Food of the Gods: Adventures in Chocolate

Chocolate has enjoyed a long and storied—and sometime controversial—history since the Spanish first brought it back from Mesoamerica, where the Aztecs had used it in their rituals for human sacrifices. Since then, chocolate has been used as a murder weapon, in a plot against the British monarchy, as a hangover cure, and even as a balm for the testicles. If the English were at first distrustful of chocolate, thinking that drinking it hot would boil the blood, the Italians enthusiastically embraced this new-fangled food, creating weird and wonderful dishes such as chocolate-covered liver and lasagne with chocolate sauce. Melanie King, British author and social historian, will share some of the lesser known myths and legends about the strange adventures of chocolate.