Why does american chocolate taste different?
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Melissa:I'm Melissa.
Jam:I'm Jam.
Melissa:And I'm a chemist.
Jam:And I'm not.
Melissa:And welcome to Chemistry For Your Life.
Jam:The podcast helps you understand the chemistry of your everyday life.
Melissa:Okay. So this week, as promised, we are going to talk about why American chocolate tastes different than chocolate in other parts of the world.
Jam:Okay. Interesting.
Melissa:And I think this took me on a really interesting journey that I didn't expect.
Jam:Nice.
Melissa:So I wanna give a shout out to, a friend of the show, Ashley m. She's both of our friends. I guess her. She got married, so Ashley m dash z. Of ours that we know in real life, but she has been listening to the show, and she's currently living abroad.
Melissa:And I think that's how how she was exposed to this, and she sent me an article about it. Yes. From the Royal society of chemistry, they have a podcast. It's it's a pretty good podcast. It's called Chemistry World, and it's short, like, 5 minute clips on different molecules
Jam:and
Melissa:the roles they play. And so she learned about this thing about chocolate and sent it to me, and it was an awesome resource. So
Jam:Nice. Very cool.
Melissa:Ashley for that. And that is probably my main source in terms of the chocolate aspect of today's episode, but I did have other sources for other things as well, they didn't cite their sources, but the Royal Society of Chemistry is generally very reputable. So I would be surprised if this information was inaccurate.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:But just wanted to give them kudos because that was a really good podcast, and it was very interesting to listen to. And I'm excited to share some of that with you today.
Jam:So So I'm guessing that this the answer to this question is gonna be more complicated than just America likes to Likes to have great profit margins, so we like to make things cheaper and less good and then still sell them for Same price. And so we're like
Melissa:a little more complicated.
Jam:Okay. I can see it being like, yeah. This there's some chocolate in this chocolate bar. And there's also then there's also brown food coloring. And
Melissa:No. I don't think so. It's a little more complicated than that. I don't think there's brown food going.
Jam:I was thinking, like, what what else could it be? Like, there's all like, lots of candies have, like, Something gum in it, like, there's just, like, some weird
Melissa:Xanthan gum. Yeah.
Jam:Yeah. Mhmm. That, like, seems like a filler kind of thing, and then it's like one of it's like, yeah. We have, Quote, unquote chocolate bars
Melissa:here in the US. It's just for chocolate. But I think you'll be surprised
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:Buy this. Okay. So there's one key ingredient that gives milk chocolate in America a distinct flavor that's different than other chocolate manufacturers in the world.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:That ingredient is butyric acid.
Jam:Okay. Petric acid.
Melissa:Okay. So Doesn't
Jam:sound very tasty.
Melissa:No. It doesn't sound very tasty, but it's actually in a lot of foods that we like, like fermented foods. So it actually is around a lot.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:Butyric acid has a functional group on the end. We've talked about functional groups a lot.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:They are atoms that are arranged in a specific way that function consistently, and so we call them functional groups.
Jam:Right. Right. Right.
Melissa:Right. And this one has a carboxylic acid functional group, which means it has a carbon with a double bond gin, and then on the other side, it has a carbon bonded to an o h group.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:The carbon has oxygen on one side, oxygen and hydrogen on the other, and then a long chain of carbons on the other side or a short chain of carbon on the other side or whatever it wants on the other side.
Jam:K. Okay.
Melissa:Okay. So this particular one, butyric, has 4 carbons on it. Okay. It has a distinctly sour smell. In one of my resources that that just kind of goes through different molecules, it basically thed, it's described as a colorless liquid with a penetrating and unpleasant odor.
Melissa:And it's in a class of compounds known as short chain fatty acids.
Jam:K.
Melissa:So the acid part comes from that carboxylic acid functional group. It has a relatively acidic proton. And the fatty part is carbon chains with hydrogens on them, that's a fat, generally.
Jam:Mhmm. Mhmm.
Melissa:And it's a short chain fatty acid because it's only 4 carbons. So it's shorter than if it were, say, 15 carbons.
Jam:Right. Okay.
