Facts about Chocolates

Won't chocolate make me fat?
Chocolate packs fat and sugar, so overindulging does put on pounds. But chocolate is not a prime cause of obesity, studies worldwide find. The Swiss eat twice as much chocolate per person as we do -- 22 pounds a year -- but have one of the lowest obesity rates.

Isn't chocolate full of saturated fat, the type that clogs arteries?
About 60% of chocolate's fat is saturated, and a typical chocolate bar contains 8 grams of saturated fat, so bingeing on chocolate drives up your intake of saturated fat. But moderate amounts do not appear harmful. Extensive research at Harvard found women who ate chocolate bars three or four times a week were no more apt to have heart disease than women who rarely ate chocolate.

Isn't the sugar in chocolate unhealthful?
In excess, yes. But a chocolate bar's glycemic index -- a measure of ability to drive up blood sugar -- is surprisingly low, about like oatmeal's.

What about chocolate's caffeine?
A dark chocolate bar's 10-30mg is modest next to the 100mg in a cup of coffee.

Isn't most research funded by the chocolate industry?
Yes, but it's done by reputable scientists at leading universities and published in excellent scientific journals. Quaker paid for much original research on oats; that doesn't make it untrue.

Source : www.usaweekend.com