Kim Mishra, main author of the Nature Food study [Valorization of cocoa pod side streams improves nutritional and sustainability aspects of chocolate] , says that the cocoa fruit is similar to the honeydew melon: "These fruits have similar structures. Both have a hard outer shell that reveals the flesh of the fruit when cut open, as well as the cocoa beans or melon seeds and pulp in the interior." Conventional chocolate only makes use of the beans, but the researchers were able to use the flesh and parts of the fruit shell ?" or the endocarp, to use the field-specific term ?" for their cocoa-fruit chocolate recipe. They process it into powder and mix it with part of the pulp to form cocoa gel. This gel substance is extremely sweet and can replace the added powdered sugar that is normally part of the chocolate experience.