The melt-in-the-mouth experience

Q&A/ Paul Hebbiethwaite, Group science director, Cadbury Schweppes

meets a "professor of chocology" and comes back learning a few things about cocoa, its cultivation, the health benefits of chocolate, and milky Indian bars.

Why do you call yourself "professor of chocology"?

I am a chemical engineer and a bio-scientist and commissioned research on how chocolate is beneficial to health. We wanted to encourage guilt-free consumption, in moderation. We thought "chocology" would be a good "scientific" term.

Chocolate is a mood-enhancer. But any other startling finds?

Is reduction in blood pressure startling?

Really?...

I mean, if you have blood pressure, you'll need to take a tablet. But compounds in chocolate help dilate vessels and increase blood supply to the brain, if you eat in moderation, of course.

So how much chocolate can one have per day, in moderation?

For an average female consuming 2,000 calories a day, 10 per cent could be "treat for the day". That would mean 200 calories ""exactly what you have in this bar [shows a Dairy Milk, 40 g).

You are also going to tell us about how to enjoy chocolate...

Eat it at room temperature.

Even in the Indian summer?

At 25-27 degrees centigrade. In summer, take it out of the fridge for a little while. Then smell it ""you could have fruity or grassy notes "" put a piece in your mouth and let it melt, rolling it so all the 400 individual compounds present in cocoa, that no one has been able to replicate, are tasted by the 9,000 sensory points on the tongue.

[Swallowing] Why does Indian chocolate taste different?

Because it is tropicalised to keep it stable in the heat. Then, there is milk. Also, the blend of cocoa varies. In India, we use, 50 per cent Indian cocoa. In the UK, it would be from West Africa.

We also don't have much dark chocolate...

Even in the UK, the market for dark chocolate is 7 per cent though it is the fastest growing (15 per cent) as opposed to 2-3 per cent per annum for the industry. In India, 98-99 per cent is milk chocolate.

Is there a concept similar to wine's "terroir" for cocoa?

The gold standard would be from Ghana. Chocolate from Equador would be more smoky, musky and heavy. From West Africa, fresher, from Indonesia, earthy... But apart from where the beans grow, how they are fermented and processed also plays a big role in the taste.

In West Africa, they are dried in the sun, in Indonesia, dried artificially but it would be possible to produce West African flavours from Malaysian beans in Malaysia.