Chocolate comes from a bean called the cacao bean.  The cacao beans grow on trees and they are harvested, cut open and the pulp and seeds are taken out and left to ferment for about ten days. Fermentation is taking place and the flavors are mixing together during this time.  Then the beans are dried in a kiln or in the sun.   They are shipped to factories where the beans get cleaned, roasted and broken down into small pieces; melted and poured into molds and hardened.  At this point the chocolate is not sweet, in fact it is bitter.  Coco butter, sugar and vanilla are added and this is where the chocolate gets tasty.  It gets ground one more time to be very smooth.  The final step is to make it solid by melting it again and adding more and more solid pieces to it, until it will hold a shape.  Then it is ready to be wrapped, shipped, and eaten by you and me.