The Benefits of Chocolate for Your Heart
Think you have to skip chocolate to eat a heart healthy diet? Don't be heartbroken. Indulging (In Moderation) can be GOOD for you!
Here's the good news: According to Emory's HeartWise Risk Reduction Program nutritionist, you can indulge in chocolate and still keep your diet resolutions. In fact, chocolate may even offer some health benefits.
Just because you are eating healthy and watching your weight doesn't mean you have to give up things you love, including chocolate, forever. Denying yourself a food you love creates a feeling of deprivation and can set you up for binging. You can enjoy chocolate as part of a healthy diet, but that means paying attention to controlling how much you eat.
Curiously, chocolate has been associated with matters of the heart for thousands of years. The ancient Aztec and Mayan civilizations are believed to be the first people who drank a chocolate drink they connected to romantic powers. While no one has proven indulging in chocolate can actually help your love life, scientists have found that there are substances in some types of chocolate that may be beneficial to a healthy heart:
Milk chocolate, dark chocolate, and bittersweet chocolate have similar properties. They contain a unique kind of saturated fat — stearic acid — which doesn't raise blood cholesterol levels.
Dark chocolate is also a rich source of substances called antioxidants that are helpful in combating heart disease and other health problems.
While chocolate's ability to make you feel good is partly psychological, we now know there are some agents in chocolate that can alter one's sense of well being. Tyramine, serotonin and 2-phenylethamine (PEA, for short) affect neurotransmitters and giving you a lift similar to the feeling of being in love.
Some cautions for chocolate lovers, too:
♥ White chocolate is actually not chocolate at all, but a high calorie confection made without cocoa and it contains none of the possible health benefits of the real thing.
♥ Chocolate also lacks fiber and important vitamins and minerals you get from eating fruits and vegetables.
♥ Chocolate contains sugar, fat and calories that will make you fat if you eat too much. You can't simply eat as much as you might like to.
The key to not eating too much chocolate is to understand portion control. For example, consider having a few chocolate kisses, instead of an entire chocolate candy bar — one typical chocolate kiss has only 26 calories and one gram of saturated fat.
You can also get a lot of chocolate flavor from cocoa powder — which has much less fat and calories than regular chocolate. One ounce of cocoa powder has 58 calories, three grams of fat, and no saturated fat. However, it still contains all the antioxidant properties of chocolate. Replacing a good portion of some or all of the chocolate in many recipes with cocoa powder is a good way to have the chocolate taste you love but without adding a lot of extra fat and calories to your diet.
The Emory HeartWise Risk Reduction Program is designed for anyone who has experienced a heart or circulatory event or for anyone who is considered at risk for heart disease. Emory Heart & Vascular Center physicians and other health professionals offer individualized risk assessment followed by a carefully monitored program of exercise, nutrition and education to help lower heart disease risk. To find out more about the HeartWise program, call 404-778-2850.
For more heart healthy nutrition advice, visit Ask the Nutritionist.
