Americans bake more than 7 billion chocolate chip cookies each year.

Chocolate contains vitamin A, phosphorus, potassium, calcium, riboflavin, iron, niacin and thiamine.

About 90% of all chocolate consumed in the United States is milk chocolate.

Per person, the Swiss eat 20 pounds of chocolate a year.

Mayas were familiar with cacao earlier than 600 A.D. Cacao bean grows on trees within 20 degrees of the Equator in tropical rain forests.

In the 18th century, America began manufacturing chocolate; its popularity spreading, in part, because Thomas Jefferson touted its health benefits.

Chocolate contains phenylethylamine, a natural antidepressant.

White chocolate isn’t truly chocolate because it doesn’t contain chocolate liquor.

It is typically a mixture of sugar, cocoa butter, milk solids, lecithin and vanilla.

The annual yield per cacao tree is 20 to 30 pods, each pod containing 25 to 49 beans.

It takes 400 beans to produce a pound of chocolate.

Russians call it shokolandno; Italians call it cioccolate; Germans refer to it as schokolade; the Spanish, chocolate; and the French, chocolat.

Hershey’s Chocolate was introduced in 1900.

Cole Porter got a kick from fudge. He had nine pounds of it shipped to him each month from his hometown.

The fruit of the Cacao tree grow directly from the trunk. They look like small melons, and the pulp inside contains 20 to 50 seeds or beans. It takes about 400 beans to make a pound of chocolate.

Never give a dog chocolate, as it contains theobromine, which is a central nervous system stimulant. As little as 2 ounces can be lethal to a small dog.

Bittersweet chocolate is what is usually called for in baking. It contains more chocolate liquor (at least 35%) and less sugar than sweet chocolate. Semisweet chocolate contains 15% – 35% chocolate liquor.