Easter approaches and you might have been given advance warning by the stacks of chocolate Easter eggs that have been on supermarket shelves since late February. Instead of quoting warnings from health authorities about over-consumption, in this Dorsal View we’ll look back at a time when cocoa was considered to have therapeutic properties and how that has evolved all the way to the supermarket shelf.
The very modern, soothing psychological influence of chocolate and a good movie needs no explanation. But more than 4,000 years ago the Mayans and Aztecs blended chocolate with ingredients like honey, chilli peppers, and cornmeal for physical healing purposes. Or so they believed. The chocolate in question was called ‘xocoatl’, with crushed cocoa the main ingredient.
This elixir was also used in ceremonies by the healers of the time, along with chants to conjure up the spirits of trees or animals. This appears to be the earliest recorded use of cocoa as a therapeutic and it was taken to ease stomach problems, such as indigestion. It was also commonly mixed with tree bark to treat infections, or with maize to lower a fever.
The 16th Century Florentine Codex is considered the most reliable early account of Mesoamerican culture and contains a chocolate-based prescription to treat a cough of unknown aetiology: Tea brewed with the tail of an opossum, followed by a brew made from chocolate, herbs, vanilla, and peppers. The chocolate was often used simply to mask the rancid taste of some of these concoctions.
It was the Spanish conquest of Mexico that brought chocolate to the attention of the Western world and the early invaders were taken aback by its use as a therapeutic. One of its most immediate and obvious effects was to help those who had lost weight through illness. A modern-day nutritionist might have something to say about that, but clearly, chocolate was used and studied by healers over some time.
Chocolate was introduced to Europe from the ‘New World’ in the 1500s, initially in Spain. Monks and nuns were among the first to get a taste for it and monks would often swig it as drinking chocolate before services. Over the next 100 years, it spread throughout the continent. It was particularly popular with the nobility and, in fact, Marie Antoinette had her own personal chocolatier. There’s a pun in there somewhere about the elite hobnobbing with chocolate, but I’ll spare you.
Over the following centuries, chocolate inexorably grew in popularity. It wasn’t until the late 18th Century that it made its appearance in Ireland and the first brand to emerge was Fry’s Chocolate Cream in 1908. Now, revenue from the sales of chocolate products is approximately €250 million per year in Ireland.
Worldwide, ‘Big Chocolate’ is targeting the products that are believed to confer some kind of mild health benefits, such as dark chocolate high in cocoa content. There is also more of a focus by consumers on how equitably the chocolate is produced, which will influence the range of products that emerge.
So the earliest efforts to use chocolate as a therapeutic have crystallised into building a research base for the health benefits of dark chocolate. Dark chocolate contains a flavanol called epicatechin, a powerful antioxidant, and some studies suggest regular intake can lower blood pressure, improve circulation, and even have a preventive role in cardiovascular disease.
Studies are ongoing and becoming more numerous, but most suggest that dark chocolate should contain at least 70 per cent cocoa to provide any health benefits.
The exact ‘dose’ has not yet been calculated definitively, but it should of course be kept in mind by consumers that it also contains sugar and fat. As ever, moderation is the byword.
That said, it would appear that in the right amounts, high-cocoa dark chocolate confers some health benefits. These include the benefits of flavonols for the immune system and to reduce oxidative stress and epicatechin for cell protection and better processing of insulin.
As always, there’s a catch for the average consumer, as high-cocoa dark chocolate is considerably more expensive than the most popular chocolate brands.
From humble beginnings, chocolate has become ensconced in society as a symbolic gift for almost any occasion. Just ask any nurse.
To make sense of it all, the final word goes to actor and comedian Larry David: “Switzerland is a place where they don’t like to fight, so they get people to do their fighting for them while they ski and eat chocolate.”
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