Melissa:So that's butyric acid, short chain fatty acid. If it loses that the acidic proton that makes it an acid, it becomes butyrate, which is a negatively charged ion.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:So a lot of times I found in the literature that butyric acid and butyrate were sort of used, not quite interchangeably, but usually if butyric acid is present, and then it seems like if it goes into the body, it'll very quickly turn into the butyrate. So I'm gonna say butyric acid, but sometimes the thing that's functioning is actually the butyrate in the situation of being in your body or whatever.
Jam:Okay. Okay.
Melissa:Okay. So for butyric acid, the odor in small doses is actually sometimes kind of pleasant. So cheese has butyric acid in it sometimes.
Jam:Nice. Okay.
Melissa:But in high concentrations like in rotten butter, it's not pleasant.
Jam:Okay. Got it.
Melissa:But there's more to butyric acid than just, like, weird smells and tastes and being in chocolate.
Jam:Mhmm.
Melissa:Short chain fatty acids are actually, in general, pretty good for you. So you may have heard that dietary fiber is good for you. Have you heard that before?
Jam:Yes. I feel like I have heard that, but not really explained. But I feel like in general here, like, the word fiber is just a good thing normally.
Melissa:Yeah. Yeah. So the reason fiber is good for you, what they think is it has been demonstrated to reduce risk of metabolic disease, and they believe that the benefits are likely due to the increase of a short chain fatty acids when you have an increase of fiber in your diet.
Jam:Oh, interesting.
Melissa:Like butyric acid.
Jam:Uh-huh. Uh-huh.
Melissa:And that's also why some fermented foods are considered to be good for us because they have those short chain fatty acids.
Jam:Oh, interesting. Mhmm. And, also some some fermented foods end up having, like, more, like, probiotics and stuff like that. And then 2 which I don't really know how much about, but that seems to be a different also positive thing about those foods.
Melissa:Well, and probiotics are highly associated with gut health, so let's talk about that.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:Butyric acid is a key modulator, so it helps regulate the immune system in the intestinal tract and in the lungs.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:It also helps maintain the lining. The there most of our gut is lined with mucus, and butyric acid helps maintain the mucus lining.
Jam:Okay. Okay.
Melissa:It's shown to possibly be useful in treating IBS.
Jam:Mhmm.
Melissa:It may help reduce colon cancer instances.
Jam:K.
Melissa:It's being looked into on how healthy levels of butyric acid and other short chain fatty acids could help with regulating sleep.
Jam:No. Wow.
Melissa:I know I could go on and on, but the most exciting one that I found, I thought, was in June 20 of in June was in June 2020, there was a paper that suggested treating both the intestine and possibly the lungs with butyric acid could help in regulating, or maybe mitigating is a better word, some side effects of COVID nineteen.
Jam:Wow. Weird.
Melissa:Because part of what happens when we get COVID is our immune system responds, and it responds so strongly that sometimes it can do a little bit of damage to your mucus linings and stuff like that. So giving some butyric acid, which helps maintain the mucous linings, could help both possibly in your lungs and in your gut.
Jam:Interesting. Okay.
Melissa:I know. I mean, I didn't see them actually have trials for it. They basically just posted a paper that said, this should help with this, so this is recommended as a possible treatment, and that was it. And it was in June of 2020, so I didn't get to learn much more about it, but it was super interesting.
Jam:So wait. So are you saying that For some reason, chocolate in the US, milk chocolate in the US has more of that than in other places?
Melissa:Well, in other places, it doesn't have butyric acid at all.
Jam:Oh, really?
Melissa:Yeah. So that was what I was about to get to. This is all fascinating. Oh, no. That's great.
Melissa:You're right on track with my outline
Jam:Yeah. I was like, this is all very cool, but why?
Melissa:Yes. I literally have the question written, what does this have to do chocolate.
Jam:Okay. Okay. Got it. Got it.
Melissa:Good job. You anticipated my direction. So milk chocolate requires milk.
Jam:Mhmm.
Melissa:And in the early 1900 when chocolate was becoming popular, there was not a lot of options to transport milk in refrigerated systems. And in America, dairy farms and chocolate manufacturers were not close together the way they are oftentimes in Europe.
