Cocoa! How many times have you simply had the almost overwhelming want to eat chocolate in whatever form? To name a few, chocolate can be found in chocolate cake, brownies, chocolate milk, chocolate bars, chocolate ice cream sundaes, and cups of hot cocoa.
Whoa, so many options—you may have white chocolate, milk chocolate, orange, mint, or raspberry chocolate, or black chocolate! However, ought you to? If you should, how much is too much and what is going too far? Exist any “healthier” chocolate varieties? There is, as many of us as possible certainly hope!
The “Shady” Background of Chocolate
The cacao tree, which is indigenous to the Amazon rainforest, produces chocolate from its fruit and seeds. Theobroma cacao is the botanical name for the cacao tree, which comes in three main varieties: Forastero, Trinitario, and Criollo. The Criollo variety is the rarest and most treasured for its exquisite taste and aroma, while the Forastero species is the most often utilized.
It is believed that Christopher Columbus was the first European to come into touch with the cacao bean. He and his crew discovered—and presumably stole—a canoe that had baskets of cacao beans among other food supplies.
The popularity of cacao and chocolate skyrocketed when Hernando Cortez brought three chests of cacao beans—this time taken from the Aztecs—back to the Spanish king’s court. Although the cacao beans were really utilized as local currency, their quality was overlooked for another twenty years.
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However, it seems that the history of chocolate is actually far older, dating back to the Olmec civilization, which may have existed before the Mayan civilization, if not before even. The classic chocolate drink might be flavored with vanilla, pimento, or chili peppers and was mixed with water or wine. Translating this as “drink that builds up resistance and fights fatigue,” Cortez named the beverage xocoatl.
Sugar use started around the same time as chocolate was “discovered” by Europeans, and sugar began to replace diverse flavorings. Chocolate was quickly being produced on the slave-driven plantations owned by the French, Spaniards, English, and Dutch for use as the beverage that was becoming more and more popular.
But soon, baking with chocolate was becoming common. Conrad Van Houten, a Dutch chocolatier, invented a process for extracting cacao and making a “cake” that was portable and readily powdered.
Joseph Storrs Fry, an English chocolatier, created what is effectively the first chocolate bar in 1849. Henri Nestlé, a Swiss chemist, invented powdered milk, which Swiss chocolatier Daniel Peter combined with cacao powder to make milk chocolate! Another Swiss chocolatier, Rudolphe Lindt, created a method for giving chocolate more smoothness.
If you truly are a chocolate enthusiast, you will undoubtedly recognize several of these names as indicating some of the most well-known and frequently best chocolate available today!
What distinguishes milk, white, and dark chocolate from one another?
The percentages 35%, 55%, and 78% indicate the proportions of cacao powder solids and cacao butter; the higher the percentage, the purer, darker, and less sweet chocolate is. Dark chocolate is considerably closer to the original chocolate.
Cacao butter, or the oily and fatty portion of the cacao bean, is combined with milk and sugar to make white chocolate. Cacao solids, sugar, and either liquid, condensed, or powdered milk are used to make milk chocolate.
The Fine Chocolate Industry Association states that sugar, cocoa butter, lecithin, vanilla, and cacao liquor are the only components that should be present in dark chocolate. But they also point out that, as with everything else, a higher percentage of chocolate does not always translate into superior quality.
Buyer beware! Choose well-known, respectable businesses or smaller artisan chocolatiers who place a high emphasis on the quality of their goods!
What Advantages Does Dark Chocolate Have for Your Health?
The most crucial thing to realize about chocolate’s health benefits is that they only apply to dark chocolate, and the more dark chocolate there is in a piece, the healthier it is overall! Maybe depressing, but unquestionably true.
For those of us who adore milk chocolate, the harsh reality is that these advantages genuinely only slightly relate to either milk chocolate or white chocolate. Cacao beans are tough, but it’s there!
Some of the benefits of dark chocolate (at least 70% cacao) have been demonstrated.
