Get a great big dose of chocolate

The chocolate "pod" contains seeds that are imbedded in a sticky substance. Photos by Deborah Booker • The Honolulu Advertiser

By Wanda A. Adams
Assistant Features Editor

Kathleen Izon, exhibits manager at the Bishop Museum, sits on a cushion shaped like a piece of chocolate candy. The museum is showing an extensive exhibit on chocolate from Chicago's Field Museum.

Chocolate Oct. 18-Jan. 4, Castle Memorial Building, Bishop Museum, 1525 Bernice St., Honolulu. Kama'aina rates: $7.95 adults, $6.95 youth 4-12, seniors and military; children under 4 and Bishop Museum Association members free. Family Sunday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Oct. 26 — chocolate tastings, demonstrations and exhibits, music and special planetarium show; free admission for two persons with a Bank of Hawaii bank card, credit card, check or employee ID or Bishop Museum membership. Otherwise: $3; children under 4 free. 847-3511, bishopmuseum.org

Visitors learn how chocolate has played a role in the loss of South American rain forests and how indigenous peoples have been used throughout the years to grow and process this labor-intensive "food of the gods," without getting much benefit from it themselves. In the most productive cacao-growing area in the world, the Ivory Coast, "people that live and work on cacao plantations may never taste chocolate," a woman explains in one televised snippet.

Exhibit items range from priceless pre-Columbian earthenware vessels to impossibly fragile Meissen tableware created when cocoa parties were all the rage in the 18th century. The meandering chronology, beginning with a replica of a cacao tree in a make-believe rainforest and ending with interactive, multimedia

installations, gives you a sense of the significant role that chocolate — like so many other foods of value — has played in various cultures and economies.

The bilingual exhibit (all signage and narration are both in English and Spanish, making this a fine outing for a Spanish language class) was extremely popular when it opened at the Field Museum on Valentine's Day, 2002, and was held over until Christmas before traveling to Los Angeles, New York and now Honolulu, said Field exhibits registrar Angie Morrow.

Bishop Museum exhibits manager Kathleen Izon said she plans three years in advance, polling visitors to ascertain their interest: Chocolate, naturally, ranked high. The museum also favors exhibits with a local tie-in, and there is ongoing interest in building a cacao industry here.

A well-stocked shop is the final stopping place, selling local and imported chocolates (by the end, you positively crave it), bears that growl "I loooove chocolate," books developed by the Field Museum to go with the exhibit and T-shirts that say "I'll Be Nicer If You Give Me Chocolate."

Wanda A. Adams writes about food, books and travel. She can be reached at wadams@honoluluadvertiser.com or 535-2412.

Put your chocolate knowledge to the test

Bishop Museum employee Roxanne Hew Len selects a piece of candy from the counter of a chocolate shop that is part of an exhibit. The shop sells local and imported chocolates, as well as other items.

a) a bitter drink used in religious ceremonies
b) money
c) a closely guarded secret

2. Which continent uses the most chocolate today?

a) North America
b) Africa
c) Europe

3. It lowers human blood pressure but it can kill a dog, and it's a key chemical element in chocolate. What is it?

a) Caffeine
b) Theobromine
c) Cavacate

4. On St. Nicholas Day in Holland, you're given something made of chocolate. What is it?

a) A chocolate basket filled with candies
b) Your initials formed from chocolate
c) A chocolate windmill

5) The chief flavoring in early cocoa drinks was . . .

a) chili pepper
b) achiote (annato)
c) corn flour

6) If you were preparing hot chocolate in the Mexican style, you would use a ...

a) molcajete
b) molinillo
c) coma

Do you deserve to pig out on Godiva or earn just one Hershey's Kiss?

Europeans in the 1700s added sugar to their chocolate drink and served it in exquisite porcelain cups.

These ancient Mayan vessels, part of an exhibit, portray nobles using chocolate. In Mayan and Aztec cultures, chocolate was only drunk by people in positions of authority and was used in religious rituals.

1) All of the above. In the Aztec and Mayan cultures, cacao drinks were reserved for royalty and drunk ceremonially (although they became more generally available later). To the Aztecs, who couldn't grow cacao because they lived outside the trees' narrow growing range (20 degrees north or south of the equator), the beans were valuable enough to serve as money; they acquired the beans from the Mayans and used them in trade. When the Spanish brought cacao beans home in the 16th century, they created the happy marriage of cacao and sugar, then tried to keep the secret from the rest of Europe so as to control trade.

2) c. Although Americans appear to be unable to function without their candy bars, Europeans use the most chocolate, probably because of the proximity of such candy-making centers as Switzerland, Belgium and the Netherlands.

3) b. Although chocolate does contain caffeine, theobromine is the more significant of the two alkaloids; it dilates blood vessels and so may reduce high blood pressure. However, it's death to dogs; a square of baker's chocolate can kill a medium-size pooch.

4) b. As you learn in a film at the "Chocolate" exhibit, the Dutch give their children chocolates in the shapes of the first letter of their first name on St. Nicholas Day, Dec. 6, when presents are also handed out. Originally, the letters were made from cake or marzipan, but chocolate has become fashionable.

5) All of the above. Early chocolate drinks were made by roasting and then grinding cacao seeds and whisking the powder together with water, flavorings such as chilies and vanilla, sometimes the reddish dye of the achiote seed, and a thickener made from corn. The Indians of Central America loved the drink, but it took Europeans a while to appreciate its finer points.

6) b. The Mexican technique is to bring milk to a simmer, add a chunk of semi-sweet chocolate (often Ibarra brand, from Guadalajara) and other flavorings (ground almonds, vanilla, cinnamon) and use a molinillo — a grooved, wooden whisk, rotated briskly between the palms — to beat the mixture to a froth. The drink may also be made with unsweetened cocoa powder and Mexican-style brown sugar.

How'd you do?

You get one point for each correct answer; give yourself half a point if you knew part of the answer.

• 5-6 points: You deserve a Godiva binge!
• 3-4 points: A Whitman's sampler.
• 1-2 points: Make do with just one Hershey's Kiss.