Jam:Okay.
Melissa:So back then, chocolate manufacturers would let milk go bad, basically, in a safe way, and therefore, it'd be more stable for transport, which is not that crazy. It sounds a little gross, but we do fermented dairy in other situations a lot, like yogurt and cheese. You know? But But
Jam:just slightly fermented already
Melissa:slightly fermented already, basically, they just let it break down a little bit so that it can be more stable for transport.
Jam:Interesting. Interesting.
Melissa:So Milton Hershey, founder of Hershey Company Mhmm. Figured out a way. It's actually a trade secret, so we don't know exactly what he did. Mhmm. But he treated milk with butyric acid so the milk would be stabilized and easier for transport, and that gave the chocolate the distinct tangy, sour ish flavor Mhmm.
Melissa:That is in Hershey's chocolate.
Jam:Mhmm.
Melissa:And many of us Americans really don't recognize it at all because it just seems like chocolate to us. That's what we've had our whole lives.
Jam:Right.
Melissa:And so, actually, other companies who aren't Hershey, who don't know the trade secret, who don't treat their milk with butyric acid, add butyric acid into their chocolate so that it has that American chocolate flavor.
Jam:Interesting. Weird. So it really just solve a problem, and then there's a benefits from it. And it became ubiquitous because, Here in the US, we you know, Hershey obviously became a massive name. It's like, we love our chocolate.
Jam:And now other Places try to replicate that because for many of us, it's what chocolate is supposed to taste like.
Melissa:Right.
Jam:Weird.
Melissa:But to Europeans, that makes them think American chocolate tastes literally like vomit, which it's not far from the truth because butyric acid is present in vomit. I felt very excited when I learned this because I've always felt that blue cheese smells a little bit like baby spit up, and, that's because it does. So that was exciting for me. Yeah.
Jam:Yeah. Very much so. I have smelled baby spit up So much, obviously, the past year, and that slight sourness has become a very normal smell of my daily life now. But it's funny how is not that different from some foods and stuff like that. It's kinda funny.
Melissa:Right. And there is butyric acid in breast milk, so that absolutely makes sense that there is that smell to spit up. And there's butyric acid in our gut, so that is why there's a little bit of that that smell in our in our vomit.
Jam:Yeah. Interesting.
Melissa:So there that's it. That's why American chocolate to non Americans quite literally tastes a little bit like vomit.
Jam:Wow. And there's still a mystery to it because at least in terms of the The we know kinda why, but knowing the exact way that Hershey figured that out Is obviously kept under lock and key for them. So Interesting, dude. That's crazy.
Melissa:And it does they know the process that it causes the milk to go through, but I felt like that was a little too complicated for today, and I was way more excited about all the stuff that butyric acid does. Yeah. Because when I first read about this, I thought that sounds disgusting. Why do we do it? And then reading this and all these other things that butyric acid can do, it's like, oh, actually, I guess this is Yeah.
Melissa:This is kind of good that it's in the chocolate. Although, I now can't stop thinking about that. I tried to have some milk chocolate the other day, and Mhmm. I'd already been moving towards dark, but after Yeah. Learning this, I'm a little bit over it.
Jam:Yeah. So does does dark so say you got, like, a dark chocolate bar from Hershey's, would it still have some of that milk in it? Just a lot less?
Melissa:I don't know because the way they treat the milk means that they don't put butyric acid on the label. The milk is on the label. So I can't figure out what chocolate has butyric acid and what chocolate doesn't.
Jam:But does a Hershey's chocolate bar just have some a Hershey's dark chocolate bar, Does it still have some milk in it? Is my question
Melissa:because it so.
Jam:If so, then we could probably assume that it has butyric acid just less in less milk too.
Melissa:Yeah.
Jam:But I've wondered about that because, obviously, it's not like dark chocolate is just a 100% Chocolate dissolved cacao solids like we talked about Right. Couple episodes ago, there's still some other things in there. Yeah. It's not just straight up only cacao solids, but, I've
Melissa:had that, and it's not the tastiest thing.
Jam:Yeah. I've had 98% Kakao Salad, and I was like, oh my gosh. I feel like they're, like, 75, 80% is like a sweet spot where
Melissa:Yeah. Yeah.
