Facts About Chocolate

The facts about chocolate are interesting. The chocolate industry as a whole tries to please the palates of everyone. But for some of us that is not the most important thing. We do love chocolate that is creamy and melt in your mouth delicious, but we want it to be healthy for us also.

Everywhere in the news and on the internet dark chocolate is being touted for it’s health benefits. Dark chocolate per say does have some redeeming qualities, but not enough, because of the way it’s manufactured.

Wellness-vs-health has done extensive research on the facts about chocolate and found only one chocolate that we feel is a good sound healthy chocolate. It is cold processed which means there is no heat of any kind used in the manufacturing. Heat reduces the vitamin, mineral, protein and antioxidant levels in the finished product.

There is another process that decreases the health values of chocolate, it’s called dutching. That means, an alkali is added to the cocoa powder or nibs and then it is heated to fifty to one hundred degrees Celsius and stirred for up to fifty minutes before it's cooled down. This dutching process further reduces the amount of antioxidants in the product. This is another one of the facts about chocolate few people know about.

According to the labels, most chocolate, dark chocolate included, uses milk and or milk by products. Research suggests that milk inhibits the absorption of the all important antioxidants. As far as wellness-vs-health can tell, The facts about chocolate indicate most of the research on the health benefits of chocolate has been done using off the shelf dark chocolate. If that is the case, a question arises in our minds. What if real cold processed, antioxidant fortified dark chocolate were used in research, what would the results show then?

We have found an article that’s very critical of the hype in the news and on the internet involving the so called health benefits of dark chocolate. Keep in mind, what is being discussed here is off the shelf chocolate found in your local supermarket. The article is lenghty but it is also factual.

It is important to be knowledgeable about the things we eat. After all our wellness and health are involved and the quality of life is important too.

Wellness-vs-Health, Healthy Chocolate Is another interesting place to visit. Here you can find out what ORAC values are and how they can have an effect in your body.

These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration and are not intended to diagnose, treat, prevent or cure any disease.

Re-turn to "What is Healthy Chocolate"

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