Cocoa Flavonols – The Healthy Part Of Chocolate

Cocoa Flavanols Guide

Cocoa flavanols are the compounds that make chocolate good for you. What’s the best way to take cocoa flavanols for health benefits? Here’s our guide.

What Are Cocoa Flavanols?

We’ve known for a long time that chocolate is somewhat good for you. The main problem with chocolate and cocoa is that it’s often surrounded by sugars, fats, and other unhealthy compounds.

Thanks to new food technologies, however, Cocoa Flavonols – which are the active health-promoting ingredients in chocolate – are easier to access than ever before.

Food manufacturers are starting to release products that have purified the benefits of cocoa flavanols while leaving the unhealthy parts of traditional chocolate out. That means you can enjoy the taste of chocolate and the health benefits at the same time.

To understand what cocoa flavanols are, we have to talk about flavonoids. Flavonoids are a class of naturally-occurring compounds found within foods like fruits, vegetables, and other plant-based foods.

Flavanols – like cocoa flavanols – are a distinct group of chemical compounds found within the flavonoid family. The most prominent flavanols in the world today come from the flavonoids in tea, red wine, and cocoa.

Cocoa flavanols are classed as phytonutrients. They’re unique because they can only be found in the cocoa bean.

The cocoa beans themselves come from the fruit of the tree, Theobroma cacao, which grows naturally in subtropical regions of the world. Theobroma actually means “food of the goods”.

Health Benefits of Cocoa Flavanols

Most of the health benefits of cocoa flavanols revolve around the ability of these flavanols to positively influence the body’s cardiovascular system. Cocoa flavanols do this by keeping blood vessels healthy and by supporting good circulation.

Cocoa flavanols help support healthy circulation by encouraging your arteries to stay flexible as they age. Your body’s circulatory system delivers oxygen and nutrients wherever they need to go within the body. When the blood vessels and arteries in this system are flexible, it helps your body deliver those benefits exactly where they need to go.

Unlike with other natural compounds, there have been a number of studies reinforcing the cardiovascular benefits of cocoa flavanols. Check out the dozens of references at the bottom of this article to learn more about some of the studies that have been done on flavanols and flavonoids.

Many of those studies reveal that cacao works by raising nitric oxide levels within the body. Nitric oxide widens blood vessels, lowering your blood pressure.

At the same time, cocoa flavanols work as antioxidants, which means they target free radicals within your blood stream. This can reduce your risk of disease.

In addition to containing flavanols, cacao beans contain a significant amount of the xanthine theobromine (1.2% by weight). Cacao beans also contain nearly 400 other identified compounds – in future studies, we may learn more about the health benefits of cocoa flavanols.

How to Enjoy the Health Benefits of Cocoa Flavanols

Why aren’t we eating cocoa beans every day? The truth is: raw cacao beans are bitter and virtually inedible.

That’s why we process cacao beans and turn them into foods we can eat – like chocolate. To turn cacao beans into chocolate, we roast them, ferment them, ground them, and separate them into cocoa powder and cocoa butter.

Here’s where the problem lies: these modern processing methods strip the flavanols from cocoa, which is why modern chocolate bars don’t come with superfood-like health benefits.

The flavanols have a bitter flavor, which is why we strip them from chocolate during processing. Traditionally, people have eaten chocolate for its sweetness.

However, now that we’ve identified the health benefits of cocoa flavanols, there has been a renewed push to introduce these flavanols back into chocolate production.

CocoaVia and Cocoa Flavanols

Cocoa flavanols have been popping up around the internet more and more lately. A big reason for that is CocoaVia, a food manufacturer that has recently begun selling its CocoaVia cocoa extract supplement online.

CocoaVia is a cocoa flavanols supplement available in capsules or powdered stick packs.

The 90 capsule package of CocoaVia capsules is priced at $44.99 per bottle, while the 30 count box of single serving powdered packets is priced at $44.99. You can save about 15% off both these prices by signing up for the company’s autoship program.

The creators of CocoaVia claim that their supplement can offer huge cardiovascular system benefits. By targeting the cardiovascular system, the supplement can improve the health of all of the following:

— Heart Health
— Brain Health
— Muscle, Skin, & Eye Health
— Exercise Performance

CocoaVia works by expanding your blood vessels, which makes it easier for your circulatory system to deliver valuable oxygen and nutrients throughout your body. As mentioned above, this blood vessel expansion is related to the fact that cocoa flavanols appear to raise nitric oxide (NO) levels within your blood.

Ultimately, cocoa flavanols are more popular today than they have ever been before. Thanks to new advances in food manufacturing technology, companies are able to purify the benefits of cocoa flavanols while stripping away unwanted fatty acids and sugars. By creating the perfect combination of cocoa flavanols, these manufacturers have ensued you can enjoy substantial cardiovascular benefits.

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