Tidbits: How Much Dark Chocolate is the Dose for Health?

Well, chances are that by now, you have worked your way through your Valentine box of chocolates.  No matter if you got the chocolate as a gift or you picked them up yourself the day after Valentine’s for a bargain.

You were probably thinking, “chocolate is good for me”, when you got them, especially if you listen to the news often enough.

So here are my questions for you, to get you to think a minute:

• Did you eat the whole box within a week?
• Did you share with anyone?
• Did you make a vow to eat one piece per day until it was gone (because you always watch your weight)?
• Did you ask for or buy dark chocolate? Or are you a milk chocolate fan? 

• And last but not least, have you ever thought about how much chocolate you “need” in order to be healthy?

One thing amazes me in news stories about nutrition and food: The reporters give you the sound bite, “dark chocolate is good for (fill in the blank with either your heart, brain, blood pressure, cholesterol)”, but they neglect to mention “the rest of the story”, including the amount of chocolate that the study participants ate to get the good results.

According to the February 2013 issue of Tufts University Health and Nutrition Letter, yes, dark chocolate is good for you. But don’t take that as a license to eat a ton of it. Moderation may be a boring word, but that is the word of the day when it comes to chocolate.  Tufts reported that in one study, published in JAMA in 2007, it took just 6.3 grams (0.2 ounces) of dark chocolate per day to see a beneficial effect on blood pressure in people with mildly elevated blood pressure. 

So what is 6.3 grams of chocolate?  Half of a small square of foil-wrapped chocolate, or 7 Ghirardelli Double "dark" chocolate chips, or 13 Nestle’s semi-sweet chocolate chips.

A piddling amount of chocolate is all you need each day. Pictured is the "dose" of Ghirardelli Dark chips with a "normal" chocolate chip in the middle to compare size.

As for the quiz questions above? If you were truly eating chocolate “for your health”, that box of chocolate should have lasted at least until now (2 weeks later). Unless, of course, you share. 

"Healthy" Oat Chocolate Chip Cookies

So how can a cookie be healthy? When whole wheat flour replaces some of the white, when it contains oats, and when it has half dark chocolate chips and half semi-sweet.  If you came to my house for a visit, these are the cookies I almost always have on hand.

This recipe is an adaptation of the oatmeal cookie recipe on the Quaker Oat box. It took a few tweaks to get it to the point where I am happy with the results.

Here's the reason why I thought I had better retype the recipe I actually use:

Can you read all those extra scribbles in the margins? Me neither. But I have the recipe memorized; I keep this old recipe cut from the box just in case I have a brain fart.

Anyway, here's what I really do:

Healthy Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies       

• 1-1/4  cups (2-1/2 sticks) margarine or butter, softened (I use one stick butter and the rest margarine)
• 3/4  cup firmly packed brown sugar
• 1/2  cup granulated sugar
• 1  egg
• 1  teaspoon vanilla
• 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
• 1  teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2  teaspoon salt
• 3  cups Quaker® Oats, uncooked (I use “quick oats”)
• 2 cups chocolate chips (half 60 percent Bittersweet Ghirardelli dark and half Nestle Toll House chips)        
• Heat oven to 375°F. In large bowl, beat margarine, butter and sugars until creamy. Add egg and vanilla; beat well. In separate bowl, combine flours, baking soda and salt; mix into sugar / margarine mixture. Add oats; mix well. Add chocolate chips, mix well.

Drop dough by rounded tablespoonfuls (I use a one-tablespoon scoop) onto ungreased cookie sheets.

Bake 10 minutes. Cool 1-2 minutes on the cookie sheet; remove to wire rack. Cool completely. Store tightly covered and freeze.

Nutrition information per cookie: 128 calories, 1 gram protein, 7 grams fat, 15 grams carbohydrate, 1 gram fiber, 9 milligrams cholesterol, 88 milligrams sodium