedly through the years.
“Because now we have machine the chocolate is a lot smoother, we can really remove all the acidity, the flavor is completely different. It’s actually way better now,” claims Torres.
Today machine processing removes the acidity and brings out the best flavors.
“People ask me what is the best chocolates and I always tell them, the best chocolates is the chocolates that you love,” Torres said.
“It doesn’t matter if it’s 80 percent cocoa content, 60 percent cocoa content, if it’s European or American.”
“It doesn’t matter, it’s something that you have to enjoy.”
