“Life,” as Forrest Gump’s Momma used to say, “is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get.” Which suggests (as may have been the intention) that Mrs Gump was either illiterate or just too damned lazy to read the chocolate box menu card before cramming a fistful of soft centers into her gob.

Well, this enlightening little film, How Do They Put the Centers in Chocolates? shows exactly how those tasty surprises Mrs Gump favored so much are added to every box of chocolates.

Chocolate is produced from the seed of the tropical Theobroma cacao tree. In 2007, archaeologists at a site in Puerto Escondido, Honduras, uncovered the oldest known cultivation and use of cacao dating back to around 1100 to 1400 BC. Mayans used cacao to make a rather frothy drink, and it wasn’t until the Spanish invaded South America did rich Europeans first get a taste of the delightful stuff.

Cacao was a luxury, and it wasn’t until 1847, that Englishman Joseph Fry invented the modern chocolate bar when he mixed cacao butter with Dutched chocolate, added sugar and made a chocolate paste that could be molded.  Roald Dahl that fabulous writer and connoisseur of chocolate believed such historical events were more important than the tiresome facts of battles and kings taught at school:

“Never mind about 1066 William the Conqueror, 1087 William the Second. Such things are not going to affect one’s life ... but 1932 the Mars Bar and 1936 Maltesers and 1937 the Kit-Kat - these dates are milestones in history and should be seared into the memory of every child in the country.”

Europe still consumes around 40% of the world’s chocolate, with Ireland, Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom making up the top 5 of the per capita chocolate consumption table. The USA is 12th, ahead of Australia, Italy and Canada.