All Things Chocolaty

How can 1 resist the savory taste of chocolate!

Chocolate today is known to be the most popular sweet treat in the world. But, did you know that eating chocolate does not only make you feel good, it’s also good for your heart and brain.

As cacao beans are full of phytonutrients, which act as antioxidants and provide additional benefits. Dark chocolate contains 2 or 3 times more beneficial flavanols than milk chocolate because milk chocolate’s cacao concentration is diluted with milk with possibility of more sugar in it.

Chocolate is often associated with positive effects on mood, but the reason is why? Chocolate contains substances that stimulate the brain in the same way as cannabis. However, how is chocolate good for your brain in any means? Well, studies have focused on chocolate’s ability to improve cognitive function. According to the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease in 2016, the study took 400 Portuguese citizens over age 65 and saw that those who ate a reasonable amount of chocolate — on average, one chocolate snack a week— decreased their risk of cognitive decline by 40% over 2 years.

Here are some fun facts for your daily dose cocoa knowledge~

1. Chocolate is actually a vegetable – Well, kind of?

Chocolates originated from the cacao bean, which grows on the cacao tree, an evergreen from the family MalvaceaeI. Making it the most important part of the sweet treat a vegetable.

2. White chocolate is not chocolate.

Before you come after us, continue reading! As white chocolate does not contain cocoa solids or chocolate liquor, white chocolate is not chocolate in the strict sense. But it does contain parts of the cacao beans, the cocoa butter to be exact.

3. Cocoa? Cacao? Same thing.

The words are interchangeable, both the same bean.