Dietary cocoa improves health of obese mice; likely has implications for humans

[Mary]

And who knew? Apparently this is a delicacy popular in North Dakota! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chocolate-covered_potato_chips

I remember a recent discussion about the medicinal value of heavily salted potato chips so can only imagine the benefits when slathered in very good dark chocolate!

 

[Booble]

I remember a recent discussion about the medicinal value of heavily salted potato chips so can only imagine the benefits when slathered in very good dark chocolate!

That would be a "med" I could get behind!

 

[Strawberry]

My BP has gone up the last several months. I don't know why, I haven't changed eating patterns or anything.

If you like beets, they are good at lowering blood pressure. Which reminds me I need to eat some before tomorrow’s shot...

I know, right? The second I saw that article, I knew it was sent by some protective higher force.

And here I just found two extra cans of cocoa that I intended to give away. I will be keeping them for myself now!

I wonder if it’s ok to eat a bunch of fat bombs daily? That WAS the reason for buying so much cocoa. I just never had the energy to make them.

TO ANYONE:

Did they say anywhere how much should be consumed?

 

[wabi-sabi]

Here's a review article of human studies which might be a bit more applicable than mouse size doses.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5539137/

 

[Booble]

You can consume quite a bit of cocoa. I've read studies done on sheltered tribes that drink something like 8 - 10 cups of cocoa per day. There was concern that they might have kidney problems (which is what I was wondering about and how I found the research) but in fact there was no evidence of kidney problems in this population. Evidently they have been drinking large amounts of cocoa for generations.

 

[pattismith]

@YippeeKi YOW !!

I have no idea if cocoa had an effect on my oxalate problem, because I completely stopped my cocoa consumption in 2019, and I only identified my urine oxalates some months ago.

The reason why I stopped was exacerbation of my acne, another known condition linked to cocoa.

The chocolate I was eating was a wonderful raw dark chocolate, (it was really heartbreaking to stop it as I was an heavy eater), but once the effect on my skin became evident, I had no other choice.

According to our results, dark chocolate appears to increase both epidermal corneocyte desquamation and Gram-positive microorganism presence on the surface of the facial skin (Figures 1b and and1c);1c); however, the difference between the initial and concluding points of the study was convincing only in the young group (Table 2).
Although the molecular mechanisms of these shifts remain obscure, cocoa components have been previously shown to increase production of interleukin 1-beta (IL1β), an inflammatory cytokine,20 and results of a recent study suggest that chocolate potentiates IL1β induction by P. acnes.21 It is interesting that IL1β expression was shown to precede keratinocyte cornification,22 thus being directly linked to eventual corneocyte desquamation, the enhancement of which might be interpreted as a proinflammatory phenomenon

.

Continuous Dark Chocolate Consumption Affects Human Facial Skin Surface by Stimulating Corneocyte Desquamation and Promoting Bacterial Colonization (nih.gov)

 

[YippeeKi YOW !!]

Here's a review article of human studies which might be a bit more applicable than mouse size doses.

The posted article very thoughtfully translated the 'mouse-sized' dosages into human consumption terms ....

I'm not sure if I'm remembering accurately, but I think it worked out to approx 5 cups of cocoa a day, but you'll want to read the article and double check that for yourself, since my brain function doesn't come with any guarantees. Believe me, I've checked for that option repeatedly ....

 

[Rufous McKinney]

The reason why I stopped was exacerbation of my acne,

I can get away with modest dark chocolat consumption, but if I eat too much....I get an odd type of- well swelling on my scalp. Its happened several times.

so my chocolate dose is just once during a day.