How to Choose Healthy Chocolate

Chocolate can be good for you. By choosing chocolate wisely, you can actually reduce your risk of cardiovascular disease, the primary cause of death in the industrialized world. More importantly, if you give chocolate as a gift, say for Mother's Day or St. Valentine's Day, you can now blend chocolate's emotional lift with a genuine health benefit.

Instructions
Step1 Understand why chocolate can be healthy.

Raw cocoa has more antioxidants than green tea or red wine. Cocoa is also rich in bioflavonoids, especially epicatechin, which is absorbed at high levels. This compound increases blood flow in the arteries, according to a study at the University of California San Francisco. Chocolate is rich in magnesium, which affects nerve transmission, and chromium, which helps control blood sugar. Chocolate is high in fat, but the fat itself is largely oleic acid, the healthy fat also found in olive oil.

Step2 Cacao Pod Appreciate its history.

The cacao bean is actually classified a fruit. It grows in tropical climates, where it is harvested from the tree of the same name. The bean had long been in use by the Aztecs in Mexico when, in 1519, the Spanish General Hernando Cortez landed. Montezuma, the king of Mexico, mistook Cortez for a god, and served him a drink of chocolate in a gold cup. The bean was so highly valued there, that it was used as a currency, so in Mexico, money did literally grow on trees. Cortez brought chocolate back to Europe, where it rapidly caught on. Milk chocolate was invented in 1876 by the Swiss Daniel Peter, who successfully blended milk solids with chocolate. Today the average American consumes 12 lbs. a year, mostly as milk chocolate.

Step3 Learn how it is made.

After harvesting at the peak of ripeness, the pods are split with a machete to expose the beans. These are covered with banana leaves to ferment for 5 days. They are next dried in the sun, then roasted. The husk is removed, producing cocoa nibs. These are milled with large granite slabs, making chocolate liquor, a non-alcoholic liquid. Cocoa butter is the fat in the liquor. It is solid at room temperature, but melts readily in your mouth. The butter is frequently extracted through a cocoa press and used for other products such as sun screen, because it’s a great moisturizer. After the butter is removed, the dried solids are ground into cocoa powder. You can create cocoa with different butter content by varying the press time. Sometimes the powder is made more alkaline to offset some of the bean's natural acids through what is called Dutch processing. The cocoa particle size in a bar is reduced by refining. Conching blends sugar with the cocoa. Tempering aligns the crystals, and then the chocolate is cooled and is ready for consumption.

Step4 Know that all chocolate is not created equal.

To maximize the health effect from your chocolate, you want your bars to have the richest concentration of chocolate liquor. The percentage of chocolate liquor is proudly displayed on the labels of quality chocolate bars. Unsweetened baking chocolate has the highest percentage, followed by bittersweet and semi sweet chocolate. Organic chocolates are the healthiest, since they have no pesticide residue.

Step5 Avoid chocolates high in sugar.

Read the ingredient label. If sugar is listed first, don’t buy it. Refined carbohydrates are responsible for a slew of health problems, including obesity and diabetes. Favor other sweeteners that are more slowly absorbed, like evaporated cane juice or barley malt. If you see chocolate sweetened with sorbitol, eat it in moderation, since sorbitol can act as a laxative. Don’t eat any chocolate with hydrogenated fat. Avoid milk chocolate, which just adds saturated fat to your diet.

Step6 White chocolate is seductive

a blend of cocoa butter with sugar and vanilla extract--but it has no chocolate liquor whatsoever. It has absolutely no health benefits. It's simply a flavored confection of fat and carbohydrates. In some cases, white chocolate is made with hydrogenated fat.

Step7

Finally, when you’ve found a dark, rich, mildly sweetened chocolate, eat it slowly and savor it. Let it melt on your tongue to appreciate the complexity of flavors present. Allow it to stimulate your endorphins. Choose quality over quantity. Don’t eat too much but enjoy this healthy yet sensuous addition to your diet.

