cacao

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. An evergreen tropical American tree (Theobroma cacao) having leathery, ellipsoid, ten-ribbed fruits borne on the trunks and older branches. Also called chocolate tree.
2. n. The seed of this plant, used in making chocolate, cocoa, and cocoa butter. Also called cacao bean, cocoa bean.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. The chocolate-tree, Theobroma Cacao, natural order Sterculiaceæ. The cacao is a small evergreen tree, from 16 to 40 feet high when growing wild, a native of tropical America, and much cultivated there and to some extent in Asia and Africa. Its fruit is a somewhat pear-shaped pointed pod, 10-furrowed, from 5 to 10 inches long, and contains numerous large seeds embedded in a sweet pulp. These seeds are very nutritive, containing 50 per cent. of fat, are of an agreeable flavor, and are used, both in their fresh state and when dried, as an article of food. The seeds when roasted and divested of their husks and crushed are known as cocoa-nibs. These are ground into an oily paste, and mixed with sugar and flavoring matters, to make chocolate, the most important product of the cacao, (See chocolate.) Cocoa consists of the nibs alone, either unground or ground, dried, and powdered, or of the crude paste dried in flakes. Broma consists of the dry powder of the seeds after a thorough expression of the oil. A decoction is also made from the husks alone, under the name of cocoa-shells. These substances, containing the alkaloid theobromine, analogous to thein and caffein, are very extensively used as substitutes for tea and coffee. The oil from the seeds, called cacao-butter, is solid at ordinary temperatures, and has a pleasant odor and chocolate-like taste. It is used for suppositories, and for making soap, pomatums, etc.

Wiktionary

1. n. A tree, Theobroma cacao, whose seed is used to make chocolate.
2. n. This tree's seed, the cocoa bean

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. (Bot.) A small evergreen tree (Theobroma Cacao) of South America and the West Indies. Its fruit contains an edible pulp, inclosing seeds about the size of an almond, from which cocoa, chocolate, and broma are prepared.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. tropical American tree producing cacao beans