Sort of True

Sonia Jones ND  from The Haven Spa and Alternative Treatment Clinic

There are many headlines declaring chocolate is good for you, it is not quite true in the sense a lot of articles don’t clarify what exactly is meant by chocolate. Most people eat chocolate bars and this month there will be plenty of chocolate Easter Eggs to be had.

There is chocolate and there is chocolate and then there is cocoa. In some traditional societies like the Kuna people of Panama, they drink a lot of cocoa, they are considered healthy but they also eat a lot of fruit, vegetables, rice, and fish. Their cocoa beans go though minimum processing, it is not chocolate they are eating or drinking.

The original drink was made by the Aztecs – the drink was prepared by crushing the cocoa beans, they were then boiled in water, plus various spices were added.

Cocoa contains alanine, alkaloids, alpha-sitosterol, aphla-theosterol, amylase, arginine, ascorbic-acid-oxidase, aspariginase, beta-carotene, calcium, dopamine, fructose, glucose, glutamic-acid, leucine, linoleic-acid, lipase, lysine, niacin, peroxidase, phenylacetic-acid, phenylalanine, phosphorus, riboflavin, rutin, tannins, theobromine, thiamin plus so much more.

It is rare to find minimally processed cocoa, you need to look out for the term raw cocoa, the beans have been dried slowly at low temperature to preserve more of the amazing nutritional properties.

The average chocolate that most people eat contains 23% to 29% cocoa

100% cocoa powder 1 tablespoon – plenty for a drink = 20 calories

Chocolate kisses 41 gms this is 9 small pieces =  230 calories

The average chocolate bar does not announce the amount of cocoa it contains you need to read in the small print. Good quality chocolate will often declare on the front of it packaging – 50%, or 60%, or 70%, or 80% , I have even see 90% cocoa chocolate!

For instance a quality 60% cocoa chocolate it is said to contain 40% sugar and of the 60% cocoa (half is cocoa solids and the other half is cocoa butter).

The average chocolate with less than 30% cocoa contains huge amounts of sugar as the first ingredient, and milk solids as the second ingredient (another cheap ingredient).

The phyto-chemicals theobromine and theophylline both found in the cocoa plant, are chemicals that are beening used in modern medicine as anti-asthmatic. So if you are going to eat chocolate for health reasons then only if it is 70% cocoa or more. Other wise you are eating huge amounts of sugar that compromise the immune system.