Healthy Chocolate Delight

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I am a full time networker for 16 years now and I love the business because I enjoy meeting new people and of course making money without leaving my home. Being of the old school and marketing by phone and now the internet, I believe that developing relationships is still a major key to success. Now Social Networks make that much easier and alot more fun. I can help with: Online Marketing and Networking. www.anetincome.com Skype: anetincome or Shirley Adkins Follow me on Twitter at anetincome Have a Wonderful day/evening!

Saturday, November 18, 2006

Chocolate Has Antithrombotic Effects Similar to Aspirin

I found this article on a study of Chocolate and how it works like Aspirin to help slow blood clotting time. You will find a link to the full article below.

Martha Kerr

November 17, 2006 (Chicago) — Subjects enrolled in the Genetic Study of Aspirin Responsiveness (GeneSTAR) inadvertently helped Johns Hopkins University researchers measure chocolate's inhibition of platelet function and show that eating chocolate slows clotting time. The findings may explain how chocolate and cocoa-containing foods exert a cardioprotective effect.

Subjects in the GeneSTAR study were instructed to exercise, stop smoking, and avoid food and drink known to contain flavenoids, which interfere with platelet activity. These foods include grapefruit, caffeine-containing substances, wine, and chocolate and other cocoa-containing substances.

A group of 139 healthy individuals did not eliminate chocolate from their diet.

Senior investigator Nauder Faraday, MD, associate professor of anesthesia and critical care medicine at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, told Medscape that "chocolate was just one of those things this group couldn't give up."

The subjects were ejected from GeneSTAR proper and were not randomized in the aspirin assessment phase of the study. But Dr. Faraday and colleagues took advantage of the subjects' noncompliance to assess chocolate's previously demonstrated role in cardiovascular risk reduction, using the same platelet function analyzer test employed in the GeneSTAR study.

The investigators measured agonist-induced platelet activation in the presence of shear and calculated time to closure in the system by a platelet plug. Platelet activation was also assessed on urinary excretion.

Chocolate consumption caused a significant increase in time to closure, but remained within the normal range, the investigators announced here this week at the American Heart Association 2006 Scientific Sessions.

"Chocolate, even in small amounts, was an independent factor in inhibition of platelet activation," Dr. Naraday said. It extended closure time, regardless of age, sex, smoking status, body mass index, systolic blood pressure, total cholesterol level, fibrinogen levels, or von Willebrand factor.

"The magnitude of the effect was quite small," Dr. Naraday emphasized. Chocolate had the same type of effect as aspirin, but by a factor of 5 to 10 times less, according to the assay used in the GeneSTAR study, he said.

Elliott Antman, MD, professor of medicine at Harvard University in Cambridge, Masssachusetts, told Medscape that he found the results intriguing. "It might help explain the tremendous variability among patients to platelet inhibition, particularly as seen in response to aspirin."

Dr. Naraday pointed out that "any time you shift the balance away from thrombosis, you set up a situation with the potential for increased bleeding time and other risks, but I don't think this is a big problem with eating chocolate!"

Dr. Faraday's study is funded by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Antman reports no relevant financial relationships.

AHA Scientific Sessions 2006: Abstract 4101. Presented November 14, 2006.

For the complete article on this, goto: http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/548025

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Wednesday, November 15, 2006

A Dark Chocolate a Day Keeps the Doctor Away

I found this article on a study of Dark Chocolate and a Daily Dark Chocolate is good for the Heart. You will find a link to the full article below.

Here's news that's hard not to like. Eating a small, 1.6-ounce bar of dark chocolate every day is good for you. Very good for you, find Mary Engler, PhD, RN, of the University of California, San Francisco, and colleagues.

Now here is a medical experiment you would love to volunteer for. Engler's team divided 21 healthy adults into two groups. One group got a Dark Chocolate bar every day for two weeks. Like other dark chocolate bars with high-cocoa content, this one is loaded with something called epicatechin. Epicatechin is a particularly active member of a group of compounds called plant flavoniods. Flavoniods keep cholesterol from gathering in blood vessels, reduce the risk of blood clots, and slow down the immune responses that lead to clogged arteries.

