Drinking chocolate was initially very much the drink of the Catholic aristocracy and became associated in the minds of the Protestants North with the idle rich.
It was not until 1657 however, that cocoa was introduced to England. It became a trend in London in the 1700s; English will added milk to the chocolate and served after dinner.
In the eighteenth century chocolate started to become available to more classes of society with the establishment of chocolate houses in London.
The eighteenth century also saw the English mixing brick dust with their chocolate to thicken it, a habit that was stopped in 1727 when Nicholas Sanders mixed chocolate with milk creating the first hot chocolate.
In 1828, Dutch chemist, Coenraad Johannes Van Houten, invented the way forward by extracting the butterfat (cocoa butter) from the bean therefore making the drink smooth and tastier.
In 1926 Hershey capitalized in the soda fountain and ice cream parlor boom by marketing cocoa syrup, renamed chocolate syrup in time to compete with Bosco Chocolate Syrup for hearts and wallets of the baby boomers of the post-World War II generation.
Cocoa drinks in Europe
