“Over the years we have heard many claims about chocolate – that it gives us migraines and acne; that it contains the same chemical that floods our brains when we fall in love; that it is full of saturated fat, which will clog our arteries; that women regularly treat their PMS with chocolate; that eating chocolate kills dogs and horses; that chocolate is the Prozac of candy. More recently, the positive claims have escalated. Now chocolate is supposed to be good for our hearts; it is even said to decrease the risk of cancer.”

This is food writer for American Vogue, Jeffrey Steingarten, in his 2002 book It Must’ve Been Something I Ate.

As he says, chocolate is getting greatly improved report cards on health grounds. It contains high levels of magnesium, which protects the heart, working with calcium, which builds strong bones, iron, potassium, antioxidants to slow the ageing process and it releases its energy slowly, giving it a low glycemic index of 45-49.

Such considerations, however, probably are not uppermost in our minds when we reach for a piece of chocolate, order a chocolate dessert or curl up with a hot chocolate drink. Still, among the many comforts to be gained from chocolate, is the knowledge that the better its quality the better it is for you.

Paul Richardson in Indulgence says unlike other luxuries, chocolate is always in reach, “the cheapest of cheap thrills”. On the other hand he reserves a piece of Valrhona’s best, Guanaja, “for personal rituals of particular solemnity”.

The difference between a cheap thrill and something to be approached with solemnity can be measured in the amount of cocoa solids in the chocolate. Some “chocolate” has none at all, or a token of cocoa solids from the cacao bean bulked up with cheaper vegetable fats, such as palm or soya oil. This compound chocolate is cheaper and not as temperamental as the real thing, so is easier to work, but it has nothing like the silky feeling of couverture chocolate that melts in the mouth at 22C.

Couverture chocolate has a high percentage of cocoa butter in it. Even white chocolate, which contains no cocoa mass, contains cocoa butter and can be called couverture. Unsweetened and bittersweet chocolate has less sugar than sweet or milk chocolate, to which milk granules have also been added.

We’ve devoted this issue of Provisions entirely to chocolate – growing and processing it, working with it, reading about it, drinking and eating it. We feel it’s a particularly suitable subject for our winter issue. Jeffery Steingarten again, on the trail of perfect drinking chocolate in wintry Paris, says: “. . . really cold unpleasant weather can justify, as I see it, what would ordinarily be considered a nauseating display of gluttony”.

Chocolate goes with… apricots, bananas, cherries, dried fruits, dates, sultanas, raisins, figs, oranges, pears, prunes, almonds, brazil nuts, hazelnuts, macadamias, pecans, pine nuts, pistachio, walnuts, blackcurrants, blueberry, raspberry, strawberry, cognac guinness, muscat. rum, sweet sherry, butter, caramel, cardamom, chestnuts, chilli, cinnamon, coffee, cream, eggs, hare, venison, ginger, honey, ice cream, marzipan, mint, vanilla.

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