intoxicating: the Indians esteem it above
everything, wherever they are accustomed
to it.Benzoni and other visitors reported that the
Maya and Aztecs flavored their chocolate
drinks with a number of different ingredients,
including aromatic flowers, vanilla, chilli,
wild honey, and achiote (p. 423). The
Europeans then began to add their own
flavorings, among them sugar, cinnamon,
cloves, anise, almonds, hazel-nuts, vanilla,
orange-flower water, and musk. According to
the English Jesuit Thomas Gage, they dried
the cocoa beans and spices, ground them up
and mixed them together, and heated them to
melt the cocoa butter and form a paste. Then
they scraped the paste onto a large leaf or
piece of paper, allowed it to solidify, and then
peeled it off as a large tablet. According to
Gage, there were several ways of preparing
chocolate, both hot and cold.