The day that supermarket shelves inhabited by chocolate become emptied, I shall, unabashed, organize a requiem. Trivial you say for a grown woman to cry over? Well, forget me and my fear of being widowed by chocolate. The Mars company, probably the largest chocolate manufacturer in the world, was gripped by such fear a few years ago that in 2008, they decided to do something about it.
I just read in the Washington Post last Sept. 15 that the Mars company, in partnership with IBM, would have, by the end of this year, finished sequencing the DNA of chocolate — the complete chocolate genome. This means that they have identified all the genes that make up chocolate. Knowing the chocolate genome is the mother of all chocolate recipes since knowing the genes responsible for the myriads of traits — sweetness, acidity, texture, fat content etc. — that makes chocolate what it is will help, not only in balancing these traits but most importantly to save chocolate from impending death.
What death, you ask? In the 1980s, a fungus called witches’ broom plagued the cacao trees of Brazil, once one of the largest producers of cacao. It wiped out an industry. A fungus could hitch a ride through a careless tourist, through the winds that cross the Atlantic to Africa (West Africa is the largest cacao producer in the world now). It could even be carried by someone who thinks they can win some victory for humanity by intentionally wiping out cacao. That is why the sequencing of the chocolate genome three years ahead of schedule is a lifesaver.
When the chocolate genome is completed, like the human genome, it will be available online for free to all who know what to do with all that information. The Mars company is sharing that information to all those who can make use of all that data. This information could be used to re-engineer cacao trees to make them more resistant to infestations like the witches’ broom. This is no different from what rice researchers are doing since they have been able to sequence the rice genome earlier.
Chocolate has been found out to be tied with moods. But the studies I have read over the years seem to always shy away from definite statements about what really is the relationship between chocolate and mood. Chocolate contains substances that will freak out drug enforcement units if they did not occur in such minute traces per serving. I think you would have to eat vats of cacao to be on their Most Wanted List but not before the people from Talentadong Pinoy contact you to be in their show.
But out of labs into the private corners of PMSing women, or in a buffet of chocolate desserts that make me wish that if there were a heaven that it be made of chocolate, or having the worst day of your life and being handed a chocolate by a sympathetic stranger at the airport, there are hardly any more candidates for a more universal flavor currency for peace on earth and goodwill to all.
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