- nourishment
- An ounce of dark chocolate has between 70 and 85%
- 13 grams of total carbohydrates
- Seven sugar grams
- Three grams of fiber from food
- 168 calories, of which 108 are fat-based.
- Two protein grammes
- 4 is the glucose load.
- 341 mg of omega-6 and 9.5 mg of omega-3 fatty acids, respectively
- The majority of fats are either monounsaturated or saturated.
- 19% of the Iron Daily Value (DV)
- 16% of the daily value of magnesium
- 25% of the Copper DV
- 27% of the Manganese DV
- 225 mg of theobromine, a chemical that is comparable to caffeine, and 22.4 mg of caffeine
- Antioxidants are abundant in dark chocolate. It is thought that all forms of chronic diabetes are disorders of oxidative stress, and antioxidants can help limit the damage produced by oxidative stress.
- High blood sugar levels surround the cells in a high sugar solution, which is toxic to the cells (particularly nerve cells) and promotes the synthesis of chemicals known as free radicals. Oxidative stress is brought on by these free radicals, which do great harm to the insides of cells. The way antioxidants function is to absorb these free radicals and stop them from causing harm to the cell.
- Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity, or ORAC, is a metric that scientists use to assess a food’s antioxidant content. The ORAC value of one ounce of dark chocolate is 5903. [5] To sum it without being too technical, that is high! Comparatively, one ounce of 100% cranberry juice has an ORAC of roughly 216 and is said to be relatively high in antioxidants. The ORAC value of one ounce of artichokes is 2354.
- Among the antioxidants found in dark chocolate are flavanols and catechins.
- Nitric oxide, or NO, is produced by the flavanols in dark chocolate when blood vessels are stimulated. Nitric oxide helps relax blood vessels, which lowers blood pressure and improves blood flow.
- The risk of heart disease is decreased by dark chocolate, which also raises HDL (GOOD) cholesterol and decreases LDL (BAD) cholesterol.
- Dark chocolate can aid enhance brain functions including memory and cognition, most likely because of its caffeine and theobromine levels.
- Significantly, dark chocolate can lower insulin resistance in diabetics.
- In a short study comparing 70% dark chocolate and white chocolate, participants who consumed 1.7 ounces of dark chocolate daily for 15 days showed enhanced HDL, decreased LDL, and decreased blood sugar. There was no measurement of insulin resistance.
How Much Dark Chocolate Is Enough?
Like many other things, there can be too much of a good thing! A standard “dosage” for dark chocolate does not exist. It is true that dark chocolate has a high calorie and moderate sugar content. Ensure that the chocolate is included in your total carbohydrates.
For more detailed advice, consult your dietitian and doctor. Aim for one ounce of dark chocolate, around four to five times a week. While solid chocolate is probably the easiest to track, you can also use approximately 4 ounces of baking chocolate and spread out the baked chocolate item over a period of 4–5 days.
To make a relaxing chocolate drink before bed, add 1 teaspoon of cacao powder. One ounce of solid chocolate is comparable to around 28 grams, and 28 grams is little more than 5 ½ teaspoons. But remember that cacao DOES include stimulants, so it might not be the best thing to eat right before bed!
DiabetesCouncils Article | Reviewed by Dr. Christine Traxler MD on June 03, 2020
Citations
- https://www.exploratorium.edu/exploring/exploring_chocolate/choc_2.html
- http://www.belgiansmaak.com/white-milk-and-dark-chocolate/
- http://www.finechocolateindustry.org/differentiate.php
- http://nutritiondata.self.com/facts/sweets/10638/2
- http://www.ars.usda.gov/SP2UserFiles/Place/80400525/Articles/AICR07_ORAC.pdf
- https://authoritynutrition.com/7-health-benefits-dark-chocolate/
- http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=207783
- http://jn.nutrition.org/content/130/8/2109S.short
- http://hyper.ahajournals.org/content/46/2/398.long
- http://hyper.ahajournals.org/content/46/2/398.long
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