I love sweets. I adore chocolate. I want to eat of the goodies my sweet friends and boyfriend give me for Valentine's Day. I bet you’re the same way. And I have great news for us!
Dr. Sylvia E. Morris, an MD, MPH, and board-certified physician in internal medicine and holistic medicine at and Emory Hospital Midtown, shared some scrumptious secrets with me this week about how chocolate actually is good for us.
Chocolate has always been a part of medicine going back to earlier cultures. In fact, Native Americans used chocolate for the heart that worked well. Only in recent history has chocolate been used for candy rather than for medicine.
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Chocolate is full of anti-oxidants – just like red wine, bright fruits and veggies. These anti-oxidants help prevent cellular aging and help engage vitamins. Chocolate specifically reduces our blood pressure by a few points. It also helps reduce our bad cholesterol and our triglycerides. It does this by relaxing our vessels. In doing this chocolate also acts as a stress-reducer and increases our endorphins. Those facts make me smile. And biologically, they should!
The Catch
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This good news about chocolate only applies to dark chocolate with at least 70% cocoa content. We don’t need a whole bar either. It is just 6.3 grams (.22 ounces) a day that help. That means we can only healthfully enjoy one or two dark chocolate Hershey’s Kisses a day.
Milk chocolate does not have nearly enough raw chocolate to give us health benefits. White chocolate actually has no cocoa in it—it’s a byproduct of the chocolate making business and is mostly made up of coco-butter.
Creative Ways to Enjoy Healthy Chocolate
Chocolate actually has less caffeine than a cup of decaf coffee. There are some places where you can buy dark chocolate with additional flavors/nourishing additives such as green tea (anti-oxidents), ginger (stomach healing) and almonds (good fats).
You can also buy non-dutch hot chocolate which should read 100 percent cocoa/dark chocolate and use skim or rice milk or water to make heart healthy hot-coco for these cold winter days.
For even more benefits, add a little dash of cinnamon (which helps us metabolize sugar) or cayenne pepper (gives extra endorphins). And to stay even healthier, sweeten the drink with agave nectar rather than sugar because it does not increase our glycemic index.