Founded in 2010 with five members, the Chocolate and Confections Technology Club was formed to apply technical and scientific knowledge to chocolate production and processing. Now boasting 20 active members, the club hopes to further foster its members love for chocolate through tasting opportunities, hands-on chocolate making workshops, guest speakers’ lectures and field trips to events such as the annual New York Chocolate Show.

For the contestants, Valentine's Day means three things: family, chocolate, temptation.

The club is the closest thing to Hershey's factory right on campus!

Chemistry determines the tastes and sensations experienced in chocolate and beer. The laws of physics command the movement of balls to and from a juggler’s hands. And, of course, biology rules the wilderness that inspires many artists.

The sweet taste of chocolate is something we probably all enjoy once in awhile, but chocolate is the cause of cruel and abusive treatment to one of the world’s most vulnerable populations. While child labor has been around since the dawn of civilization, the use of young labor is becoming an increasing problem in countries that harvest cocoa. Considering that chocolate is one of our most satisfying pleasures, cocoa is in high demand - and cheap labor is vital for maintaining low production costs for struggling farmers.

Legend has it that the Aztec emperor Montezuma drank 50 goblets of chocolate every day. Of course, this was well before the modern inventions of cane sugar, whipped cream and $4 lattes — all which give good reasons to avoid this particular habit. Just about everyone has come to experience and love chocolate (those few haters out there must be very unhappy people) to the extent that hundreds of scientists have been studying it on the molecular level for years to see why cacao is as amazing as it is.