Anxious About Chocolate Antioxidant Sources? Orac Scores Clarify ChoicesSearch here to quickly find information you're looking for.  Custom Search Unsure which chocolate products provide the most antioxidants? ORAC scores guide you to the best choices saving you time and energy. Nine common chocolate foods were tested. The results are painfully clear. Dark chocolateproducts dominate. Read it and weep milk chocolate fans. Your favorite ranked near the bottom. But all is not lost. Milk chocolate did manage to score higher than chocolate syrup and cocoa mix.
What is ORAC?What is ORAC? ORAC stands for Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity. It's a way to measure the capacity of a food to fight health-damaging free radicals. The higher the score or value, the more free radicals a food can nullify.Destroy them before they can destroy you. A diet rich in foods with a high orac value mayslow down aging of the body and brain. Kind of important wouldn't you say? How do we know the free radical fighting ability of these chocolate products? The United States Department of Agriculture, in 2007, published the ORAC values (scores) of common foods. Fortunately, nine chocolate products were included. Check the chart. Save time. Add the delicious foods packed with precious antioxidants. Skip the ones that don't deliver.
ORAC Chart of 9 Chocolate ProductsThe chart speaks for itself. Most of the dark chocolate products deliver a big dose ofantioxidants. Milk chocolate was left in the dust.So just where on the list did milk chocolate rank? Number 6 out of 9. That's a pretty anemic performance. The ORAC scores are per 100 grams or about 3.5 ounces of each food.
(Data taken from the USDA's Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity (ORAC) of Selected Foods – 2007) These are average scores, not typical. Antioxidant levels can vary for a multitude of reasons. Still, those are some impressive averages for dark chocolate products! Remember, the list is meant to be a guide not a guarantee. Now you know which chocolate foods are the best sources of antioxidants. How many ORAC units do you need?
Is There an RDA for Antioxidants?Nope, there's no official Recommended Daily Allowance for antioxidants, yet. Scientists haven't figured out how much of each antioxidant you should take each day.But Prior and Cao, researchers from the USDA's Agricultural Research Service, recommend an intake of 3,000 to 5,000 Orac units per day. They didn't just pull that number out of thin air. It's based on years of studying the effects of antioxidant foods on aging. Dark chocolate can easily provide a large portion of that, if not all. So is it safe to devour more units than that per day? Yes. If the extra antioxidants
come from a conventional diet, according to Cornell University's Dr. Chang Lee, food chemist.
Why Not Just Take an Antioxidant Supplement?You could do that and avoid calories and fat. But studies show that taking supplements of single antioxidant vitamins or minerals...
Seems it safer to stick to natural sources of antioxidants found in foods like chocolate.It's a complex food containing multiple antioxidants. Pills just can't provide all the protective benefits. Ditch the pills. Eat chocolate. It's more fun and better for you! Let the ORAC scores guide you to the good stuff.
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