Fry's Cocoa Powder from an advertisement of 1887
By the early 1600's chocolate as a drink was being served at coffee houses in London, and known to be used as a flavour in other 'Chaculato' drinks. In 1764 Elizabeth Moxon gives one of the first receipts for a chocolate desert:
Original Receipt in 'English Housewifry' by Elizabeth Moxon, 1764 (Moxon 1764)249. To make CHOCOLATE CREAM.
Take four ounces of chocolate, more or less, according as you would have your dish in bigness, grate it and boil it in a pint of cream, then mill it very well with a chocolate stick; take the yolks of two eggs and beat them very well, leaving out the strain, put to them three or four spoonfuls of cream, mix them all together, set it on the fire, and keep stirring it till it thicken, but do not let it boil; you must sweeten it to your taste, and keep stirring it till it be cold, so put it into your glasses or china dishes, which you please.
In 1747 we find possibly the first known description in Europe of making solid chocolate sweets;
Original Receipt from 'The Complete family-piece and country gentleman and farmer's best guide' (Family Guide 1747)To make Chocolate Almonds
Take a Pound of Chocolate finely grated and a Pound and half of the best Sugar, finely sifted, then soak Gum traganth [E413] and Orange flower water and work them into what form you please. The Paste must be stiff. Dry them in a Stove.
But it was not until 1847 that the Bristol Company of Fry & Son first made a 'bar' eating chocolate. By mixing cocoa powder and sugar with cocoa butter extracted from the beans Fry produced a bar that could be moulded and given flavourings or fruit centres. In 1875 the Swiss confectioner Daniel Peter produced a milk chocolate using the condensed milk developed by Henri Nestle, and Cadbury's began producing this 'Swiss' chocolate in 1897.
