Have you ever wondered where chocolate comes from? Well, it actually does grows on trees.
Chocolate starts off as small coco beans and through a series of steps becomes that delicious candy sitting on the desk in front of you.

Stage one: coco Bean
Growing and harvesting
Farmers grow coco trees on small farms in hot, rainy environments by equator the pods must be harvested
They are cut off the tree with a machete. workers open the pods by hand and remove the beans.
Fermentation
beans are placed in wooden bins and are covered with banana leaves-left to ferment. heat changes the bitter flavors in the beans into something more edible-less bitter. sugars in the bean turn into acids-color changes from pale to dark brown length of the fermentation process depends on the type of bean-higher quality- only a few days, others may need a week or more. the beans are dried in the sun for about a week.

Stage two: factory
Chocolate Liquor coco beans are roasted in large rotating ovens-temperatures of about 210-290F
Roasting lasts half an hour up to two hours the coco beans are craked open and have their outer shell removed leaves the crushed and broken pieces of coco beans coco bean pieces are ground into a thick paste called chocolate liquor the manufacturer adds sugar, coco butter, vanilla, and milk to the chocolate liquior
The mixture is still grainy-so the manufacturer runs the mixture through a series of steel rollers to refine texture.
Chocolate bar to further refine the texture the mixture is conched ran through a chocolate making machine that mixes-mashes-swirls and aerates the chocolate. during conching-add more coco butter and maybe some soy lecithin –gives the chocolate a silky smooth texture.
Conching last a few hours for cheaper chocolates, up to six days for the expensive the chocolate is tempered by stirring it- letting it