Food Category Details

Cocoa mixes (powders) and cocoa mass/cake (05.1.1)

Description:
Includes a variety of products that are used in the manufacture of other chocolate products or in the preparation of cocoa-based beverages. Most cocoa products have their origin in the cocoa nib, which is obtained from cocoa beans that have been cleaned and freed from the shells. Cocoa mass is obtained from the mechanical disintegration of the nib. Depending on the desired finished chocolate product, the cocoa nib or mass may be treated by an alkalinization process that mellows the flavor. Cocoa dust is the fraction of the cocoa bean produced as a product during winnowing and degerming. Cocoa powder is produced by reducing the fat content of cocoa mass or liquor by pressing (including expeller pressing) and molding into a cocoa press cake. The cocoa press cake is disintegrated and ground to cocoa powder. Cocoa liquor is a homogeneous flowing paste produced from the cocoa nib, which has been roasted, dried, disintegrated and milled. Cocoa-sugar mixtures contain only cocoa powder and sugar. Chocolate powder for beverages is made from cocoa liquor or cocoa powder and sugar to which flavouring (e.g. vanillin) may be added.^1,2 Examples include: drinking chocolate powder; breakfast cocoa; cocoa dust (fines), nibs, mass, press cake; chocolate liquor; cocoa mixes (powders for preparing the hot beverage); cocoa-sugar mixture; and dry mixes for sugar-cocoa confectionery. Finished cocoa beverages and chocolate milk are included in category 01.1.4, and most finished chocolate products are included in category 05.1.4.

This page provides information on the food additive provisions that are acceptable for use in foods conforming to the food category.

Items in uppercase (e.g. PHOSPHATES) refer to food additive groups.