Chocolate lovers, before you unwrap your next bar, brace yourselves. Researchers just came out with the not-so-sweet news - bite your tongue - that chocolate doesn’t have a single health benefit to recommend it.
I don’t know about you, but for years I’ve indulged, assuming that chocolate, so decadent, so delicious, was actually an improbable health food? loaded with high concentrations of antioxidants that could lower cholesterol, prevent heart disease and ward off the ravages of age.
Well, oops. A giant, and well-conducted study called COSMOS, found that none of this is true.
What happened?
Misconceptions about chocolate have been going on for thousands of years. The Mayans referred to chocolate as the food of the gods; they mixed with it spices to concoct a beverage to treat fatigue and stomach woes. By the 1500’s, Europeans were using chocolate to treat fever and anemia, even obesity.
And then came us. Modern researchers found what they thought were the crucial good-for-you chemicals in chocolate: the antioxidant, flavonoids, found in high concentrations in the cacao (KUH-COW) bean. Chocolate is made from the cacao bean and flavonoids are thought to have some pretty impressive heart healthy effects.
But?
You know there is a BUT coming.
Almost all the studies on chocolate are based on the flavonoid levels in raw cocoa beans. Years ago, I spoke to Dr. Robert Steinberg. He was in the unique position of being both a family physician and, as head of Scharffen Bergen Chocolate, a chocolatier.
He revealed something so fascinating. Before cacao beans end up a confection, they need to be fermented. That fermenting process, particularly the heat it generates, causes those cherished flavonoid levels to plummet. Then comes the drying and roasting, another assault on the darlings (OR I SAY FLAVONOIDS)
And then there’s what we knew deep down anyway. The chocolate we love is loaded with sugar and fat. I do, though, have something positive to say about the kind of fat in chocolate.
Mostly, it’s a type of saturated fat called stearic acid which does not raise cholesterol.
But, truth is, fat is fat, meaning, like sugar, it’s fattening!
Remember I said that most chocolate studies were performed on the cacao bean itself and not what we eat? No surprise that studies on the bean would shine favorably. Well, same with the COSMOS study - it looked at the beans, not the confection.
Another reason to doubt prior studies was that they tended to be funded by the likes of Mars Inc - the folks who bring us M&M's, and Milky Ways. A notable conflict of interest.
Well, the COSMOS study was also funded by chocolate companies. Which is why we really have to take it to heart. (remember this months from now on Valentine’s Day)
These findings may be disappointing, but they are not a tragedy. The advice here will be familiar. Moderation!. If you like chocolate, go ahead and have some and enjoy it.
But remember: if you eat a Hershey kiss, it won’t kiss you back.
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