Swiss chocolate
Brought from North America to Europe by Hernán Cortés in 1528, cocoa beans and chocolate finally reached Switzerland in the 17th century.
However, most of the chocolate made at the time was mainly the work of Italian and French migrant artisans, active in Ticino (Val Blenio) and Vaud.
[3] At that time, chocolate was essentially consumed as a drink and transport of cocoa beans was slow and difficult, therefore making the product very expensive.
They migrated throughout Europe and created a network of small shops and cafés, where chocolate was sold and could be consumed.
[5] Earlier, in 1819, a chocolatier from the Val Blenio, Giovanni Martino Bianchini, founded a factory in Turin (Italy) which would be used by Caffarel.
[13] Shortly after, in 1826, another Swiss chocolatier, Philippe Suchard, opened a chocolate factory in Neuchâtel where he developed a millstone machine to mix sugar and cocoa: the melanger, which is still used today.
[11] Before opening his factory, Suchard realized that a small tablet sold at a pharmacy was worth three days' wages.
[18] In 1875, the Swiss entrepreneur Daniel Peter, based in Vevey and related to the Cailler family, first successfully combined cocoa mass, cocoa butter, and sugar with condensed milk, recently created by his neighbour and friend Henri Nestlé, to produce milk chocolate.
[20] Meanwhile, the chocolate industry was again revolutionized by another Swiss chocolatier, Rodolphe Lindt from Bern, who developed conching in 1879.
[22] Upon returning to the device, Lindt recognised the final product to have different properties to conventionally produced chocolate at the time, with a less granular texture and greater shine than conventional chocolate at the time, which was generally gritty when solidified owing to the presence of non-ideal cocoa butter crystals.
[25] In 1898, Cailler opened its new factory at Broc, where milk chocolate began to be produced on a large scale.
[25] The same year, Suchard launched the Milka brand; Carl Russ-Suchard had previously developed a first milk bar in 1896.
[24] The chocolate industry also expanded in the late nineteenth century with the establishment of new companies, such as Frey and Tobler.
[29] To meet these demands, cocoa production expanded, notably in West Africa, where the Forastero variety began to be mass cultivated in the early twentieth century.
[30] Although considered inferior to the Criollo variety, the Forastero type bean is more suited for the manufacture of milk chocolate and is cheaper to produce owing to its higher yields.
This favoured the implantation of large factories (as well as new populations of workers) in the countryside, where abundant fresh milk supplies are readily available.
[33] The Union libre des fabricants suisses de chocolat ("free association of Swiss chocolate manufacturers") was founded in 1901.
In addition to being popular, hazelnut specialties (like gianduja) help minimize the amount of cocoa, historically an expensive ingredient, in the finished product.
[40][41] In 1901, Swiss chocolate producers created the Union libre des fabricants suisses de chocolat.
Some of the largest are the Lindt Home of Chocolate in Kilchberg,[43] the Maison Cailler in Broc and the Maestrani's Chocolarium in Flawil.
