


If you invented a pharmaceutical like that, the photo of you picking up your Nobel Prize would be going viral this very minute. Yet chocolate is still considered a guilty pleasure rather than a valuable health resource. That’s because confectioners often strip the flavenols out during processing (such as roasting, fermenting, and alkalizing) and load up the treats with huge amounts of fat and calories, especially when they add in yummy caramel, nuts, and candied cherries. American manufacturers are especially prone to throwing in extras such as guar gum, partially hydrogenated oils (the infamous trans fats associated with a host of ghastly diseases), artificial flavors, artificial perfumes, and other questionable ingredients, all of which will, at the very least, dilute the amount of actual cocoa you’re consuming.

The bottom line is that chocolate – good, relatively pure dark chocolate, at any rate – should no longer be stigmatized as an occasion of sin but celebrated for its healing powers and divine taste. As the Spanish saying goes, Las cosas claras y el chocolate espeso (clear thoughts and thick chocolate). Amen to that.
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