Article By: Paul M. J. Suchecki

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Homemade Refreshing Fruit Juice Recipes

Lemon~Lime Ginger Ale
handful of grapes1 apple,

cored and sliced½ inch fresh ginger (less if you find the taste too strong)

1/2 lime

1/4 lemonsparkling mineral water

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Remove the grapes from the stem. Juice the apple and ginger together, then juice the rest of the fruit. Pour the juice in a large glass and fill to the top with sparkling water and serve with ice.

Sparkling Tropical Fruit Juice
1 kiwi peeled

1 orange peeled and sectioned

1/2 mango peeled and sliced

sparkling mineral water

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Process the fruit in a juicer. Pour the juice in a large glass and fill to the top with sparkling water and serve.

Blueberry Cherry Juice Recipe

handful of cherries pitted

3/4 cup blueberries

1 apple, cored and sliced

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Process the fruit in a juicer and serve.

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Snacks for Children

Snacking worries parents and they often try to prevent eating between meals. That isn't necessary or even helpful. Children's energy needs are high, and they usually can't eat a lot at any one time, so they need to eat about every 3 hours. What's important is that you have control over the time of the snacks and the type of food.

Timing of snacks

Offer snacks midway between meals. Give snacks long enough after the meal that your children know they'll have to wait a while to eat again if they refuse the meal. That keeps children from refusing meals and then asking for food a short time later. It will be easier for you to refuse their begging if you know a snack is coming up.
If children have an early lunch and late dinner, they may need 2 snacks. Try having a snack with protein, fat, and carbohydrate in it 2 or 3 hours after lunch. Then offer a lighter carbohydrate snack, such as fruit juice or crackers, later in the afternoon. Regulating snacks
Plan a reasonable snack time and get the food on the table. Then you will be in charge of the timing, location, and selection of food. If you wait for your children to request the snack, they may have made up their minds about what they want and you may have a struggle over food.

Selecting snacks
In general, snacks should be nutritious. Any food appropriate for a meal is okay for a snack. Snacks that you want to last a while should have some protein, fat, and carbohydrate, the same as a nutritious meal. Snacks should be big and substantial enough to be filling for a hungry child.

Nutritious snack ideas

Grain products
Bread products:

Use whole-wheat products about half the time. Read the label to make sure the flour is enriched or is whole grain (the first listed ingredient should be whole wheat). Try a variety of yeast breads and quick breads, such as whole wheat, rye, oatmeal, mixed grains, and bran -- plain or with dried fruit. Try rye crisps, whole-grain flat bread, and whole-grain crackers. Serve bread and crackers with cheese, peanut butter, or a glass of milk to give protein and fat.
Dry cereals:

Choose varieties of cereals with less than 5 grams of sucrose or other sugar per serving. Serve with milk to give protein and fat. Add dried fruits, nuts, and seeds for variety and increased nutrients.
Popcorn:

Try using grated cheese on the popcorn instead of salt and butter. Serve with milk or cocoa to give protein and fat. Be cautious offering popcorn to young children as they may choke on it.
Cookies:

Bake your own cookies, substituting whole wheat flour for half of the white flour. Try oatmeal, peanut butter, or molasses cookies. Experiment with cutting down on sugar in recipes. Often you can decrease the amount of sugar by one third to one half. Serve cookies with milk to give protein.

Beverages
Use fruit juices and vegetable juices rather than powdered or canned fruit-flavoured drinks. Fruit drinks lack folate, fibre, and other nutrients provided by real juice.
Serve milk with bread, crackers, cereal, etc. Mix milk in a blender with a banana or other fruit or mix it with orange juice for a healthy milkshake. Try adding vanilla extract, honey, molasses, or even a little sugar. Use chocolate or strawberry flavourings for a treat sometimes.

Vegetable snacks

Cut up fresh raw vegetables. Be careful about serving broccoli, carrots, and cauliflower because young children could choke on them. Serve the vegetables with peanut butter, cheese, cottage cheese, or milk to provide protein and fat. (Use 2% or whole milk to give fat.) Add crackers or fruit juice for carbohydrates.

Good vegetables include:
broccoli
green beans
carrots
green peas
cauliflower
turnip sticks
celery
zucchini
cucumber

Fresh fruit snacks

Slice the fruit or serve it whole. Serve it with peanut butter, cottage cheese, yogurt, ricotta cheese, or milk to give protein and fat.

