Chocolate cake without chocolate? This Cocoa Butter Layer Cake uses pure cacao butter for flavor!
It is a common legend that the cocoa bean was a sacred gift from the Mayan and Aztec Gods. The Mayans were the first civilization to cultivate the cocoa tree called Xocoatl.
Cocoa beans were so important in Mayan civilization, they were also used as currency. I can understand why. When you stop eating chocolate and replace it with cocoa (cacao) butter you really begin to appreciate the purity of this substance.
Cocoa (cacao) butter has a high content of saturated fats mainly derived from stearic and palmitic acids as well as monunsatuated fats from oleic acids.
Cocoa butter is obtained from whole cacao beans, which are fermented, roasted, and then separated from their hulls. About 54 – 58% of the residue is cocoa butter. The Broma process is a process by which the cocoa fat is dripped out of the solid mass leaving the cocoa powder separated out.
Cocoa solids are the low-fat component of chocolate. They may also be called cocoa powder, cocoa, and cacao.
In contrast, the fatty component of chocolate is cocoa butter. Cocoa liquor is the melted combination of cocoa butter and cocoa solids.
Cocoa solids are what lends a chocolate bar its characteristic flavor and color, while cocoa butter is what provides smoothness and a low melting point. Also, cocoa solids contain most of the antioxidants associated with chocolate.
Cocoa solids also contain the greatest concentration of the psychoactive chemicals caffeine and theobromine, which are mostly absent in the cocoa butter.
For those who wish to avoid sugars and starches, pure, food grade cocoa butter (preferably organic) is the way to go.
It is a treat from the gods.
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