Matt Metzgar

Chocolate: The Darker the Better

I've now come across a few studies showing that dark chocolate, as compared to traditional milk chocolate, is quite good for you.  One of the better studies is this one, which shows that eating a daily piece of dark chocolate can lower blood pressure in subjects with hypertension. 

The key healthy ingredient in dark chocolate appears to be cocoa flavonoids.  This particular study compared dark chocolate to white chocolate, because white chocolate actually has no cocoa (or cocoa flavonoids) in it.  Milk chocolate does have cocoa flavonoids in it, but not nearly as much as dark chocolate.

Does dark chocolate fit in the Paleolithic framework?  Yes, because chocolate is actually a fruit, made from the seeds of cacao trees.

I have begun incorporating some dark chocolate in my diet.  From what I've read, it's important to select dark chocolate that has at least 70% cocoa content.  This is the type of dark chocolate that has been used in the research studies, and it appears to provide the most  health benefits.  Some manufacturers produce dark chocolate with much less cocoa content, hence reducing the health benefits of the product.  The amount of cocoa content for any dark chocolate product is usually listed on the packaging.

Meat Intake

The scientific evidence that early humans ate meat is very convincing, almost overwhelmingly so.  But the question of how much meat they ate (and how often) is still very much debated.  For the past few years, I have usually included some type of protein/meat with each meal.  Loren Cordain has been a big proponent of this, suggesting that people should consume lean meat at each meal.

Lately, my thoughts on this subject have begun to change.  Igniting this change is some more recent research done by Cordain in regards to  hunter-gatherer meal patterns.  In his latest Paleo diet newsletter, Cordain summarizes the exisiting research on this issue.  A few main ideas emerge: 1) hunter-gatherers ate "breakfast" about only one of every three days; this breakfast was mostly leftovers from the previous day's dinner.  2) They almost never ate lunch.  3)  The largest (and sometimes only) meal of the day was dinner, which included the meat from the day's hunt.

From this evidence, it looks like hunter-gatherers usually only consumed meat once a day, at dinnertime.  The may have consumed a lot of meat during this time, but it was only at one setting and not spread throughout the day.  I'm betting this type of meat consumption has quite a different impact on the body than eating meat 2-3 separate times per day.

Activity Threshold

Here and there, I've read pieces that talk about how many calories of exercise would be needed to burn off a specific food.  For example, an article may say you need to walk 4 miles just to burn off the calories in a Big Mac.  This type of view incorrectly suggests that diet is the engine behind weight management, and that exercise is ineffective.

Two facts poke holes in this theory.  The first is that food intake balances out over the course of a week.  A splurge one day naturally leads to less eating the next day or two.  This is mostly an unconscious process, as the body attempts to regulate total food intake.

The second fact is that, over the course of a week, activity needs to pass a certain threshold for one to lose weight.  If you pass this threshold and eat a halfway decent diet, you will lose weight.  If you don't, nothing will happen.  A piece of cheesecake or some other indulgence won't alter this process.  People worry about eating too much, but many heavy exercisers eat more than the average couch potato.  The key to weight loss is energy expenditure - not counting every calorie you eat.