Health effects of chocolate no medical or regulatory authority has approved any health claim. "Theobroma cacao", the cacao tree, produces seeds containing flavanols. The seeds have been used to make beverages for some 2000 years in Aztec, Olmec, and Maya civilizations in central and south America. The drinks were ascribed a wide variety of curative and stimulant properties, unsupported by experimental evidence. In the 19th century, chocolate as a solid was invented, and milk and sugar were added to create milk chocolate, high in fat and sugar. Doubtful research, sometimes funded by the chocolate industry, has at times made suggestions of possible health benefits
Theobroma cacao Albert Eckhout shows a wild cacao tree in mid-seventeenth century Dutch Brazil. The Nahuatl-derived Spanish word "cacao" entered scientific nomenclature in 1753 after the Swedish naturalist Linnaeus published his taxonomic binomial system and coined the genus and species "Theobroma cacao". Traditional pre-Hispanic beverages made with cacao are still consumed in Mesoamerica. These include the Oaxacan beverage known as "tejate". In 2016, cocoa beans were cultivated on roughly worldwide. Cocoa beans are grown by large agroindustrial plantations and small producers, the bulk of production coming from millions of farmers with small plots. A tree begins to bear when it is four