Chocoholic Recipes

Coco and to a certain extent dark unsweetened (or semi sweet) chocolate are good source of antioxidant biofalvinoids and also give you a feeling of euphoria and may have some real aphrodisiac effects.

This comes from the Wikipedia post on chocolate with some additions from me:

Chocolate and cocoa contain a high level of bioflavonoids which are very strong antioxidants. They have the bioflavonoid epicatechin, which may have beneficial cardiovascular effects on health. The ingestion of flavonol-rich cocoa is associated with acute elevation of circulating nitric oxide, enhanced flow-mediated vasodilation, and augmented microcirculation.

Note Viagra works by elevating you nitric oxide, so the chances are that eating half a pound or so of raw unsweetened dark chocolate or coco may be much better, cheaper, and heart healthy way of ridding erectile dysfunction than taking a pill. I believe the amino acid arginine has a similar effect on the nitric oxide pathways.

Prolonged intake of flavonol-rich cocoa has been linked to cardiovascular health benefits, though it should be noted that this refers to raw cocoa and to a lesser extent, dark chocolate, since flavonoids degrade during cooking and alkalizing processes.

Milk chocolate’s addition of whole milk reduces the overall cocoa content per ounce while increasing saturated fat levels, possibly negating some of cocoa’s heart-healthy potential benefits. Nevertheless, studies have still found short term benefits in LDL cholesterol levels from dark chocolate consumption.

Hollenberg and colleagues of Harvard Medical School studied the effects of cocoa and flavanols on Panama’s Kuna Indian population, who are heavy consumers of cocoa. The researchers found that the Kuna Indians living on the islands had significantly lower rates of heart disease and cancer compared to those on the mainland who do not drink cocoa as on the islands.

It is believed that the improved blood flow after consumption of flavonol-rich cocoa may help to achieve health benefits in hearts and other organs. In particular, the benefits may extend to the brain and have important implications for learning and memory.

Foods rich in cocoa appear to reduce blood pressure but drinking green and black tea may not, according to an analysis of previously published research in the April 9, 2007 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine,[8] one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

A 15-year study of elderly men published in the Archives of Internal Medicine in 2006 found a 50 percent reduction in cardiovascular mortality and a 47 percent reduction in all-cause mortality for the men regularly consuming the most cocoa, compared to those consuming the least cocoa from all sources.

I eat a small piece of totally unsweetened dark cooking chocolate (at times in my coffee) for health benefits and have noticed that my addiction (I’m a chocoholic and cannot stop eating chocolate once I start) is not to chocolate which is a great health food but to the addictive mind altering drug (alters brain biochemistry – more about that in a later post) sugar which is added to all but unsweetened cooking chocolate.