Cocoa Is a Spelling Mistake for Cacao
Cocoa is powdered chocolate and the drink made from it. The spelling is a long-standing error for cacao, which never got corrected.
Cocoa is the powder made from roasted cacao seeds, and the hot drink made from it. The word is a mistake that stuck: the Nahuatl and Spanish form is *cacao*, and English spellers confused it with *coco*, the coconut palm, in the eighteenth century. Dr Johnson's dictionary recorded both, and *cocoa* won. The tree and the raw bean are still properly *cacao*; the processed powder is *cocoa*.
- Chocolate powder. *A tin of cocoa.*
- A hot drink. *A mug of cocoa.*
- Cacao — the tree and raw bean. *Cacao pods.*
- Cocoa butter — the fat. *Cocoa butter.*
- Nahuatl — *cacahuatl*, the source word. *The Aztec name.*
Word forms
| Form | Word | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Noun | cocoa | Hot cocoa. |
| Compound | cocoa butter | Cocoa butter. |
| Correct form | cacao | Cacao beans. |
| Different word | coco | The coconut palm. |
| Nahuatl | cacahuatl | Cocoa bean drink. |
- Stir the cocoa into warm milk.Cooking.
- Cacao pods grow straight from the trunk.Botany.
- The spelling arose by confusion with coco.History.
Cocoa, cacao, coco, coconut
- Cacao — the tree and its raw beans
- Cocoa — the processed powder and the drink
- Coco — the coconut palm, a completely different plant
- Coconut — the fruit of that palm
- The confusion between cocoa and coco is what produced the spelling
Spanish *cacao*, from Nahuatl *cacahuatl*. The English spelling *cocoa* arose in the 1700s by confusion with *coco*, the coconut palm.
What is the difference between cocoa and cacao?
Cacao is the tree and the raw bean. Cocoa is the roasted, processed powder and the drink made from it.
Is cocoa related to coconut?
No. The similarity is the accident of spelling that produced the modern form of the word.