The second group that didn't get same dark chocolate bars but wasn't totally left out. They, too, got dark chocolate bars. But their treats had the flavoniods taken out.

All subjects underwent high-tech evaluation of how well the blood vessels dilate and relax -- an indictor of healthy blood vessel function. Blood vessel stiffness indicates diseased vessels and possible atherosclerosis. Those who got the full-flavonoid chocolate did significantly better. Why? Blood tests showed that high levels of epicatechin were coursing through their arteries.

"This is the longest clinical trial to date to show improvement in blood vessel function from consuming flavonoid-rich dark chocolate daily over an extended period of time," Engler says in a news release. "It is likely that the elevated blood levels of epicatechin triggered the release of active substances that ... increase blood flow in the artery. Better blood flow is good for your heart."

Why Dark Chocolate Is Different

Not all chocolate is created equal. Dark chocolate contains a lot more cocoa than other forms of chocolate.

Sure, this seems like a scam. Can't you get more and better flavoniods from other foods? Surprisingly, the answer is "not really." Engler says that dark chocolate contains more flavoniods than any other food -- including green tea, black tea, red wine, and blueberries.

"Many people don't realize that chocolate is plant-derived, as are the fruits and vegetables recommended for a healthy heart," Engler says.

While a little dark chocolate is good, a lot is not better. Chocolate still is loaded with calories. If you're going to eat more chocolate, you'll have to cut back somewhere else. And remember that a balanced diet -- and plenty of exercise -- is still the key to heart health.

Engler's study was funded by the University of California, San Francisco, School of Nursing. The American Cocoa Research Institute, a nonprofit group funded by the chocolate industry, provided the chocolate used in the study.

The findings appear in the June issue of the Journal of the American College of NutritionNutrition. Engler previously reported the findings at the 2002 Scientific Sessions of the American Heart Association and at the Experimental Biology 2003 meeting.

For the complete article on this, goto: http://www.webmd.com/content/article/88/99702.htm

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Monday, November 13, 2006

Some Fun With With Chocolate

Children danced in liquid chocolate
after lorry overturned

Children in Brazil thought Christmas had come early when a tanker lorry overturned and lost its cargo of liquid chocolate.

Youngsters - and some adults - feasted on the chocolate which covered three lanes of the Pinheiros highway in Sao Paulo.

Some of the more excited children stripped to their underwear and rolled about in the road, covering themselves in chocolate, Jornal Nacional reports. Nobody was hurt in the accident but it caused tailbacks of up to seven miles.

All the cars had to wait for all the chocolate to be cleaned up before they could continue their journeys.

A police spokesperson said: "It was the best accident ever. Everyone was so happy to see all that chocolate. It was like a movie or a dream. It was difficult to get the kids out of the road."


Now Come check out Our Healthy Chocolate Products they are different, they have retained the flavanoils in the cocoa, because our cocoa is cold processed and has no or little preservatives and little or no sugar added! This makes Our products even good for those that are Diabetic.

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Thursday, November 09, 2006

Chocolate in pregnancy keeps baby happy

I found this article on a study of Chocolate and Found that Dark Chocolate is Good for your Health. You will find a link to the full article below.

Chocolate in pregnancy keeps
baby happy

chocolate: health benefits

Expectant mothers can take heart this Easter. Tucking into chocolate eggs is good for the baby, according to a study of over 300 women - especially if you are feeling a bit on edge.

Katri Raikkonen at the University of Helsinki, Finland, and her colleagues asked pregnant women to rate their stress levels and chocolate consumption.

After the babies were born, they looked for an association between the amount of chocolate their mothers had eaten and the babies' behaviour. Six months after birth, the researchers asked mothers to rate their infants' behaviour in various categories, including fear, soothability, smiling and laughter.

The babies born to women who had been eating chocolate daily during pregnancy were more active and "positively reactive" - a measure that encompasses traits such as smiling and laughter.

And the babies of stressed women who had regularly consumed chocolate showed less fear of new situations than babies of stressed women who abstained.

The researchers point out that they cannot rule out the possibility that chocolate consumption and baby behaviour are both linked with some other factor.

