Chocolate!

You are seriously talking to one of the biggest chocoholics in the world right now. When I was younger I would have made every meal out of chocolate if I could, even nowadays it is rare for a day to go by where I don’t eat chocolate. There’s something about that piece of chocolate that always makes your day a bit better. So you can only imagine how excited I was to find out that chocolate actually does have quite a few benefits for you.

Often times when we are stressed or nervous we like to indulge in a bit of chocolate. It happens to most of us, you get stressed and a comforting bit of chocolate always seems to help. It ends up that those couple bites of chocolate while stressing or nervous could actually help lower your stress level and calm you down. Even J.K. Rowling knew that when she was writing Harry Potter, Harry was handed chocolate all the time throughout the series whenever something stressful, or emotionally draining came up (e.x. Dementors)!

On those stressful days where you’ve spent your whole time working on the computer or studying for a big test, chocolate could actually be one of the best things for you to eat! Chocolate is a brainfood!! Professor Ian Macdonald conducted a study at the University of Nottingham in which he found that eating a piece of dark chocolate rich with flavanols boosts the blood flow to your brain. This new boost gives your brain a refreshed sense of energy that can help with concentration, attentiveness, and alertness for two to three hours after. Next time you feel tired, out of power or out of ideas just eat a couple pieces of chocolate, and notice the boost you’ll get!

Dark chocolate can even help you lose weight! Weird, right? Chocolate can help you lose weight? Chocolate (especially dark chocolate) is filling, which means that after eating a few pieces you will no longer be hungry or crave other foods that you don’t need. It can help stop the unnecessary eating.

Plus, Cocoa Beans (what coffee is made from) is full of an organic compound known as flavanols, which are known to help lower blood pressure while also increasing your vascular functions. By lowering your blood pressure and increasing your vascular function you will also be reducing your risk of heart attacks and stroke.

Now this doesn’t go for all chocolate though. While all chocolates definitely have some health benefits, the chocolates that contain more flavanols have been known to provide you with the most benefits. For example, dark chocolate is known be richer in flavanols than milk chocolate, and let’s face it something like a Milky Way bar is pretty much going to be all sugar. The darker the chocolate, the more flavanols it has, and the more it can help you out throughout your day! So never feel guilty about eating about eating your chocolate, you are actually doing something good for you body by eating it!
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Chrisi Keating

Santa Clara University

Communications Major