Health benefits

Recent studies have shown that cocoa or dark chocolate has potent health benefits for people. Dark chocolate, with its high cocoa content, is full of the flavonoids epicatechin and gallic acid , which are antioxidants that help protect blood vessels, promote cardiac health, and prevent cancer. It also has been effectively demonstrated to counteract mild hypertension . In fact, dark chocolate has more flavonoids than any other antioxidant-rich food such as red wine, green and black tea, and blueberries. There has even been a fad diet named "Chocolate diet" that emphasises eating chocolate and cocoa powder in capsules. However, consuming milk chocolate or white chocolate, or drinking milk with dark chocolate, appears to largely negate the health benefits. Chocolate is also a calorie-rich food with a high content of saturated fat, so daily intake of chocolate also requires reducing caloric intake of other foods.

Two-thirds of the fat in chocolate comes in the forms of a saturated fat called stearic acid and a monounsaturated fat called oleic acid . However, unlike other saturated fats, stearic acid does not raise levels of LDL cholesterol in the bloodstream. <1> A 2001 study by researchers at Penn State University found that the flavonoids in chocolate slowed the oxidation of LDL cholesterol, a process that is believed to lead to atherosclerosis .

Medical applications

Mars, Incorporated , a Virginia-based candy company, spends millions of dollars each year on flavanol research. The company is in talks with pharmaceutical companies to license drugs based on synthesized cocoa flavanol molecules. According to Mars-funded researchers at Harvard , the University of California , and European universities, cocoa-based prescription drugs could potentially help treat diabetes, dementia and other diseases.

Mars is presently marketing the Cocoavia™ brand , a line of functional food chocolates which have cholesterol-reducing phytosterols and at least 100 milligrams of flavanols . The snacks are designed to be eaten primarily for heart benefits, and as such, Mars has recommended a regimen of two snacks per day.

Chocolate as a drug

Current research indicates that chocolate is a weak stimulant because of its content of theobromine . [2] However, chocolate contains too little of this compound for a reasonable serving to create effects in humans that are on par with a coffee buzz. The pharmacologist Ryan J. Huxtable aptly noted that "[Chocolate is] more than a food but less than a drug ". However, chocolate is a very potent stimulant for dogs and horses ; its use is therefore banned in horse-racing .

Chocolate also contains caffeine in significant amounts, though less than tea or coffee, according to careful scientific studies and despite a few websites which claim otherwise. Some chocolate products contain synthetic caffeine as an additive .

Chocolate also contains small quantities of the endogenous cannabinoid anandamide and the cannabinoid breakdown inhibitors N-oleoylethanolamine and N-linolenoylethanolamine . Anandamides are produced naturally by the body, in such a way that their effects are extremely targeted (compared to the broad systemic effects of drugs like tetrahydrocannabinol ) and relatively short-lived. In experiments N -oleoylethanolamine and N -linolenoylethanolamine interfere with the body's natural mechanisms for breaking down endogenous cannabinoids, causing them to last longer. However, noticeable effects of chocolate related to this mechanism in humans have not yet been demonstrated.