July 7 is World Chocolate Day. With its history dating back nearly 2,500 years in what is now southern Mexico, chocolate arrived in Bulgaria in the early 20th century.

“At the beginning of the 20th century, chocolate was something unknown and exotic for Bulgarians,” the head curator of the National Polytechnic Museum in Sofia, Vasil Makarinov, told BTA.

The pioneer chocolatier on Bulgarian soil was Belizar Peev – a veteran soldier who fought in the Serbo-Bulgarian and Balkan wars.

In 1901, he founded the first chocolate workshop in Bulgaria, in Sofia, under the name “Chocolate and Confectionery Industry – Belizar Peev”. She made chocolate, luxury confections and cookies.

There were many obstacles the entrepreneur faced, including the taste of customers: Bulgarians at that time were not familiar with chocolate, Makarinov explained. Legend has it that a priest from the province, excited by the new production, sent a letter to Peef: “If the chocolate is liquid, send us a bottle to try.”

Initially the laboratory employed only ten staff and had 3 to 4 machines. In the following years, the small business developed into a more serious European-style factory. It had 300 workers, 32 electric motors and 172 modern machines.

1922 was an important year for Peev: he opened a branch of the factory in the town of Svoge, about 30 kilometers north of Sofia, bought new German and Italian machinery. He even had his own power plant, which operated in Svoge and even supplied the city with electricity, Makarinov added.

A large-scale chocolate industry was established in Bulgaria after World War I. In the 1930s, other factories began to produce chocolate. The most famous among them were the factories of Stefan Balakchiev, Abraham Cheliovsky, Aron Beraha.

Chocolate Day has been celebrated since 2009 and is associated with the anniversary of the first shipment of cocoa beans from South America to Spain in 1550.