The Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian’s “Power of Chocolate” festival will be held on Saturday, March 28 and Sunday, March 29 from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. daily. This celebration of culture, music, art, science and food explores the rich history and ongoing story of chocolate and includes an assortment of presentations including experts sharing the cultivation and cultural use of cacao in Mexico and showing the imagery of cacao in Mesoamerican pottery.
Visitors will learn about the healing, scientific and medicinal properties of chocolate, and deepen their understanding of the cultures and communities that have cultivated this valuable crop. Families and young visitors will also have a chance to experience hands-on activities as they make a Mayan cacao rattle, create a vase using cacao glyphs and images, hear traditional marimba music with GuateMarimba, see how to make Guatemalan chocolate cups, or grind cacao beans on a lava stone metate along with spices used in ancient hot chocolate beverage recipes with Rodney Snyder and staff from Mars Chocolate North America during their “From Blossom to Beverage” presentation. Visitors will be able to sample a hot chocolate beverage—American Heritage Chocolate—following the presentation.
“This program will teach the real history of chocolate, beyond the confection we know today and allows visitors to understand the Native origins,” said museum director, Kevin Gover (Pawnee). “It is one of the many foods that were introduced from the Americas to the world, along with pumpkins, corn, vanilla and many other foods.”
Join the museum’s Mitsitam Cafe’s executive chef Jerome Grant as he demonstrates several dishes including the savory chocolate and adobo brined pork chop, a tasty wild grain bar that is gluten- and nut-free along with a dessert of white chocolate and parsnip ice cream, popped quinoa and a cherry compote. Botanist Diana Xochitl Munn (Mazatec) joins him to add cultural commentary. This event at 11:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. will be live webcast on Saturday only.
The film screening on Saturday, March 28 at 3:30 p.m. in the Rasmuson Theater, will feature “The Chocolate Farmer,” which is a full-length documentary that takes us to an unspoiled corner of southern Belize, where cacao farmer and father Eladio Pop manually works his plantation in the tradition of his Mayan ancestors: as a steward of the land. The film captures a year in the life of the Pop family as they struggle to preserve their values in a world that is dramatically changing around them. Presented in conjunction with the Environmental Film Festival in Our Nation’s Capital.
This program is made possible with in-kind support from American Heritage Chocolate and Mars Chocolate North America. The full schedule is at http://bit.ly/1GMMQKH. Follow us via social media on Facebook or on Twitter @SmithsonianNMAI and use the hastag #PowerofChocolate.
# # #
SI-131A-2015
