The Chocolate Museum: an option to taste

Chocolate MuseumInspired in the Royal Museum of the Real Square in Brussels, Belgium, and born thanks to the support of Madame Jo Draps, its director, this singular place in Havana offers a tour through the history of cacao, its harvesting, production and commercialization.

In panels placed in the museum’s rooms are exhibited texts with the history of the chocolate, from its discovery by the Spaniards in America, and its use by the native population before the colonization. It also has posters showing different times and famous foreign and Cuban industries and enterprises related to the chocolate.

The permanent exhibition presents a collection of china cups for chocolate, from the United Kingdom, Germany, France and Italy, examples of the variety of designs in this pieces in the 19th and 20th centuries. It is relevant a French bow cup, used by men to drink the delicious liquid without wetting their moustaches. Bakelite molds and containers for comfitures donated by the Royal Museum of the Real Square in Brussels, enriched this collection. It also holds simple ceramic chocolate cups, pots, containers and large English bowls found in archeological excavations in the Old Havana. They evidence the presence of this kind of articles in the domestic and religious environment of Havana in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Chocolate museumThe Chocolate Museum, inaugurated on November, 2003, is placed in the well known House of the Green Cross, former residence of the Counts of Lagunilla and starting point of the Saint Via Crucis procession.

Visitors can appreciate the techniques to manufacture candies, every Tuesday and Friday at 11:00 a.m, or taste the delicious drink prepared either in the traditional form or in the Aztecs way.

chocolate museum

Address: Mercaderes Street and Amargura, Old Havana.
Telephone: 866 4431.
Open: Mondays through Sundays 10:00 -20:00.
Entrance Fee: According to the visitor’s consumption.