Valentine’s Day & Chocolate

As a chocolate fountain hire company, we’re often asked why chocolate is so popular around Valentine’s Day. As synonymous as roses and love; chocolate and Valentine’s Day are undeniably the perfect partnership. Whether it’s for a quiet night in with a film, or to complement the end of a romantic dinner out; chocolate on February 14^th has been a tradition for centuries.

Referred to as “the food of the Gods” since the Aztec era, chocolate was long believed to be an aphrodisiac mighty rulers and leaders. Finding chocolate in the newly discovered Americas, Christopher Columbus shipped crates back as a tribute to the Queen of Spain; alongside gold and jewels. Chocolate became an expensive trinket of the rich and powerful, but in time it filtered down to the common man.

In the nineteenth century a village in Birmingham became the setting for the first major chocolate distributor outside of London. John and Benjamin Cadbury established their factory in Bourneville and in 1861, the younger Richard Cadbury packaged his world famous chocolate in a heart-shaped presentation box. An instant success, Valentine’s Day became tantamount with chocolate.

But why is chocolate so associated with love? The much debated study of cocoa has yielded some very interesting results. Phenylethylamine is a chemical present in chocolate, has been attributed to causing outbursts of excitement, pleasure and attraction. It seems that the Aztec King’s theory about chocolate being an aphrodisiac could be closer to the truth than we suspect.

Along with boosting your energy and libido, chocolate has also been speculated to give profound feelings of pleasure beyond that of life changing events. Studies at Cambridge University showed that human brains were more strongly affected by chocolate than they are by music, love or money. But it’s not just eating the chocolate which causes the effect; even the scent of freshly melted milk chocolate can set your mind off in excitement and wonder. We would know, every time we fire up one of our chocolate fountains we’re almost too distracted to carry on!

Forget science, we all have a natural knowledge that chocolate is a feel good food. There’s nothing like curling up on the sofa with a bar of your favourite chocolate, it’s an instant improvement to any day. Perhaps the link between Valentine’s Day and chocolate hasn’t got anything to do with science, chemicals or thousand year old traditions. Perhaps it’s just human nature.