Jam:Nice and dark, but not not, like, way too intense.
Melissa:But Oh, yeah.
Jam:Interesting. Okay. Wow. And interesting too because I didn't expect you to say that they add it on purpose.
Melissa:I
Jam:know. I thought maybe it was like a natural byproduct of when you started saying that the Dairy farms and the chocolate factories or whatever weren't close together, I thought you're gonna say it just accidentally happened in transit, but that they did it on purpose
Melissa:Mhmm.
Jam:Is very interesting.
Melissa:They did it to control it safely, basically.
Jam:Yeah. I
Melissa:also have a lot of questions because Ghirardelli is probably my favorite chocolate, and I mostly only have their dark chocolates. But they're in America, but owned by a European person or company so I don't know if they have butyric acid in it. And the same thing with the Lind Lindor chocolates.
Jam:Mhmm. Mhmm.
Melissa:I have so many questions. I tried to Google to find out which chocolates had butyric acid and which didn't, and I couldn't find it. So I wanna kind of taste test and see if I can figure out which ones have it and which ones don't because the only milk chocolate I really ever want anymore is the Lindor, those, like, circular truffles,
Jam:you know Oh, yeah. Yeah. Good.
Melissa:So but I even that, I really like the dark chocolate a little bit more now. But I'm I'm just wondering what which ones actually have butyric acid. Could we figure it out? Could we taste it? As Americans, we've had this our whole lives.
Melissa:Would we know the difference?
Jam:Yeah. Interesting. I'm guessing that, like, we could u knowing that Hershey pioneered that, we could probably use them as, like, a, a control. You know? It's like we know for sure that they use it, and that's their proprietary kind of strategy.
Jam:So maybe we could just Have always have a little bit of Hershey's in the house and then compare it and be like, okay. Yeah. Pretty similar.
Melissa:Yeah.
Jam:I also wonder what percentage dark, like, a Hershey's dark chocolate bar is. You know? But who knows?
Melissa:Need to get someone to bring us some European chocolate so that we can really know that there's no butyric sit in this one, and there is in this one, and then check some other American European brands and see what they do to it.
Jam:Yeah. Yeah.
Melissa:I thought it was fascinating. I was very interested, and I thought it was very cool to know that American chocolate really is different. Because I went to Switzerland, and their chocolate was good. So I wonder if I was unknowingly picking up on the lack of butyric acid.
Jam:Yeah. Yeah. Interesting.
Melissa:Well, do you wanna take a stab at telling that back to me?
Jam:Yeah. I feel like I don't have a like, I guess there's an element of that that There's not as much of a chemical process to describe, you know Right. Which are, like, read
Melissa:We didn't go into the molecular interactions as much, we just talked about the molecule and what it does in the chocolate.
Jam:So let me see if I can remember. So, butyric acid
Melissa:Mhmm.
Jam:And it's a short chain fatty acid. Mhmm. And it has The functional group is carboxylic, or what'd you call it?
Melissa:Carboxylic acid.
Jam:Okay. Okay. K. And oh, man. It has carbon, Oxygen, hydrogen, and then a carbon chain off of it?
Melissa:Very close. It has carbon, oxygen hydrogen, and then it also has carbon double bonded to oxygen. Carbon likes 4
Jam:bonds. Okay.
Melissa:So there's 2 bonds to 1 oxygen, one bond to another to gen that has a hydrogen coming off of it, almost like an alcohol group, and then a carbon chain as the fourth thing.
Jam:Okay. Okay. So it's hard for me to remember, especially, like I try to visualize it while you're saying it, but then I also try not to take notes and just see what sticks with me. And Mhmm. Those can get lost easily.
Jam:But, Basically, it sounds like the gist of that is that, one, it's a functional group, so we see it at other places, but the carbon chain can be longer or shorter. Right? Mhmm. And something about this being a short chain fatty acid, it has a lot of benefits in our body in a lot of different places. So, for our gut health, for our lungs, it has been known to be good for specific, like, recurring problems like IBS or whatever else or
Melissa:Right.
