While it's not the healthiest food in some ways there are many health benefits to eating chocolate too.
Dark chocolate is of course the best, as it has the most cocoa and therefore the flavonoids, which provide the benefits. The flavonoids have antioxidant properties, which have the potential to help prevent cancer, heart disease, and stroke.
Natural cocoa powders are the best, and when you're shopping for chocolate you can get the best benefit from chocolates with the highest cocoa content. In addition, milk chocolate has more fat and calories due to the milk content than darker chocolates do.
The benefits aren't extreme and unfortunately not worth overindulging in chocolate. They do give a delightful bonus to one of life's little pleasures. The occasional dark chocolate is about as good for you as the occasional glass of red wine, which also contains flavonoids.
A new potential benefit has been discovered by Children's Hospital & Research Center Oakland. They've found that chocolate can help with diarrhea by limiting the production of fluids. The flavonoids appear to bind to a protein called CFTR, and then inhibit them. This discovery is promising for its potential to be developed as a cheap treatment with few or no side effects. Only time will tell on that possibility, of course.
Some worry about the stearic acid found in chocolate. Stearic acid is a saturated fat, but some say it's a neutral so far as risk to the heart while others say it has been shown to be a problem. As with many health topics it can be very hard to decide what to believe.
You can call chocolate addictive but it isn't really, or at least there's no evidence that it is. It's just a delight to eat. It contains a variety of chemicals that can improve your mood but in very small quantities.
The absolute best way to indulge in chocolate is to use cocoa powder in recipes that have other healthy ingredients. You can substitute cocoa powder for baking chocolate in some recipes to decrease the fat content. To make many baked goods even better for you, use just egg whites rather than the entire egg and replace butter and oil with unsweetened applesauce.
To finish this article off, I'd like to include a favorite recipe for chocolate meringue. There's a lot of sugar in this recipe, so it's not 100% healthy but they're quite decadent without a lot of calories.
2 egg whites 1/2 cup sugar 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder 1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips
Preheat oven to 250 degrees. Beat the egg whites in a large bowl at high speed until peaks start to foam. Slowly add sugar as you continue to beat. Keeping beating until stiff peaks form.
Mix in vanilla and cocoa powder while beating at a lower speed. Mix chocolate chips in by hand.
Cover a baking sheet in foil or parchment paper. Drop spoonfuls of meringue about an inch apart.
Bake for one hour. Turn off oven and leave meringues in the cooling oven for at least two more hours to allow the meringues to completely dry. Store in an airtight container.
Candy bars and other sugary sweets have long been associated with a slew of troublesome health concerns ranging from unsightly acne to dangerous obesity. Many people have been conditioned from childhood (by media stereotyping and well-intentioned parental figures) to believe that delicious candies and tasty chocolates are evil things to be avoided at all costs, and are made to feel as though each sweet indulgence in which they might occasionally partake is very nearly a mortal sin.
Fortunately, widespread public perception does not always equate to reality. Despite all that intense stereotyping, it's been proven chocolate isn't actually an instrument of the devil, nor is it going to result in an overnight onslaught of pimples and cellulite. In recent years, an awful lot of research has been conducted in regard to the potential health benefits that chocolate may be able to offer. Both researchers and study participants alike have been able to record and report a number of promising findings that seem to suggest chocolate may have been getting a seriously bad rap for all these years, and with no real basis for such harsh scrutiny at all.
Cacao happens to contain some powerful antibacterial agents known for fending off tooth decay. Sadly, in milk chocolate candy varieties, this positive effect is largely counteracted by the candy's extremely high sugar content. Rest assured, though, your teeth aren't going to rot and fall out if you should happen to eat a couple of "king size" Hershey bars in one sitting. In fact, a team of oral-hygiene-loving scientists at the Eastman Dental Center in New York have managed to conclude that milk chocolate, because of its considerable phosphate concentration and other mineral content, is one of the least likely snack foods to be associated with contributing to tooth decay.
Chocolates might also prove to be beneficial to one's state of mind, studies show. Many researchers speculate that a simple whiff of chocolate may increase theta brain wave activities, resulting in an overall sense of calm and relaxation. Furthermore, chocolate is rich in a substance known as "phenyl ethylamine," which promotes mood elevation in a comfortably mild, all-natural fashion.
Individuals with cholesterol issues may wish to consider the fact that the cocoa butter contained within their favorite chocolatey treats provides a healthy dose of oleic acid, which is a mono-unsaturated fat that may raise levels of good cholesterol in the body. Even better, chocolate may be able to aid in appetite suppression and weight management! Some research studies suggest that enjoying a cup of tasty hot cocoa prior to mealtimes could result in a noticeably diminished appetite.
As with everything in life, chocolate consumption can certainly be overdone and end up causing unpleasant side effects. While it's a bad idea to deprive yourself of those scrumptious Hershey and Twix bars you've been craving altogether, tumbling off the deep end and into a never-ending sea of chocolatey crapulence is equally ill-advised (if not more so). Milk chocolates are relatively high in calories and fat, but not so astronomically that they can't be worked into a sensible diet every now and then. Chocolate lovers, fitness fanatics and casual dieters can all reap the health benefits outlined in this article by simply allowing for the occasional cacao-based treat.
Both Stephanie Foster & Kandi Kurosawa are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.
Stephanie Foster has sinced written about articles on various topics from Credit Cards, Shopping and Pets. Stephanie Foster runs and is maybe just a little obsessed with chocolate.. Stephanie Foster's top article generates over 823000 views. to your Favourites.
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