While we know that too many sweets isn’t good for us, chocolate seems to blur the line between an indulgent and a healthy treat. Does eating chocolate provide health benefits or are we just trying to make ourselves feel less guilty about eating it regularly? Let’s take a look at proposed health benefits and if they hold up in research studies.
Not All Chocolate Is Created Equally
Before we get into the science, let’s quickly break down the different types of chocolate and their nutritional differences.
Cocoa Nibs – the closest to pure cacao on this list, nibs are just fermented, dried, roasted and crushed cacao beans. They have virtually no sweetness and are packed with nutrients including magnesium, flavanols (we’ll get to these later in the post), and iron.
Dark Chocolate – made up of 50-90% cocoa solids, cocoa butter, and sugar, dark chocolate should not contain milk (although there may be cross-contamination from processing) and is also a good source of iron, copper, magnesium, zinc, phosphorus, and flavanols. Dark chocolate usually contains a percentage on the package, which indicates the amount of cocoa solids. The higher the percent, the less sugar it will have. For example, a 72% dark chocolate bar will have less sugar than a 50% one. Generally speaking, 1-oz of dark chocolate with 60-85% cocoa contains 6.8 grams of sugar.
Milk Chocolate – probably the most popular of the chocolates, milk chocolate is made up of 10-50% cocoa solids, cocoa butter, milk, and sugar. Milk chocolate contains calcium, iron, and magnesium. It has a much smaller amount of flavanols than cocoa nibs or dark chocolate, but has much more calories, fat, and sugar. One ounce of milk chocolate, on average, contains 15 grams of sugar.
White Chocolate – technically not chocolate, white chocolate doesn’t contain any cocoa solids. Instead, it is made up of cocoa butter, sugar, and milk. It has the highest amount of sugar, with 1-ounce containing 17 grams of sugar. Due to its lack of cocoa solids, white chocolate does not have the minerals or antioxidants found in real chocolate.
Proposed Health Benefits
Besides the fact that eating chocolate can often make us feel happier, there’s been research looking into whether or not it can also make us healthier. While there are many proposed benefits, we’re going to focus on the three biggies: heart health, stroke risk, and cognitive improvements.
Cardiovascular Health
We all know that chocolate is the key to the heart, but is it healthy for the heart as well? The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Family Heart Study looked at 4,970 participants between the ages of 25-93. The study found that consumption of chocolate at least 5x/week was associated with 57% lower prevalence of coronary heart disease compared to those who didn’t consume chocolate at all independent of traditional risk factors. However, they didn’t find an significant effect of chocolate intake on blood pressure.
Similarly, in a prospective study using data from the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer found that higher chocolate intake associated with lower risk of future cardiovascular events. The study also found a statistically significant lower risk for cardiovascular disease at higher chocolate intake and remained borderline significant after adjustment.
In terms of risk of a myocardial infarction (heart attack), a Swedish prospective study of 67,640 women and men found chocolate consumption of >3-4 servings per week was inversely associated with heart attack risk.
Lastly, when looking at heart-failure, a meta-analysis on chocolate consumption and heart failure found light-to-moderate (but not high) consumption of chocolate was associated with decreased risk. Light-to-moderate consumption was defined as 1-6 servings per week.
Stroke Risk
Research looking at the role of chocolate in preventing strokes is quite varied. A Japanese cohort of 38,182 men and 46,415 women aged 44-76 years and without pre-existing cardiovascular disease, found that regular chocolate consumption was associated with a significant lower risk of stroke in women, but not in men.
However, a Swedish cohort looking only at stroke risk in men found that men who consumed high amounts of chocolate (average of 62.9 grams/week) had a significantly lower risk of stroke over 10 years compared to men who ate little-to-no chocolate.
The Women’s Health Initiative also looked at chocolate intake and stroke. Unlike the Japanese study, this prospective analysis found no association between chocolate intake and stroke risk in women without pre-existing cardiovascular disease.
Cognition
The results looking at the role of chocolate on cognition are inconsistent, largely due to the fact that some studies look at actual chocolate while others simply give a supplement containing a large dose of cocoa flavanols.
Daily consumption of a flavanol-rich cocoa drink has been shown to improve cognitive performance in older individuals, with and without pre-existing cognitive decline. It’s also been shown that even younger adults have improved cognitive performance when consuming high amounts of flavanols on a daily basis for 8 weeks. However, in a study where participants were given actual chocolate bars, no improvements in cognition were seen.
While the research is promising, it’s still unclear if just eating chocolate can provide enough flavanols to have a significant benefit on cognition.
Chocolate’s Health Superhero: Flavonoids
Many of the proposed health benefits of chocolate have been attributed to a group of compounds known as flavonoids.
Technically a plant metabolite, flavonoids are a family of health superstars with antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and anti-carcinogenic properties. Due to these properties, flavonoids are thought to have a broad spectrum of health benefits, including reduced risk of stroke and heart disease, decreased risk of cancer, and improved cognition (a.k.a all the same benefits that we just discussed). The exact mechanisms of how these compounds work is still unknown.
The amount of flavonoids varies by type of chocolate, with unsweetened chocolate having 206 milligrams of flavanols per 100 grams of chocolate. Dark chocolate has about 103 milligrams of flavanols per 100 grams of chocolate, and milk chocolate only contains 15 milligrams. Because white chocolate doesn’t contain cocoa, it doesn’t contain these beneficial flavanols.
While dark chocolate is a rich source of flavanols, a sub-group of flavonoids, other food sources include fruits, vegetables, whole grains, stems, tea and wine.
Bottom Line
Chocolate, specifically dark chocolate, in moderation may have health benefits, especially for vascular health. However, there’s also substantial evidence showing the negative effects of eating high amounts of sugar.
For the biggest health bang for your buck, stick with pure dark chocolate, ideally 70% or higher for the most flavanols, in a form that’s easy to keep portions under control, for example pre-wrapped squares.
It’s also important to note that these proposed health benefits may largely be due to flavonoids, which can also be found in many healthy, lower sugar foods such as fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and tea.
Looking for more healthy ways to enjoy chocolate? Look no further than these LoseIt! recipes:
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