Van Houten
The dutchman Van houten was a 19th century Dutch chocolate maker. He made two very important inventions
for chocolate making.
Hydraulic Press
Van Houten was looking for a better way of removing cocoa butter from the cocoa. At the time cocoa butter
was a waste product, as it produced a fatty scum on the top of drinking chocolate. The current method was to boil the
chocolate mix, and then skim the cocoa butter from the top. Van Houten invented a hydraulic press, which could remove
more of the cocoa butter.
Alkalizing (dutching)
Van Houten also found that by treating the cocoa with potassium or sodium carbonate the miscibility of cocoa in hot water
was greatly improved (although it would still not dissolve). This also weakened the flavour and darkened the resulting drink,
but the end product seemed much better.