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very February, shops around the world create sumptuous chocolate havens for the most romantic holiday of the year. While the main attraction are the sweet confections inside the box, wise retailers know it's the packaging that often sells the product. Note, Godiva's gold boxes, Lula's satin ribbons and See's red hearts. It's a $4-billion industry in the U.S. alone, with the average American consuming a half-pound of chocolate each month. Growing up on a farm, one wouldn't think my dad, the farmer, would even remember such a frilly holiday. But as far back as I can recall, there was always a red heart candy box and a rose for my mother waiting for her on the kitchen counter. I think that's when I start- ed to fancy not only the candy inside, but the box it came in. I loved this holiday. It was a rather girly time of lacey cards, chocolates and childhood crushes. This sweet dark confection has been asso- ciated with love. It contains the substance phenylethylamine, which is the very same aphrodisiac chemical produced by the brain when we are entranced in total bliss and explains why cocoa is so addictive. 1930s films cast Jean Harlow draped in satin, lounging on a bed with a heart-shaped pillow, exuding tender sighs while munching on those sumptuous confections. That wonderful deca- dent era of seduction started with an irresistible box of chocolate. The first mention of St. Valentine's Day as a romantic holiday appeared in the writings of Chaucer in 1382. With the medieval period came an awareness of courtly love, and it is here that we see some of the familiar patterns begin to appear. Knights would give roses to their maidens and celebrate their beauty in songs from afar. But sugar was still a precious commodity in Europe, so there was no talk of exchanging candy gifts. Many modern historians have estimated that chocolate has been around for about 2000 years, but recent research suggests that it may be even older. And although it's difficult to nail down exactly when chocolate was born, it's clear that it was cherished from the start. Anthropologists discovered cacao residue on excavated pottery in Honduras as far back as 1400 B.C., where the sweet pulp of the fruit that surrounds the beans was fermented into an alcoholic beverage. For several centuries in pre-modern Latin America, cacao beans were considered valu- able enough to use as currency. According to a 16th-century Aztec document, one bean could be traded for a tamale, while 100 beans could purchase a fine turkey hen. In America during the Revolutionary War, chocolate was so valued that it was included in soldier's rations and used in lieu of wages. The power and addiction of the cacao bean became a moving economic force. In 1770, Marie Antoinette, upon her mar- riage to Louis XVI, brought her personal chocolate maker to Versailles. The official "Chocolate Maker to the Queen" created such recipes as "chocolate mixed with orchid bulb for strength, chocolate with orange blossom to calm the nerves, or chocolate with sweet almond milk to aid digestion." By the 1840s, the recognition of Valentine's Day as a holiday in cele- bration of romantic love had taken over most of the English-speaking world. It was the golden age of Cupid. The proper Victorians adored the notion of cour tly love and showered each other with elaborate cards and gifts. Into this romance-crazed era came Richard Cadbury, son of a British chocolate manufacturing family and responsible for elevating sales 98 C A R M E L M A G A Z I N E • W I N T E R 2 0 1 7 COLLECTING T E X T A N D P H OTO G R A P H Y B Y M A R J O R I E S N O W Chocolate as Dizzying, Dazzling Eye Candy E COLLECTING Those frayed old paper boxes that lived their life showing off chocolates as if they were precious jewels are now cherished just for their beauty alone, reinforcing the fact that you can judge a box by its cover.