FAMILY :: MALVACEAE

$150 pesos (6 month old from seed)
$300 pesos (2 years old from seed)

CHOCOLATE, COCOA, CACAO:

A tropical tree whose seeds are the source of commercial chocolate. Some of the plants that we sell (the larger ones) were seedlings produced from a plant we gave a friend to grow after we had brought it to Mexico about 15 years ago. The smaller plants are from specimens grown at the Vallarta Botanical Gardens.

The generic name is derived from the Greek for “food of the gods”; from (theos), meaning ‘god’, and (broma), meaning ‘food.’ The specific name cacao is the Hispanization of the name of the plant in indigenous Mesoamerican languages. The cacao was known as kakaw in Tzeltal, kagaw in Sayula Popoluca; and cacahuatl (bean of the cocoa-tree) in Nahuatl.

Chocolate has been used by humans for thousands of years.

In Puerto Vallarta this tree is at its northern limit for commercial growth but it does well here. It loves shade and warmth and does not like wind at all. Naturally, it grows under a jungle canopy with lots of moisture. It is a heavy feeder and requires frequent fertilizing and watering and it grows very quickly, up to about 2 meters a year. It fruits in the 4th or 5th year. It can be grown easily in a pot. I have one tree that is over 20 years old and it is still growing in a pot.

Medicinally, chocolate is considered a stimulant and an aphrodisiac. The stimulating properties of chocolate are documented and well known but the aphrodisiac qualities are in dispute by some because they do not realize that the component of chocolate responsible for the reported aphrodisiac effects, Phenethylamine (PEA), is rapidly destroyed in oral consumption by MAO, leading curious experimenters with the obvious solution of ingesting MAOIs simultaneously. …Look it up – this is the same chemical mechanism used in ayahuasca….

LINKS for more Information:

• Growing Chocolate (excellent information)
• Chocolate invented 3,100 years ago by the Aztecs – but they were trying to make beer
• Cocoa or Cocoa tree – Encyclopedia of Diderot & d’Alembert
• Cradle of Chocolate

 

#cacao

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