[Sca-cooks] chocolate as passion

[agora at algonet.se]

There is and old and quite anonymous Mexican book, published in Mexico, I bought it 
in a second hand bookstore in Mexico city, 1984. The title is "Comida Precolonial".
Ana

On 15 Feb 2006 at 14:35, Terri Spencer wrote:

> agora at algonet.se wrote: 
> >Found in a wonderful book with pre-columbian recipes some modern
> variations, a 
> >drink made with dark chocolate (Porcelana beans or Varlhona 100
> procent cacao) and chilipeppar.  It was fantastic...

Kiri responded:
> And the recipe is.......???????
> Chocoholic minds want to know!


And my question - what about the book?  Recipes I've got. 
(Not to be a spoon tease, here they are):

Aztec Cacahuatl Recipes

My version:
1/4 cup roasted cacao nibs	
1 3/4 water		
1/4 tsp ground red chile pepper	
1/8 cup honey 						
1/4 tsp ground achiote		
1 inch vanilla bean
Optional: up to 1/2 cup masa (2 parts maize flour to 1 part water)

Boil water, Scrape seeds from vanilla, Grind other dry ingredients in
molcajete, mix masa, mix all, pour back and forth between pitchers
from a height to create froth (based on technique pictured on aztec
vase). Note - this recipe is adjusted for a class full of wimps like
me, those who like it spicy should increase chile or other pepper to
their taste.



The seller of fine chocolate is one who grinds, 
who provides people with drink, with repasts.
She grinds cacao; she crushes, breaks, pulverizes them.
She chooses, selects, separates them.
She drenches, soaks, steeps them.
She adds water sparingly, conservatively; 
aerates it, filters it, strains it, pours it back and forth, aerates
it; She makes it form a head, makes it foam; She removes the head,
makes it thicken; makes it dry, pours water in, stirs water into it.
She sells good, superior, potable [chocolate]; the privilege; the
drink of nobles, or rulers finely ground, soft, foamy, reddish,
bitter; [with] chile water, with flowers, with uei uacaztli
(Cymbopetalum penduliflorum), with mecaxochitl (Piper amalago), with
wild bee honey, with powdered aeromatic flowers.  [Inferior chocolate
has] maize flour and water; lime water; [it is] pale; the [froth]
bubbles burst. [It is chocolate] with water added – Chontal water
[fit
for] water flies. Barnardino de Sahagún, c.1500-1590, Franciscan
missionary 

He also describes a  banquet version spiced with xochinacaztli, or uei
penduliflorum, or teunacaztli, ear-shaped flowers of Cymbopetalum
penduliflorum, Popenoe says tastes like ‘black pepper with the
addition of a resinous bitterness’.


Clavigero mentions adding vanilla, honey, mecaxochitl, the flowers of
Piper amalago, a small vine related to Piper nigrum, flower of Tagetes
lucida, marigold called Mexican saffron, flower of fyolloxochitl, or
heart flower (Magnolia mexicana), seeds of piztle (Cahocarpum
mammosum). 

Hernández gives four recipes for drinks with cacao:
Chocolatl – equal parts sweet seeds of pochotl (Ceiba spp.) and cacao,
ground, mixed, beaten, reserve foam, add softened maize, replace foam,
drink tepid

Atextli – 100 grains of raw cacao toasted and ground, then softened
(nixtamalized?), 2 handfuls maize, spiced with Piper amalago, Vanilla
planifolia, & Cymbopetalum penduliflorum

Tzone – equal parts toasted and ground maize and cacao, with softened
maize to thicken

Aphrodisiac chocolate - hueinacaztli (Cymhopetalum penduliflorum
flower), tlilxochitl  (black flower – vanilla), mecaxochitl (string
flower, Piper sanctum, related to black pepper), cool, refreshing
chocolate 



Spanish Colonial Chocolate Recipes

My Version:
1/4 cup roasted cacao nibs		
2 cups water	
1/4 cup sugar			
1/2 inch vanilla bean, scraped seeds		
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon	
1/8 tsp ground black pepper
6 ground almonds
Optional: aniseed, red pepper, cloves, sesame seeds, hazelnuts,
orange-flower water

Boil water.  Grind/scrape dry ingredients.  Stir together in chocolate
pot.  Froth with molinillo.  

>From "Chocolate: or, An Indian Drinke." London 1652 by Capt. John
Wadsworth, translation of a book by Melchor de Lara, Physitian General
for the Kingdome of Spaine, 1631, The Receipt of him who wrote at
Marchena, is this:  	 of Cacaos, 700 of white sugar, 1 pound and a
halfe Cinnamon, 2 ounces of long red pepper, 14 of cloves, halfe an
ounce: Three Cods of Logwood or Campeche tree; or in steade of that,
the weight of 2 Reals, or a shilling of Anniseeds; as much of Agiote,
as Hasellnut. Some put in Almonds, kernells of nuts, and
Orenge-flower-water.


Mexican Chocolate Drink from 1644, Antonio Colmenero de Ledesma:  100
cacao beans 2 chillis (black pepper may be substituted), A handful of
anise, "ear flower", 2 mecasuchiles (mecaxochitl) (lacking the above 2
spices powdered roses of Alexandria may be used), 1 vanilla [bean], 2
oz cinnamon, 12 almonds and as many hazelnuts, 1/2 lb sugar , Achiote
to taste


Thomas Gage, 1648 ‘The English-American: His Travail by Sea’, on
medicinal chocolate:
With black pepper for ‘cold livers’
With cinnamon promotes urine flow , good for kidney disorders and
‘cold diseases’ With achiote to provide an ‘attenuating quality’, for
shortness of breath and reduced urine Those who drink it grow fat and
corrupt


Henry Stubbe, 1662, ‘The Indian Nectar, or a Discourse Concerning
Chocolata' Medicinal chocolate – To every hundred nuts of cacao
put
two codes of chile called long red pepper, one handful of anise seeds,
and orichelas (orejaelas), and two of the flowers called mecasuchill,
one vanilla, or instead thereof fix Alexandrian roses beaten to
powder, two drams of cinnamon, twelve almonds, and as many hazel nuts,
half a pound of sugar, and as much achiote as would color it.


Sylvester Dufour, 1685, ‘The Manner of Making of Coffee, Tea and
Chocolate’, derived from 1618 recipe of Spanish doctor Barthelemy
Marradon from Marchena (same as 1652 version above): Take 700 cacao
nuts and a pound and a half of white sugar, two ounces of cinnamon,
Fourteen grains of Mexican pepper called chili (or pimento), One-half
ounce of cloves, three little straws of vanilla de campeche (or two
ounces anise-seed), anchiote a small quantity as big as a filbert,
which may be sufficient only to give it a color; some add thereto
almonds, filberts, a grain of musk or ambergris or powder of
Scolopendre (a centipede), the pod of the Tlixochitla tree and the
water of orange flowers.


These are from my class 'Renaissance Kahve & Chocolatl or The Caffeine
Addict’s Workshop', where we make the two versions along with Turkish
coffee.  I welcome any further information y'all might have on the
more exotic New World ingredients.

Tara
I'm ba-ack, hoping I can keep up with the list 


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