The use of cocoa has greatly increased of late years. This is usually attributed to its food value, that is real, though probably not all that is always claimed for it. Cocoa contains theobromine (similar to caffeine or theine), also a little caffeine. But its stimulating effect is slight, far less than that of coffee or tea, as is also its retardation of digestion, since the tannin in raw cocoa-beans is transformed in roasting. Cocoa as a beverage has much less fat than the bean. This varies with different preparations. When pure cocoa is not digestible, it is due to the fat. Not every one can digest fat easily. Otherwise cocoa is very digestible.

Though cocoa has the nourishing food-constituents, these are insufficient for much nutriment in the quantity in which it is used as a beverage. Made with milk there is more. Cocoa is not, however, a negligible factor in the diet, as are tea and coffee in respect to nourishment. The fact that cocoa as marketed contains starch makes it important that it be cooked.

Breakfast Cocoas (Selected From Olsen's "Pure Foods")

Chocolate In Different Forms

It is the pure chocolate that is supposed to be used in cooking; but often it is mixed with sugar and cocoa butter.