The internet is full of fabulous facts about everything from current events to the history basket weaving and cocoa fun facts. As we research for our daily content on food trucks, food carts and street food, we stumble upon some items of knowledge that we just did not know.

We have decided when these fun facts pop up, that we would share them with our readers in our section titled “Did You Know?”

For today’s Did You Know we will look at Cocoa fun facts.

Cocoa Fun Facts: The fruit of the Cocoa tree grow directly from the trunk. They look like small melons, and the pulp inside contains 20 to 50 seeds or beans.

  • It takes 5 years for a cocoa tree to produce its first seed pods.
  • It takes about 400 beans to make a pound of chocolate.
  • December 13th is National Cocoa Day.
  • Chocolate has properties that combat Heart disease; thanks to flavanoids from the cocoa plant.
  • The ancient tribes, of the Maya Indians, were the first to discover the wonderful enchanting properties of the cocoa bean around the year 600 AD.
  • Christopher Columbus, in 1502, was thought to have brought cocoa beans to King Ferdinand, during his fourth trip from the New World.
  • Cocoa was exported to Europe in 1585 but the first chocolate bar was not made until 1848.
  • The first chocolate house for the United States was established in Dorchester, Massachusetts.
  • Throughout the world the annual cocoa production is 3 million tons
  • Length of time required for a cocoa tree to produce its first beans (pods): five years
  • Watching your caffeine intake? An ounce of semi-sweet dark chocolate has only 20 milligrams on average, about the same amount as three ounces of brewed regular tea.

Cacoa Fun Facts We May Have Missed

Let us know about any Cacoa Fun Facts we missed. We always love to add to these lists. If we can verify that the facts is just that, a fact, we will give the reader credit in the article.

Reference: Wikipedia facts about Cocao.

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