Chocolate: Behind Its Bad Rap

In today's society, chocolate is everywhere. It seems that people have developed a love-hate relationship with chocolate. According to the U.S. Department of Commerce, in 1997, the average American ate 11.7 pounds of chocolate. American adults ranked chocolate as the most-craved food and as their favorite flavor by a three-to-one margin. (Mustad, 2001)

Throughout the world, exists a society of chocolate lovers. While Americans consume, on average, nearly twelve pounds of chocolate per year, we are not the biggest fans. The British eat 161/2 pounds and the Swiss, the inventors of milk chocolate, consume the most at 22 pounds per person.

However, while people love it, they can't help feeling a pang of guilt when eating it because over the years, chocolate has gotten a "bad rap" as being an unhealthy food. However, recent research is slowly unraveling the hidden truth about chocolate - that...
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