hot chocolate that is good for you
I happened upon this recipe for "authentic" hot chocolate over at Sugar Savvy, and to my joy, found out that there is a way to make hot chocolate (and really, all chocolate) good for you. Apparently, it has to do with cocoa's antioxidants:
"When cocoa is combined with milk, the antioxidants in the cocoa bind to the proteins in the milk, making the antioxidants bio-unavailable, and therefore essentially useless."
Huh.
I wasn't able to find anything to back that up (the only article that mentioned it is in Nature, which I can't access), but here is some science related to cocoa and its antioxidant content:
Science says cocoa beats tea and red wine, but does not say anything about the milk + cocoa problem (nor does it compare to cranberry juice). Note that vegetables ultimately win over all.
More science: forget the word "antioxidant," it's really about a specific type of them, called flavonoids.
Either way, looks like a delicious hot chocolate recipe.
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That news is so good, I'm just going to take them at their word.
So...it's good or not good?!?!?
In that picture, the model is dipping a churro in hot chocolate!!! Just like I did in Spain with Murray--a whopping 7 years ago! Mmmmm...churros....I wonder if I can find a recipe for those...
Similarly, I've seen a bunch of news articles lately warning that adding milk to tea cancels the health benefits of tea. Something about the proteins in milk prohibiting our arteries to expand. Big bummer. But thanks for the link to the water-based cocoa recipe!