So hello and welcome to the Pleasant Vices series.
My name is Tasha Marks and I'm Paul A Young master chocolatier and today we're going to
be talking to you about chocolate.
So today we're going to be talking about 18th and 19th century chocolate, specifically in
London.
Chocolate was not necessarily in the form that we imagine it today.
It was drunk in a liquid form and not necessarily as eating chocolate.
And we've got some amazing examples and replicas of items in the British Museum Collection
that address just that.
And this particularly Number 8 Greek Street in Soho 'Dealers in Chocolate, Coffee and
Cocoa' and it's all about medicinal and the well being of cocoa and coffee and tea.
And also Sir Hans Sloane, very famous man of the time.
Founder of the British Museum Collection and also celebrated as bringing drinking chocolate
to the UK.
'Sold here Sir Hans Sloane's Milk Chocolate' so he was the pioneer, he was the go to brand.
So Sir Hans Sloane first got interested in chocolate when he was in Jamaica and the idea
that it was useful as a medicine, that it was good for digestion and according to this
advert here 'for all consumptive case'.
Scientists now have found that high percentage stuff like this 91% or above is better than
codeine and lots of medicine for the throat, it coats the throat, lots of antioxidants,
polyphenols and can help sore throats and coughs.
So eat more.
So the coffee houses, the so called 'penny universities' were very similar to the coffee
shops we have today.
People who go and work use it as their go to office space.
It's something that started in the 18th century.
And you wouldn't know that now because we have coffee culture now.
And we still say we go out, we meet people for coffee...
And have tea. ...and we invite people over for tea.
Yes that's right.
So that idea of the coffee being external and tea being something that's done at home
is still part of our language today.
And chocolates bridged both worlds.
Which in essence kind of brought people together outside as a social activity.
And hot chocolate being for the elite and for the exclusive stemmed hundreds of chocolate
houses.
But still even on this one it's a drug store but with teas, coffees and chocolate.
But it's interesting now chocolate shops are chocolate shops and you have news agents that
sell chocolate but not a drug store, that has anything medicinal like our current chemists
around cocoa or chocolate.
Next time you go to a chemist and you notice all the sweets by the tills just think 'it's
probably historical' they're not just trying to upsell you something.
So the recipe we're making today is inspired by the mesoamerican roots of chocolate.
So we're infusing it with cinnamon and chile and vanilla but the consistency itself is
going to be much thicker so we're going to add milk to it which was an addition championed
by Sir Hans Sloane.
So do you want to talk to me about what we've got?
So chocolate.
This is 100%.
So it's just cocoa bean that had been picked, fermented, dried and roasted and then ground
down and the heat from the friction from the grinding extracts the cocoa butter and the
cocoa solids the brown bit in the cocoa butter blends together and when it's cold it becomes
hard.
And of course milk.
Now this has the spices already in it so we want to remove those.
This has been brought up to the simmer.
So we've got our cinnamon.
We've got some chiles, some whole chiles, but you could use ground chile that's absolutely
fine.
Just be very careful add it gradually, you can't take it away once it's in but you can
put more in if you need to.
So it's not boiling at this stage it's just really really hot.
If it's really boiling when you add the chocolate then it can scorch the chocolate and it can
go a little bit grainy.
There we go.
And then if you'd like to chop the last two bits of that chocolate for me, without chopping
your fingers off please.
I'm very clumsy.
It can just be into even sized pieces And then we're going to throw it all in and
then use our molinello our traditional whisk to froth it up.
There we go.
Ok.
So we're going to put all of that in, pop that in the middle.
So it's quite a lot of chocolate, there's about a pint of milk there and about 100 grams
of chocolate - it needs to be very chocolatey.
I'm going to give you the honey pot and you're going to sweeten it slightly because as it
is it would be incredibly bitter.
So yeah all the historical chocolate the solid processed cocoa nibs which is a much more
rough gritty chocolate than what we would have today wouldn't be an eating chocolate
it might have had sugar added, you could eventually buy it with sugar added but we're going to
go for a traditional one so it hasn't really had any sugar added so we're going to add
it in the form of honey.
We've got some raw honey, so it's a really strong flavour.
If you'd like to tip?
Just say when.
This is about using your discretion.
I think we're good.
We don't want it sugary.
And then this is our molinello, our carved whisk.
We'll give it a little stir, and if you'd like to hold the pan, I'll start whisking,
it automatically froths the hot chocolate.
It smells incredible at this stage which makes me think how amazing the chocolate houses
must have smelt in the Georgian era.
Roasting cocoa beans, doing it from scratch particularly.
And historically that foam was as important as the chocolate itself.
The Aztecs would pour from one vessel into another to get the foam.
They would and really build the foam up from a height.
Moctezuma drank from two gold goblets about 40 a day - that's a lot of chocolate - but
it was all about the foam at the top.
Fantastic.
Little bit more, you can't overwhisk and the more you whisk the frothier it will get.
What we have as well - this is one of mine from my collection - this is an 18th century
chocolate stirer a patented design where you push it down, it has a little spring in there...
That is so satisfying isn't it?
Have you ever used it?
I haven't.
Do you want to try it?
Should we try it?
No.
Should we try it in the pot?
You've got a lovely original serving pot for this as well haven't you?
Yes.
So if I pour that in.
So this one is one of mine as well, this is a 19th century one so a little bit later than
the period we're actually responding to.
There we go.
I don't think these pots were made for left handed people, I can't..
it doesn't seem right to pour it that way.
Shall I serve you?
Ahh yes thankyou.
I'll pop this in the back.
So the froth should come out with it at the end and that's silky smooth...
it doesn't make a noise?
You can imagine how luxurious this must have been at the time.
You're going to have the first taste.
Ooo couldn't possibly.
No go on.
Ladies first.
Ok.
I love the two little handles as well , very delicate.
Two pinkies if you wanted.
Very English.
That's lovely.
It's the perfect amount of bitter and spiced.
Not too sweet.
I'll have it this way.
Look it's a sharing cup.
It's less sweet than we have now isn't it?
But the cinnamon and chile, chile's delicate.
You get all the flavours, you get the vanilla and the chile and the honey and the spices.
You wouldn't rush it would you?
That's something you would sit down and enjoy.
It's much more sophisticated than the hot chocolate we have now which tends to be incredibly
milky and sweet, with not a lot of chocolate where as that is powerful chocolate.
Thank you for watching the Pleasant Vices video about chocolate.
Next week we have a video all about alcohol.
For that or any past episodes please click here and to subscribe to the British Museum
YouTube channel click over here.
Thank you for watching.