Did you know that the most well-known, favorite flavor of all types of sweets comes from fermented, roasted, and ground bean of Theobroma cacao? That’s right! Chocolate comes from the word “xocoatl” which means “bitter water” for Aztecs, the native Central American aborigines before the Spanish colonization
Before the coming of Christopher Columbus, native Americans drank chocolates with vanilla, pepper or chili as their wine. Europeans, however, sweetened it by adding milk and sugar instead of chili and pepper to enhance its taste. After discovering that chocolates will actually taste better when sweetened, they experimented to process the chocolate to make it solid, hence the making of chocolate bars.
In the year 1868, a small company named Cadbury first introduced chocolate bars and candies the English market. Shortly, in just few years, milk chocolates hit the market, manufactured by the first and most popular company, Nestle. Since then, the interest in handmade, high quality chocolates became increasingly higher. Thus, many companies like Hershey’s, made more ways to expand their chocolate industry by buying smaller manufacturers of premium chocolates. By that time, sweetened and processed chocolates started to flourish and likewise the independent chocolate makers.
What makes chocolate flourish too easily? It is because people love chocolate!
Here are some reasons why people love chocolate:
1. Prevents blood clotting. Medical professionals found that drinking cocoa or dark chocolates improves the blood flow in major areas of the brain within two to three hours after drinking.
2. Boosts body energy. Caffeine and phenylethylamine in dark chocolate can boost your energy, much like the feeling of falling in love.
3. Balance high blood pressure. Another nutrient from cocoa called flavonoids (procynids) will help balance blood pressure and also helps reduce blood clotting.
4. Prevent heart attack. According to the study, eating a few dark chocolate every day will reduce 50% of mortality rate caused by heart attack.
5. Help process blood sugar. Eating a few bars of dark chocolate a day can increase blood sugar’s body metabolism, thereby reducing the risk of diabetes.
Many people believe chocolates are not good for health and may even cause the opposite of the effects mentioned above. That would only be the case if you eat chocolates high in calories, sugar and saturated fat. But if you want to get the maximum benefits of chocolate, do not eat the ones that have been processed, with refined sugar additives, and milk fat. But instead, you can eat pure chocolate with the higher content of flovoniod. 60 percent of solid cocoa is the best and healthy dark chocolate for all.
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