Earliest Chocolate Delivered Extra Buzz

Nov. 12, 2007 -- The world's first chocolate drink was neither hot nor frothy but, given its alcohol content, might have given drinkers a buzz, suggests a new Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences study.

Remains of the beverage, stuck on dirty pots dating from 1400-1408 B.C., extend the earliest known use of cacao -- the source of chocolate -- by at least 500 years, according to the authors.

Led by Cornell University anthropologist John Henderson, the scientists excavated the pots in the lower Rio Ulua Valley of northern Honduras. Although cacao plants are native to South America, most other early chocolate evidence comes from in and around Mexico.

"I'd guess that South Americans, navigating along the coast, took cacao pods with them as a source of liquid and it got established in coastal Mesoamerica, maybe in or near the Ulua Valley, and locals adopted the practice of fermenting the pulp (that surrounds the pods)," Henderson told Discovery News.

The researchers carefully extracted, and chemically analyzed, the residue. They also studied the gourd-shaped pots themselves. The chemical analysis revealed the presence of theobromine, a chemical limited to Central American chocolate plant species.

"There's some disagreement among pharmacologists about what kind of physical response theobromine produces," Henderson said. "In combination with the other compounds, (it was) probably a mild stimulant and a sense of well-being."

Based on the shape of the excavated pots, the researchers guess the chocolate was served in liquid form, probably for special occasions such as births and weddings. Beyond that, they think the shape of the pots also suggests how the beverage was made.

The oldest northern Honduras chocolate pots had a long narrow neck, while the newer pots have wide necks that, even today, allow cooks to insert a wooden whisk device, known as a molinillo, for frothing the liquid. Since the oldest drinks probably weren't frothed, according to the researchers, they were likely prepared from fermented cacao pulp, unlike other chocolate-flavored drinks made from the seeds.