---
title: "What is a Chocolate made of?"
description: "Ground cocoa solids and cocoa butter with sugar, plus a trace of lecithin — the fat does the rest. Every component, the material it uses, and the constraint that mad"
url: https://atoneplace.net/made-of/chocolate/
site: "At One Place"
---

# What is a Chocolate made of?

**What is a Chocolate made of?: Ground cocoa solids and cocoa butter with sugar, plus a trace of lecithin — the fat does the rest.**

Cocoa butter can crystallise into six different forms, and only one of them — form V — is glossy, snaps cleanly and melts at the right temperature. Tempering is the process of forcing that form to dominate by heating, cooling and reheating through a precise sequence, typically to about 45 °C, down to 27 °C and back to 31 °C for dark chocolate. Untempered chocolate sets soft and dull and blooms grey as fat migrates to the surface, which is also what happens when a bar is left in a warm car and then re-hardens. Bloom is harmless; it is the same chocolate with the crystals in the wrong form.

## Component by component

*Every material is a choice, and the third column is the constraint that drove it.*

| Part | Material | Why that material |
| --- | --- | --- |
| cocoa mass | roasted, ground cocoa beans — cocoa solids plus cocoa butter | The solids carry all the flavour and colour; grinding them below about 25 µm is what stops chocolate feeling gritty. |
| cocoa butter | the fat pressed from cocoa beans, added back | It is solid at room temperature and melts sharply just below body heat, which is why chocolate snaps and then floods the mouth. |
| sugar | sucrose, finely milled with the mass | Unsweetened cocoa is intensely bitter; the sugar fraction is the main difference between dark, milk and white. |
| emulsifier | soy or sunflower lecithin, around 0.3-0.5% | A tiny amount lets the fat coat the sugar particles, so the same fluidity is reached with several per cent less cocoa butter. |
| milk chocolate addition | milk powder or milk crumb | Milk fat softens the snap and blunts the bitterness, and milk crumb — cooked with the sugar first — is where the caramel note in British chocolate comes from. |

## Other food and drink objects

- [Marshmallow](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/marshmallow/) — Sugar syrup whipped full of air and held there by gelatin, which comes from animal collagen.
- [Chewing gum](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/chewing-gum/) — A base of synthetic rubber, wax and resin that you never swallow, carrying sweetener and flavour that you do.
- [Gelatin](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/gelatin/) — Collagen from animal skin and bone, broken down with acid or alkali and dried. There is no plant version.
- [Cheese](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/cheese/) — Milk protein clotted by an enzyme, drained of whey and salted — four ingredients and a lot of time.
- [Bread](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/bread/) — Flour, water, yeast and salt — plus, in most factory loaves, enzymes, emulsifiers and a mould inhibitor.
- [Potato chips (crisps)](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/potato-chips/) — Thin potato slices fried in vegetable oil, seasoned with a maltodextrin-carried flavour powder, packed in nitrogen.
- [Tofu](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/tofu/) — Soy milk curdled with a mineral salt and pressed — cheese-making, with soybeans instead of milk.

## Common questions

### What is a Chocolate made of?

Ground cocoa solids and cocoa butter with sugar, plus a trace of lecithin — the fat does the rest.

### What is the cocoa mass of a Chocolate made of?

Roasted, ground cocoa beans — cocoa solids plus cocoa butter. The solids carry all the flavour and colour; grinding them below about 25 µm is what stops chocolate feeling gritty.

### What is the cocoa butter of a Chocolate made of?

The fat pressed from cocoa beans, added back. It is solid at room temperature and melts sharply just below body heat, which is why chocolate snaps and then floods the mouth.

## Related pages

- [Marshmallow](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/marshmallow/)
- [Chewing gum](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/chewing-gum/)
- [Gelatin](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/gelatin/)
- [Cheese](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/cheese/)
- [Bread](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/bread/)
- [Potato chips (crisps)](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/potato-chips/)
- [Tofu](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/tofu/)
- [Pencil](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/pencil/)
- [Tennis ball](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/tennis-ball/)
- [Banknote](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/banknote/)
- [Golf ball](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/golf-ball/)
- [Paper](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/paper/)
- [Glass](https://atoneplace.net/made-of/glass/)

## Sources

- Official vendor product documentation — At One Place (/about/)