Chocolate As Health Food?
Can you imagine hearing the words “don’t forget to eat your chocolate” coming from your doctor’s mouth? Most people would only expect to hear such a phrase in a doctor’s office in a dream, but a recent study from Spain shows that chocolate actually has several health benefits.
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The study shows that drinking skim chocolate milk can actually provide several unexpected advantages. One of the health benefits chocolate can promote is the reduction of inflammation, which could reduce the risks of developing atherosclerosis – a condition that causes the buildup of fatty materials to thicken your artery walls.
Previous studies show that chocolate can provide other advantages to the circulatory system. A study conducted by the Yale University School of Medicine shows that chocolate can be used to lower blood pressure and improve blood flow. On top of this, chocolate can reportedly make your platelets less sticky, which can help contribute to fewer blockages in arteries.
What chocolates are healthiest?
Chocolate comes in many forms, some of which feature more health benefits than others. The following tips can have you getting your sweet fix while possibly fixing your body, too.
A good rule of thumb to use is that the darker chocolate is, the better it is for you.
The ingredient in chocolate that contains the health-benefitting attributes is what is known as a flavanoid. Flavanoids are naturally occurring antioxidants that can help protect the body against disease. The Spanish study shows that chocolate with at least 60% cocoa content contains the most flavanoids.
Adding to chocolate can either add or subtract from health benefits. For example, while adding marshmallows or other sugars to chocolate can reduce its health-benefitting attributes, adding strawberries can improve them.
The study also showed that chocolates that are processed less have more health benefits. The chocolate manufacturing process is said to destroy up to half of the flavanoids in every batch of chocolate. On a similar note, chocolate that is processed with alkali has significantly less flavanoids than chocolate that is not.
And finally, drinking chocolate has more benefits than bar chocolate. The health effects of both are exactly the same, but liquid chocolate can give you a higher concentration of flavanoids than its solid counterpart.
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