Cacao shells are the only by-product in the cacao industry, and have been developed and exploited to such an extent, that a rational utilisation of the ever increasing quantities has become a matter of urgent necessity. They are not used in our industry, for an admixture of husk is not permissible, even in the inferior kinds of chocolate or cocoa powder, but must be regarded as an adulteration. It is true that they have been brought on the market as cocoa tea, and again, have been coated with sugar, to make them tasty; and to this day, candied husks constitute a favourite sweetmeat of the population of East Germany. But in this way only comparatively inferior quantities of the by-product were absorbed, and consequently projects of all kinds have been suggested to use up larger percentage. As we have seen, the fatty contents of the bean can be extracted with benzine, and there is a resultant 4 or 5 percentage of fat of inferior value, which is commercially known as “Dutch IIa Cacao Butter”; the defatted shells can be further used for the preparation of theobromine, as Zipperer has already noted in the first edition of this book. Kathreiner’s successors in Munich[97] employ an extract of cacao shells prepared with hot water, in order to improve coffee berries during the roasting and to give a flavour to the coffee substitutes prepared from corn and malt. Cacao extract is also prepared from the shells[98] by first treating them with water or steam, and afterwards extracting with water, and finally evaporating as far as necessary. The thick extract thus prepared contains theobromine, and is intended for use either alone or as an addition to cacao powder and chocolate. Strohschein in Berlin[99] prepares from the shells a thick liquid extract which he calls “Martol Its preparation was suggested by the fact that the cacao husk gives evidence of containing a considerable amount of iron. In “Martol”, the iron occurs as a tannate, and the preparation further contains theobromine, carbohydrates, and phosphoric acid. The preparation is said to be used as a medicinal remedy in chlorosis, yet has scarcely justified such a statement.