An Easy New Year’s Resolution – Switch to Dark Chocolate

Once again, dark chocolate gets rave reviews. And it’s no less believable just because it comes from Switzerland, the home of chocolate. A study was done involving men smokers. Smokers were selected because both the lining of their blood vessels (the endothelium) and their blood platelets are somewhat dysfunctional. Women were excluded because their hormones may interfere with the measurements of vessel and platelet function.

Twenty five smokers had the functioning of their brachial (arm artery) endothelium and their blood platelets measured 2 to 8 hours after eating 40 grams of dark or white chocolate. The dark, but not the white chocolate, was accompanied by rapid improvement in endothelial and platelet function. In other words, it ‘reversed’ the effects of smoking. There was no news about the effect of milk chocolate.

Of course, one author had to throw a little cold water on the results. “Chocolate may adversely affect cardiovascular risk because of its effects on glucose, lipids, and body weight . . .“ he said; I suggest that’s the part you don’t listen to.

In case you want to start now, you should know that a Swiss chocolate bar is usually 100 grams. On the other hand, if you don’t care for chocolate, consider red wine – it has the same beneficial effect on smoking-related effects.