Artigenda
World Chocolate Day
When: anually, July 7.
July 7 is the day when it is World Chocolate Day. A day to enjoy chocolate. It is not without reason that this day was chosen, which should not be confused with International Chocolate Day.
How about this day?
What’s up with these two days related to chocolate? There is an International Chocolate Day and a World Chocolate Day. They are on two different days. One day, International Chocolate Day takes place on July 7 and World Chocolate Day on September 13.
Both days are there for a reason. Whereas International Chocolate Day is a reminder of a chocolate maker (Milton S. Hershey), this day is a reminder of an event that took place on July 7, 1550.
This is said to be the date when chocolate was introduced to Europe. Cocoa was brought to Europe even earlier and in South America, the Spanish learned what chocolate was, albeit in liquid form. Hernán Cortés (1485 – December 2, 1547), known for the terrible things he did to South America, was so enthusiastic about it that he thought that a cup of that liquid chocolate ensured that you did not have to eat for a day. The question, of course, is how big those cups of Cortés might have been…
1528
Cortés took the cocoa beans and a kind of device that could be used to brew that drink to Spain around 1528. There he gave it to Dominican friars. These then introduced it to the Spanish court. So, the date of July 7, 1550 is nicely conceived, but not quite correct. Yet, the date of July 7, 1550 kept coming back again and again. It got so bad that people decided to make it a day: World Chocolate Day. This is only a fairly young tradition. It came into being only in 2009. We may blame the Americans for this because they caused it all. With a veritable obsession with worshipping food and drink. Chocolate is the most bizarre form of worship, though. There are no less than two national days (28 October and 28 December), during which chocolate takes centre stage. There is also September 13, International Chocolate Day and, of course, July 7. Not to mention all the days on which chocolate plays a secondary role. National White Chocolate Day, National Milk Chocolate Day…
So, July 7 is an arbitrarily chosen date from 2009. The real date when chocolate was introduced to Europe is not July 7, 1550, but we can also just pretend, right?
