Which Chocolate Is Best For Lowering Cholesterol?
How wonderful would it be if something you crave can help you lower your cholesterol level? Yes, I am talking about the delicious Chocolate bars🍫.
Chocolate is one of the favorite and most delicious snacks you can have. Some studies have shown that including dark chocolate in your diet can lower your cholesterol.
Contents
Best Chocolate For Lowering Cholesterol – Does Dark Chocolate Lower Cholesterol?
But, does all chocolate available in the market have the same effect?
In this article, we will discuss how chocolate helps you lower cholesterol and How you can choose the right chocolate for it.
There are mainly two known varieties of Chocolate- dark chocolate and white chocolate. When compared to white chocolates, dark chocolate tastes less sweet and more bitter.
🍫 Dark Chocolate contains mainly cocoa solids (50-90℅), cocoa butter, and sugar. The cocoa in the dark chocolate is so high that you can’t expect it to taste sweeter.
🍫 White Chocolate contains 10-50℅ cocoa solids, milk, cocoa butter, and sugar. Thus white chocolate will result in a sweet- buttery taste.
And when it comes to the famous commercial chocolate brands in the markets, with high processing and added extra ingredients like vanilla extracts, lecithin, and artificial flavors. No need to further check-they are unhealthy for your body and heart.
Most benefits that chocolate offers come from the main ingredient Cocoa. Thus when you look at the ingredients, dark chocolate has a way better higher cocoa content than white chocolate. Moreover, white chocolate is usually a combination of cocoa butter, milk, and sugar.
So technically speaking, white chocolate is not chocolate at all. Thus it’s clear that dark chocolates are the better option for health.
And when it comes to lowering cholesterol, Dark chocolate contains more cocoa and higher amounts of flavonoids and is a quite good option to lower your cholesterol level.
You can also choose an organic brand of Chocolate since it has undergone less processing than inorganic brands.
Can Dark Chocolate Lower Your Cholesterol Level?
According to some clinical studies and the analyzed data available, dark chocolate intervention can significantly reduce serum LDL and total cholesterol. Whereas the High-density lipoprotein didn’t get reduced.
Another study conducted on 12 participants shows that the participant group who received high polyphenol-rich high-cocoa had a significant increase in HDL and a decrease in total cholesterol than low polyphenol chocolate groups.
Thus, all these studies show the positive impact of nutritious dark chocolate. However, chocolate also contains sugar, which may produce the opposite effect.
Can I Get Cholesterol-Lowering Benefits From Milk Chocolate?
Cholesterol-lowering properties and other health benefits in chocolates mainly come from cocoa. When compared to dark chocolate, the percentage of cocoa in white chocolate is less.
Moreover white chocolate also contains milk which may raise the cholesterol level in the body. Thus, it is better to avoid white chocolate. You can take organically processed dark chocolate for better health benefits.
Is Dark Chocolate Rich In Flavonoids?
Dark Chocolate is a powerful source of antioxidants ( flavonoids- polyphenolic antioxidants). flavonoids are capable of fighting against the reactive oxygen species.
This helps to protect cells from damage. Flavonoids are also known for their anti-inflammatory and antiallergic properties.
Is Lindt 85 Dark Chocolate Healthy?
High-quality chocolate should contain more than 70℅ cocoa, low sugar content, no added flavor, no preservatives, and better not be processed with alkali.
😃 Lindt 85 is one of the top-quality dark chocolate brands in the world. It tastes different from the common chocolate bars. Lindt 85 is rich in true cocoa flavor and it doesn’t contain emulsifiers like soy lecithin commonly found in chocolate.
😃 Lindt excellence cocoa bars range from 70%, 78%, 85%, 90%, 95%, 99%, and 100% . Lindt 85 ℅ includes chocolate, cocoa butter, cocoa powder, demerara sugar,and bourbon vanilla bean.
What makes it a better choice is that a couple of squares of Lindt 85 are said to satisfy your craving and make you stop overeating.
Final Words – Does White Chocolate Raise Cholesterol?
Chocolates are loved by many of us. But people especially those with health problems get scared of it due to its bad reputation associated with it like weight gain, acne, high blood pressure, coronary heart disease, and diabetes.
However, it seems chocolate is not as bad as all we thought it was. And it might be good too. The main ingredient cocoa found in chocolates is a rich antioxidant. And these antioxidants may have a wide range of health benefits.
How better health benefits the specific chocolate provides will depend on the higher cocoa content and lower fat and sugar content. However, more studies are needed to understand more on this topic.
