Chocolate ..

I think this 'Snack Size Science' snippet is worth checking out just so that you can drool over the picture for 1 minute and 19 seconds.

Just in case you became completely distracted by the fabulous food porn, the main point of the snippet is that the procyanidins in cocoa powder appear to have a blood pressure lowering effect. This is fine and definitely promising, but before you go out and down a few mars bars for the sake of your blood pressure, there are a few little things to think about.

Firstly, the study was funded by Spanish company Natraceuticals and was conducted using their own branded product, CocoanOX. This in itself is not necesarily a bad thing, apart from the fact that having invested molto dollars in a new product, could you really be unbiased in the presentation of the clinical findings? Perhaps I'm just a hardened sceptic. ;/

Secondly, the product tested is not your run of the mill cocoa powder and it's certainly not like they were actually feeding their lab rats chocolate in a form that you or I could recognise. We are talking about a cocoa that was engineered to be especially polyphenol rich. I'm not sure if you can actually go out and buy a chocolate bar that contains CocoanOX, and I know that chocolate is still high in calories and fat, so for the time being I'd keep the enthusiasm in check. I won't be giving up my 85% Rapunzel daily ration, but I'm not sure I want to start thinking of it as a serious medicine (!). I just like the round of applause that it elicits from my tastebuds. That's really all I need from my chocolate. I'm a simple girl.