Re: Re: Cocoa, Chocolate, etc.

[Guest guest]

You know palmitic doesn't concern me as much any more since Perlman said 85% of the effect was myristic and we make palmitic. Of course. I don't eat that much fat anyway.

Regards.

----- Original Message -----

From: Rodney

Sent: Monday, March 07, 2005 12:27 PM

Subject: [ ] Re: Cocoa, Chocolate, etc.

Hi JW:Yes, but according to nutritiondata.com 'cocoa butter' contains a fair amount of palmitic acid, like palm oil. Fortunately, unlike coconut and palm kernel oils, it contains negligible amounts of myristic.I certainly agree that many, including some of the more expensive and fancy-packaged, 'chocolate' brands contain considerable amounts of hydrogenated fats. In at least one case of a product I was given one Easter, the entire product appeared to be hydrogenated fat, and the words 'chocolate' and 'cocoa' did not appear in the ingredient list. Yet the package called it "chocolate". Yer gotta check the ingredient lists and hope that they are accurate.Rodney.I stick to Hershey's because the packages indicate it is made from cocoa butter, as opposed to palm oil, hydrogenated fat, etc. > I've noticed 3 things, cocoa, chocolate liquor, and cocoa butter, (not to be confused with the designation of cocoa butter for thick coconut oil). > Some products may use cocoa liquor and hydrogenated fat, eg. > ly, if you like the taste of chocolate, I think plain cocoa in milk, like a smoothee is pretty good, without the fat. > > Regards.

[Guest guest]

AND my experience is that it doesn't matter if it's "gourmet" or not, if it sells really well, they will change it to cheaper contents before long. There's like an economic organic model, that goes sugar ->-> corn syrup.

Take ice cream, eg. Is there any ice cream made that is eggs, milk, cream, sugar (sucrose)? They still call it ice cream. So I get to call a smoothee made from yogurt and frozen blueberries, "ice cream".

Regards.

----- Original Message -----

From: Rodney

Sent: Monday, March 07, 2005 7:58 PM

Subject: [ ] Re: Cocoa, Chocolate, etc.

Hi :Is there a way to determine the healthiness of the products available at Chocosphere.com? In my experience of examining ingredient lists on chocolate products I have found that if I don't read the fine print I can easily confuse 'gourmet' with fancy packaging and high price. (Of course, the same is sometimes true of cars, and many other products also).I didn't see ingredient lists for any of the three products there that I took a look at. Nor a nutrient breakdown. It would be nice to be able to calculate the grams of fat, carbs and protein per hundred grams, and a breakout of the fats by type. Hydrogenated vegetable oils and sugar are readily available and cheaper than cocoa products so there will always be a temptation to use them to reduce costs. And added fats and sugar can make just about anything taste better too, of course. Excerpt from Encyclopaedia Britannica: "In making chocolate, the kernels of fermented and roasted cacao beans are ground into a paste called chocolate liquor, which may be hardened in molds to form baking (bitter) chocolate, pressed to reduce the cocoa butter (vegetable fat) content and then pulverized to make cocoa powder, or mixed with sugar and additional cocoa butter to make sweet (eating) chocolate. The addition of concentrated milk to sweet chocolate produces milk chocolate. White chocolate, made from cocoa butter, sugar, milk, and vanilla, contains no cocoa solids". Perhaps they could have added that the product tastes about the same if they replace the expensive cocoa butter with hydrogenated palm kernel oil.All of which helps explain my desire to see the fine print!Rodney.