Good fruits include:
apples
grapefruit
oranges
apricots
grapes
peaches
bananas
melons
pears
berries
nectarines
pineapple

Dried fruit snacks, nuts, and seeds

Serve dried fruit with nuts (almonds, cashews, peanuts) or seeds (pumpkin, squash, sunflower) to give protein and fat. Be very cautious about giving seeds and nuts to young children because they could choke on them.

Nutritious dried fruits include:
apples
dates
pears
apricots
figs
prunes
bananas
peaches
raisins

CARBOHYDRATE
The main energy source for the body. Sugars and starches are carbohydrates.

*source: www.aboutkidshealth.ca

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Dark Chocolate Is Healthy Chocolate

Dark Chocolate Has Health Benefits Not Seen in Other Varieties
By Daniel J. DeNoon

WebMD Health News

It's the best medical news in ages. Studies in two prestigious scientific journals say dark chocolate -- but not white chocolate or milk chocolate -- is good for you.

Dark Chocolate Lowers Blood Pressure
Dark chocolate -- not white chocolate -- lowers high blood pressure, say Dirk Taubert, MD, PhD, and colleagues at the University of Cologne, Germany. Their report appears in the Aug. 27 issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association.
But that's no license to go on a chocolate binge. Eating more dark chocolate can help lower blood pressure -- if you've reached a certain age and have mild high blood pressure, say the researchers. But you have to balance the extra calories by eating less of other things.

Antioxidants in Dark Chocolate
Dark chocolate -- but not milk chocolate or dark chocolate eaten with milk -- is a potent antioxidant, report Mauro Serafini, PhD, of Italy's National Institute for Food and Nutrition Research in Rome, and colleagues. Their report appears in the Aug. 28, issue of Nature. Antioxidants gobble up free radicals, destructive molecules that are implicated in heart disease and other ailments.
"Our findings indicate that milk may interfere with the absorption of antioxidants from chocolate ... and may therefore negate the potential health benefits that can be derived from eating moderate amounts of dark chocolate."
Translation: Say "Dark, please," when ordering at the chocolate counter. Don't even think of washing it down with milk. And if health is your excuse for eating chocolate, remember the word "moderate" as you nibble.

The Studies
Taubert's team signed up six men and seven women aged 55-64. All had just been diagnosed with mild high blood pressure -- on average, systolic blood pressure (the top number) of 153 and diastolic blood pressure (the bottom number) of 84.
Every day for two weeks, they ate a 100-gram candy bar and were asked to balance its 480 calories by not eating other foods similar in nutrients and calories. Half the patients got dark chocolate and half got white chocolate.
Those who ate dark chocolate had a significant drop in blood pressure (by an average of 5 points for systolic and an average of 2 points for diastolic blood pressure). Those who ate white chocolate did not.
In the second study, Serafini's team signed up seven healthy women and five healthy men aged 25-35. On different days they each ate 100 grams of dark chocolate by itself, 100 grams of dark chocolate with a small glass of whole milk, or 200 grams of milk chocolate.
An hour later, those who ate dark chocolate alone had the most total antioxidants in their blood. And they had higher levels of epicatechin, a particularly healthy compound found in chocolate. The milk chocolate eaters had the lowest epicatechin levels of all.

Chocolate for Blood Pressure: Darker Is Better
What is it about dark chocolate? The answer is plant phenols -- cocoa phenols, to be exact. These compounds are known to lower blood pressure.
Chocolates made in Europe are generally richer in cocoa phenols than those made in the U.S. So if you're going to try this at home, remember: Darker is better.
Just remember to balance the calories. A 100-gram serving of Hershey's Special Dark Chocolate Bar has 531 calories, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. If you ate that much raw apple you'd only take in 52 calories. But then, you'd miss out on the delicious blood pressure benefit.
A hint: Don't replace healthy foods with chocolate. Most people's diets have plenty of sweets. Switch those for some chocolate if you're going to try the truffle treatment.

© 2003 WebMD, Inc. All rights reserved.

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