Choosing the right Chocolate for Valentine's Day

Giving and receiving chocolate is a Valentine’s tradition that everyone enjoys. Choosing the right chocolate will not only give pleasure but benefit your loved one’s heart and stress levels and your own as well.

Antioxidants in Dark Chocolate and Cocoa Protect the Heart. 

Pure chocolate, made from cocoa beans, is rich in flavanol, an antioxidant that may help protect arteries from damage, maintain healthy blood flow and fend off heart disease.

Dark chocolate and cocoa powder contain the highest levels of flavanol. A Swedish study published in 2009 showed that people who ate chocolate regularly over the 12 months before their first heart attack, recovered better than patients who never or seldom ate chocolate.

 “Chocolate consumption was associated with lower cardiac mortality in a dose dependent manner in patients free of diabetes surviving their first AMI (heart attack),” the researchers from the Department of Public Health Sciences, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden, reported.

While the chocolate eaters enjoyed better cardiac health, participants in the study who didn’t eat chocolate but ate other kinds of confectionery, gained no benefit.

The benefits of eating chocolate lasted up to eight years, the researchers noted, and this could be due to the fact that that eating dark chocolate hs been shown to lower blood pressure.

Dark Chocolate is the Key

All the studies looking at the beneficial effects of chocolate have been based on dark chocolate. Dark chocolate and cocoa powder contain the highest levels of flavanol and other antioxidants, apparently responsible for the heart protective and stress-busting effects.

But these health benefits are reduced considerably when pure chocolate is processed and ingredients such as sugar, milk and butter are added, as is the case in most candies and candy bars.

Not only that, but the extra fat and sugar levels can contribute to unwanted weight gain.

However, there are good brands of organic, fair trade dark chocolate available, including ones containing up to 80% cocoa. Consuming these would not only improve the health of those who receive such gifts, but assist the economic health of the growers and producers of organic dark chocolate and cocoa.  You can find good chocolate at a local health food store or Super 1 Foods.  Good brands to try are Endangered Species, Theo or Dagoba. The larger chocolate manufacturers like Hersheys or Nestles tends to add emulsifiers, soy lecithin, milk fat and artificial flavors to their chocolate, which causes them to do more harm than good. 

Cocoa itself is full of antioxidants, and while it might be rather dull just to drink hot cocoa on Valentine’s Day, hot chocolate made with real dark chocolate is a dreamy, melt-in the mouth sensation that could enhance your healthy Valentine’s celebration.

Have Fun!