Jam:Even more recently with COVID. And then that, like, that actually is in a lot of our foods already to a degree Mhmm. And has a discernible Kind of smell or tasting note if there's a lot of it present, especially. Yes. Which is interesting to think about because I think many of us, we think of our foods as, like, it's all one taste.
Jam:You know? Mhmm. But to think like, oh, yeah. What's a comparison I can make between cheese and yogurt and chocolate or something like that. Like Mhmm.
Jam:Oh, yeah. They all have a little bit of a tinge of this in it. It's It's kinda interesting to think about to parse out the different flavors we we taste when we eat that kind of stuff or smell it. And that is in our milk chocolate here in the US, especially in Hershey milk chocolate, on purpose because back in the day, Moving milk from a to b without good refrigeration was very hard, and so they solved it by Letting the milk ferment slightly so it is more stable to be able to transport in a not super cold truck.
Melissa:Right?
Jam:And they did that by adding putyric acid on purpose, Somehow that helps with the process of
Melissa:I think they didn't always do it. I think Hershey figured that out, so other people were doing it other ways, and he figured out the butyric acid specifically.
Jam:Okay. Got it. So everybody had that same challenge, but he they uniquely Figure it out that butyric acid helped. And Yes. And to the point of, like, this is a secret.
Jam:We're not telling people.
Melissa:Mhmm. Trade secret was the word thrown around. Man.
Jam:Dude, that's crazy. They're an empire. I've been to Pennsylvania multiple times, and it is they're an empire.
Melissa:I would love to go. I did a independent study on chocolate in 8th grade.
Jam:Oh, nice. Dude, that'd be cool. I didn't actually go to Hershey, but my town is called Hershey in Pennsylvania. But it's
Melissa:And they have a hockey team there. Yeah. The Hershey Bears.
Jam:And there's like a almost like amusement park kind of thing there. Hershey Park. But it's kinda nuts. I mean, I feel like also there's What's funny about that is that certainly they move the dial the ball forward in terms of, like, advancements in chocolate stuff or whatever. But also they're kind of regarded depending on who you talk to is not the best because Mhmm.
Jam:They're like, oh, I want a really pure you know, Not a lot of stuff added to it, chocolate bar. And so people kind of don't think of her. She is very It's what they want depending on what they're going for. Not stating opinion on that.
Melissa:I'll state an opinion. I pretty much only use Hershey uns Morris now. I've moved away from Hershey's chocolate. Like, if somebody gives me a chocolate bar, I'm not gonna turn my nose up at it, but it's not my go to at this time.
Jam:Well yeah. And the tough thing is that Hershey is a massive company who make things like Reese's and all kinds of Other really good chocolatesque things that I do love. So Mhmm. You know, hard to
Melissa:harden a the bar. That's not my go to. I just get some Gear Deli usually.
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:Not sponsored them. But, hey, if you guys want to, we'll take free chocolate all day to talk about how much we like you.
Jam:Totally. And also, Trader Joe's has a that great massive dark chocolate bar that's, Like, fair trade and all that stuff in Trader Joe's. If you want to send us some chocolate, we'll take that also.
Melissa:Oh, yeah. Your wife loves Trader Joe's more than Yeah. More than anything.
Jam:My wife would be a spokesperson for Trader Joe's for free. She would not require any payment. She just loves Trader Joe's that much. I guess she basically already is doing that. So yeah.
Melissa:She is. She she makes me believe in Trader Joe's.
Jam:Yep. Please put 1 indenture, Jess, if you're listening, please.
Melissa:Please. We'd love it. You have so many great flowers.
Jam:Mhmm.
Melissa:Okay. So now back back to our regularly scheduled programming. Yeah. So that wraps up our chocolate series. Somehow on accident, April became chocolate month, but, hey, this has been really fun.
Melissa:So I'm glad we did it.
Jam:Me too.
Melissa:And, Jim, do you have anything from fun from your week that you wanna share about?
Jam:Yes. I do. I have a small one. I was able to, this past week, Get kinda back into some, like, a project mode on our house a little bit. We've we're constantly working on it and trying to, you know, get things really need to go and Stefan, it's a movie target.
