Is Cacao a fruit?

Answer 1

Description Of the Cacao Plant

The cocoa tree takes five years to grow into a tree that gives fruit. Cocoa trees grow to a height of 50 feet but, to make harvesting easier, they are usually pruned back to a height of 20 feet. They are in leaf continuously; blossom, unripe fruit and also mature fruit can be seen on the branches at the same time. The leaves are long and slender and grow separated on the branches. It has fragile branches that are not able hold the weight of the fruit.

The first blossoms begin to appear after about two years—delicate pink and yellowish-white blossom petals. The blossoms sit right on the trunk of the tree. They look like orchids. When cacao leaves fall, they mix with the leaves of other plants and decay on the forest floor. In the decaying leaves breed midges, the little flies that pollinate cacao flowers. Without these little flies the flower would not be pollinated to form fruit.

Unlike most fruit that grows on the branches, cacao pods grow directly on the trunk of the tree. They give fruit three to four times a year.
The hard, coarse shell changes from green to yellow, and then to a reddish brown. Inside the fruit is a white sweet pulp and arranged in five rows are between 20 and 40 almond-shaped bitter cocoa seeds. These seeds are the ones used to make chocolate.

Unlike many other plants, the cacao tree has no way to release its own seeds and must rely on animals to do the work. The pods’ skins are so thick that they do not open naturally to release their seeds. Instead, pods rely on the lure of their sweet pulp to attract animals. Birds and mammals looking for a quick meal pierce the pod’s tough hide to get at the delicious sweet pulp inside and discard the bitter-tasting seeds.

The cacao tree can flourish only in the hottest regions of the world, but the young plants in particular need lots of shade. Delicate seedlings are easily sunburned, and so they must have direct cover from larger trees in the rainforest canopy. The cocoa trees develops under the shade of other large tropical forest trees. In farms they may be under or banana or coconut trees. They need 80+ inches of rain, and high humidity.

Answer 2

The cacao pod is the fruit of the tree. Cocoa & chocolate is made from the fermented seed or "bean" inside the cacao pod. I think that the seed would be considered a nut since it is not the fruit of the tree.

Answer 3

Cacao is cultivated on over 70,000 km² (27,000 mi²) international. Hershey's produces 40% of international cacao, Nestle and Mars each and each produce approximately 15%. A Cacao tree starts to bear while that's 4 or 5 years old. in one 300 and sixty 5 days, while mature, it ought to have 6,000 plant existence, yet only approximately 20 pods. approximately 3 hundred-600 seeds (10 pods) are required to offer around a million kg (2.2 lb) of cocoa paste. Cocoa is the dried and partly fermented fatty seed of the cacao tree from which chocolate is made. "Cocoa" can usually additionally consult with the drink usually conventional as warm chocolate, cocoa powder, the dry powder made by ability of grinding cocoa seeds and removing the cocoa butter from the dark, bitter cocoa solids; or it ought to consult with the mixture of the two cocoa powder and cocoa butter jointly. Processing The harvested pods are opened with a machete, the pulp and cocoa seeds are bumped off and the rind is discarded. The pulp and seeds are then piled in thousands, placed in packing containers, or laid out on grates for quite a few days. in this time, the seeds and pulp undergo "sweating", the place the thick pulp liquefies because it ferments. The fermented pulp trickles away, leaving cocoa seeds at the back of to be accumulated. Sweating is significant for the traditional of the beans, which initially have a good bitter flavor. If sweating is interrupted, the ensuing cocoa would be ruined; if underdone the cocoa seed keeps a flavor equivalent to uncooked potatoes and could become liable to mildew. The liquefied pulp is utilized by ability of a few cocoa producing international places to distill alcoholic spirits. The fermented beans are dried by ability of spreading them out over a huge floor and continually raking them. In super plantations, it incredibly is completed on extensive trays under the solar or by ability of utilising man made warmth. Small plantations would dry their harvest on little trays or on cowhides. finally, the beans are trodden and shuffled approximately (usually utilising bare human feet) and on occasion, in this technique, purple clay mixed with water is sprinkled over the beans to acquire a finer color, polish, and risk-free practices against molds for the period of shipment to factories interior of u.s., the Netherlands, uk, and different international places. Drying in the solar is best to drying by ability of synthetic ability, as no extraneous flavors which includes smoke or oil are presented that may in any different case taint the flavour.

Answer 4

No. Its a bean that grows from a tree i think it makes chocolate too. It has fruit on it

Answer 5

No, it's a tree, but it has fruit pods on it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cacao

http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&q=Cacao&btnG=Search+Images&gbv=2

Answer 6

Yes it is.Evenif its used to make chocolate it is eaten at different parts of Asia and South Africa.

Answer 7

yes it is the fruit of the coco tree

Answer 8

I think it is. I think it grows on a tree, and is later turned into cocoa powder and chocolate somehow.

Answer 9

Yes.

Answer 10

Actually I think that it is a bean or a nut