Keep eating that chocolate, ladies. It’s good for you.
I have reported to you before on some of the health benefits of chocolate.
And now I have some more good news. It also will make you look younger.
Scientists recently took a group of women between the ages of 43-86 with visible facial wrinkles. Then for the next 24 weeks, they gave half of them a chocolate drink containing 320 mg of cocoa flavanols per day. They gave the other half a placebo drink. Before the experiment began and at the end, the researchers added up the wrinkle status of each woman by measuring their “average roughness value.” And here’s the sweet result.
The women drinking the real chocolate showed a statistically significant 8.7% decrease in their wrinkle measurements over those on the fake chocolate. The authors concluded: “In moderately photo-aged women, regular cocoa flavanol consumption had positive effects on facial wrinkles and elasticity. Cocoa flavanol supplementation may contribute to the prevention of the progression of photo-aging.”
According to Medical News Today, cocoa flavanols decrease the chance of cardiovascular disease. They also decrease the age-related decline in memory, and they act to lower LDL cholesterol. But how much do you have to eat to get the benefits?
Eating 100 grams of a good dark chocolate will give you about 53.49 mg of flavanols. So to get the 320 mg wrinkle-reducing amount of chocolate that our ladies were taking every day for six months, you would need to eat about four dark-chocolate bars every day. That would amount to around 720 calories a day. Milk chocolate is worse. In that case, the calories would go up to 1700! Not a very good option. So is there a better way?
There is! Mars chocolate company has produced a specialized cocoa powder called CocoaVia® that is particularly high in cocoa flavanols. You can get it at www.cocoavia.com. Mix one sachet in water, a smoothie, or milk. It contains 375 mg of cocoa flavanols and only 28 calories.
Yours for better health,
Frank Shallenberger, MD
Sources:
REF: Yoon, H.S., J.R. Kim, et al. “Cocoa Flavanol Supplementation Influences Skin Conditions of Photo-Aged Women: A24-Week Double-Blind, Randomized, Controlled Trial.” J Nutr. 2016 January;146(1):46-50.