Jam:But I like whenever there's things that are kinda fun to do, which not everything about working in your house is fun. And so I put up some new address numbers this past week. Oh,
Melissa:Oh, yeah. They've been missing for a while now.
Jam:Yeah. They were missing when they come down, and then we didn't we had tried to do too much in one day, and so we didn't Get to then resume that until later, and then I 1 night after I put Ezra to down to go to sleep for the night, I worked on that. And then then just last night, I worked on changing out the sconces outside of our house And replacing them with some new ones we we'd gotten. And, and that was fun. I always liked doing light fixture kinda stuff.
Jam:Just fun. I mentioned that as, like, my happy thing probably, like, you know, 11 months ago.
Melissa:Definitely talked about it before.
Jam:Yeah. So that was kinda fun. And I just love, I think, whenever it works and then you go turn the breaker back on and everything works, and you're like, sweet. New light. And it worked, and I Did it.
Jam:So
Melissa:And I did it. Yeah. That always feels really good when you're like, that was me. I did that.
Jam:It was pretty fun. This one was a little more dicey because Behind one of the sconces had become, a home for geckos on
Melissa:our house Yeah.
Jam:Which is a normal thing in Texas. Those are pretty common, and they love to hang out outside. And if they can find a little place and hang out, they will. But I was like, You guys can come back here if you want, but I need you guys to get out of here right now because I'm gonna be moving things around and taking things off, screwing things in. And I don't wanna be like, 1, hurting you guys.
Jam:And, also, 2, that it always spooks me. They're not scary at all. But when something suddenly crawls out of a No matter what it is, that always makes me jump. And so
Melissa:Oh, yeah.
Jam:It was a little dicier than than the last Light fixture had changed out. But,
Melissa:anyway fun.
Jam:That was fun. It worked. It wasn't a huge headache, and it was rewarding. So that was my Happy thing. What about you?
Melissa:Well, I think probably my happy thing is going to be, I watched a TV show called Ted Lasso.
Jam:Yes. Heard of this.
Melissa:And it was hilarious and very uplifting, and I feel like it sent a good message about trying to be kind no matter what other people throw at you and trying to look on the bright side of things, but still being a flawed human and apologizing quickly and just demonstrated a lot of values that I appreciate. So
Jam:Yeah.
Melissa:And I watch it with some friends, and that was fun. Now that we're all getting vaccinated, we're able to spend more time together in person without masks on in our homes, which feels like such a treat. And so I think that's my happy thing for the week is that I watched Head Lasso, and it really brought me joy. So thanks to my roommate, Nicole, we also happen to be recording on her birthday today.
Jam:Mhmm.
Melissa:So that's kinda fun. So happy birthday, Nicole, and thanks for convincing me to watch Ted Lasso, it was really fun and brightened up my week, and I hope other people can also have their weeks brightened up by it.
Jam:Nice. Nice.
Melissa:And thanks to all of you guys for hanging with us for this chocolate series. I had a great time. I thought it was really fun. So and thanks to Renee and Ashley for sending in questions and sharing information with us because you guys really make this podcast work. So thank you guys so much for taking part in it.
Jam:And thank you for teaching us Melissa and taking us on this 3 part journey. We've got a lot of ideas just like chocolate of topics of chemistry in everyday life But we wanna hear your ideas and things that you wonder about. So you can reach out to us on Gmail, Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook at Kim for your life. That's Kim, f o r, your life to share your thoughts and ideas. If you like to help us keep our show going and contribute to cover the cost of making it, go to kodashfi.com/chem for your life, And don't at the cost of a cup of coffee.
Jam:And don't forget, from now until the end of May, if you sign up on our for any amount monthly, Molson, I will send you an exclusive sticker and a note to say thank you. But if you're not able to donate, you can still help us by subscribing on your favorite podcast app in rating and writing our review on Apple Podcasts. That also helps us to share chemistry with even more people.
Melissa:This episode of Chemistry For Your Life was created by Melissa Colini and Jam Robinson. References for this episode can be found in our show notes or on our website. Jame Robinson is our producer, and we'd like to give a special thanks to A. Kewasong and In Newell who reviewed this episode.