But they speculate that the effects they observed could result from chemicals in chocolate associated with positive mood being passed on to the baby in the womb.

Journal reference: Early Human Development (vol 76, p 139)


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Come See Our Site: http://www.greathealthychocolate.com

Monday, November 06, 2006

Eating Dark, not white Chocolate is good for health

I found this article on a study of Chocolate and Found that Dark Chocolate is Good for your Health. You will find a link to the full article below.

Washington, Nov 5 : Eating chocolate may be healthy, but it seems that the only kind that will benefit your heart, is the dark kind, a new study has found.

The study was conducted by a team of researchers led by Joe Vinson, a chemistry professor at the University of Scranton.

The researchers conducted a series of four experiments. They first calculated the antioxidant content of various chocolate products, including dark chocolate, milk chocolate, chocolate milk made with two different types of chocolate syrup and dry hot cocoa mixes.

They found that though dark chocolate is so healthy that it can help reduce the risk of heart disease, white chocolate, on the other hand, provides very little health benefits.

Coffee, tea and chocolate all contain polyphenolic compounds that neutralize the damaging effects of oxygen on cells by playing a protective role against free radicals, which are molecules with unpaired electrons, and which have been linked to diseases from cancer to bad cholesterol.

The researchers noted that the darkest chocolates bind with LDL's

i.e. the bad cholesterol - and prevent oxidation, which is linked to heart disease.


For the complete article on this, goto: http://www.newkerala.com/news4.php?action=fullnews&id=46349

Now Come check out Our Healthy Chocolate Products they are different, they have retained the flavanoils in the cocoa, because our cocoa is cold processed and has no or little preservatives and little or no sugar added! This makes Our products even good for those that are Diabetic.

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Friday, November 03, 2006

Diabetics Can Have Dark Chocolate and Feel Good About It!

I found this article on a study of Dark Chocolate Improves Insulin Sensitivity/Resistance and Blood Pressure. You will find a link to the full article below.

"Numerous studies indicate that flavanols may exert significant vascular protection because of their antioxidant properties and increased nitric oxide bioavailability," write Davide Grassi, from the University of L'Aquila in Italy, and colleagues. "In turn, nitric oxide bioavailability deeply influences insulin-stimulated glucose uptake and vascular tone. Thus, flavanols may also exert positive metabolic and pressor effects."

After a seven-day cocoa-free run-in phase, 15 healthy participants were randomized to receive either dark chocolate bars or white chocolate bars for 15 days, followed by another seven-day cocoa-free washout phase and then crossover to the other chocolate. The dark chocolate bars weighed 100 g and contained approximately 500 mg polyphenols; the white chocolate bars weighed 90 g and presumably contained no polyphenols. At the end of each period, oral glucose tolerance tests were performed to calculate the homeostasis model assessment of insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) and the quantitative insulin sensitivity check index (QUICKI).

Mean HOMA-IR was 0.94 ± 0.42 after dark chocolate ingestion and 1.72 ± 0.62 after white chocolate ingestion (P < .001). Mean QUICKI was 0.398 ± 0.039 vs 0.356 ± 0.023, respectively (P = .001). Systolic blood pressure was lower after dark than after white chocolate ingestion (107.5 ± 8.6 vs 113.9 ± 8.4 mm Hg; P < .05). "Dark, but not white, chocolate decreases blood pressure and improves insulin sensitivity in healthy persons," the authors write. "These findings indicate that dark chocolate may exert a protective action on the vascular endothelium also by improving insulin sensitivity. Obviously, large scale trials are needed to confirm these protective actions of dark chocolate or other flavanol-containing foods in populations affected by insulin-resistant conditions such as essential hypertension and obesity." Am J Clin Nutr. 2005;81:541-542, 611-614 For the complete article on this, goto: http://www.diabetesincontrol.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2593

Now Come check out Our Healthy Chocolate Products they are different, they have retained the flavanoils in the cocoa, because our cocoa is cold processed and has no or little preservatives and little or no sugar added! This makes Our products even good for those that are Diabetic.

For more information on our Chocolate products and a Sweet Income Opportunity,

Come See Our Site: http://www.greathealthychocolate.com