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Almost everybody eats Cocoa butter at some point, and a lot of people rub it all over their bodies, too. But what is it exactly, and is it healthy?
First of all, this "butter" doesn't come from a cow. Rather, along with cocoa powder, it is one of the two major products made from the cocoa bean. After farmers extract Cocoa Beans from the inside of a larger, fleshy cocoa fruit, the beans are cleaned, roasted and then pressed in hydraulic machinery, oozing forth cocoa butter. After the cocoa butter is extracted, the remaining solids are processed into cocoa powder.
Cocoa butter and powder, separated at birth, are reunited to make chocolate, along with sugar and milk, according to taste. That is, most of the ingredients for necessary for chocolate are present in the cocoa bean in the first place, which is a bit unusual – imagine making apple pie using only apples and their seeds.