healthnut

It seems there is a bit of confusion about dark chocolate, and perhaps the chocolate industry is responsible for such confusion. It turns out that both Hershey and Nestle have been funding these types of healthy research.

http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20010331/food.asp

If you believe that dark chocolate has flavonoid properties, you may want to read this article. Yes, there are lots of flavonoids in the cocoa bean but much of these flavonoids are loss during processing.

http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20060225/food.asp

“At the Cocoa Symposium, convened at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington, D.C., earlier this month, researchers reported new findings on chocolate’s biological impacts. The studies focus on specific flavonoids in chocolate, such as epicatechin, that offer the strongest cardiovascular benefits. The bad news: Most commercial products—even dark chocolates—retain few if any of these natural, plant-based chemicals.”

Think chocolate is high in CLA? The CLA study is funded by Hershey.

http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20010331/food.asp

“Each tested chocolate contained tiny amounts of CLA. The richest candy—denoted only as sample 1—contained a mere 0.3 milligrams of this fat per gram of chocolate. The findings are due to appear soon in the Journal of Agricultural & Food Chemistry.

Recent studies have suggested that humans may need to consume at least 3 grams or so of CLA for it to provide much benefit. To get the benefit from milk chocolate would require more than a little overindulgence, the new data suggest. One would need considerably in excess of 10 pounds of the candy per day!”

And, avoid drinking milk with dark chocolate.

http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn4101

“Eating chocolate can boost the level of heart-protecting antioxidants in the blood, but consuming milk at the same time cancels the potential health benefits, according to a new study. ”