It’s not just what you’ve seen, that’s precisely how it works.
I’ve had a crash course in how chocolate percentages are determined recently since I’ve been researching chocolate as a medicine for my husband’s CFS. Essentially the chocolate percentages you see are an even split between the dark cocoa solids (including very small amounts of naturally occurring carbohydrate) and natural cocoa fat, and everything else is milk and sugar. (And in the case of more artificial chocolates: flavorings, fats that are not cocoa butter, emulsifiers, etc…) Mix-ins like coffee beans, raspberries, cookie pieces, etc… aren’t considered in the chocolate percentage.
So when you’re comparing dark chocolates, where milk isn’t a factor, everything that isn’t chocolate is essentially sugar. 67% dark chocolate bars contain 33% added sugar, whereas 85% chocolates only contain 15% sugar.
Packaging can be deceiving, though. Especially if they don’t list the exact percentage in the package, like Hershey’s Special Dark. Anything more than 50% naturally occurring chocolate ingredients can be called “dark chocolate”. So you can actually have very high sugar dark chocolate if it’s only 50.01% chocolate and 49.99% sugar.
Milk chocolates complicate things. It is possible for a milk chocolate bar with a low percentage to have the same exact amount of sugar as a dark chocolate bar, when the discrepancy lies in the milk content.
Yes! I understand. I always look at the carb counts on the package to figure how much chocolate I can eat. There’s times when you have a craving and for me, one small piece usually does the trick. I know how confounding it can be as we all react to things differently. I’ve gotten used to it and will sometimes just have a small bit then forget about it. I’m sure many of us on here do the same thing.
Hope your husband’s CFS improves - it must be so difficult. Have a few friends who experience it as well.
Yes - high percentages of dark chocolate can be quite bitter. Just like eating unsweetened chocolate, the kind you melt and then add all sorts of sugar to make it palatable.
OK, for those of you that like to think a little outside the box, I was hooked on baking chocolate (it contains no sugar at all) for a while after running out of pound plus Trader Joe’s 72% Cacao. I would break off a square of baker’s chocolate, wet it with water or Vodka, or some other liquid (saliva anyone?), dip it in a bowl of Splenda baking blend and voila have a wonderful bite of sugar free chocolate no more bitter than Trader Joe’s.
For my fellow chocoholics, beware, these are super easy to get hooked on.
Desperate times call for desperate measures for those of us who live rurally, 30+ miles from decent shopping.
I actually thought of your Trader Joe’s recommendation when I learned I needed to source really dark chocolate en mass. He’s supposed to eat essentially a pound of 85% dark chocolate a week for several weeks running. Then after a 2 week break, rinse and repeat. Sounds like a treat at first, but winds up being torturous. And that stuff is expensive! I figured he could just eat more of the 72%, but we don’t have a Trader Joe’s near us, and it costs waayyyyyyy more on Amazon.
I wound up just making him chocolate from scratch. Well, sorta, since I didn’t want to waste the expensive cocoa butter on something I knew he wouldn’t really enjoy. I just did the math and used what I had on hand. I melted 13.6 ounces of coconut oil in the microwave, then stirred in an equal 13.6 ounces of cocoa powder and 4.8 ounces of powdered sugar. Then I added a teaspoon of salt to help cut the bitterness. Poured it into ice cube molds, and put them in the fridge to set up. Was a really quick 2 lb dark chocolate solution, and it cost roughly 1/10th of sourcing real 85% chocolate. They had to be kept in the fridge because the summer heat softens the coconut oil really fast. But other than that, they were really good. Or so he said. I’m allergic to chocolate, so couldn’t test it myself. Thinking I might use some real cocoa butter next time.
For me though it isn’t just the carbs it is the type of carbs, that is what I meant. I don’t eat any grains, no potatoes or anything like that and for sure no Chinese food etc.
I also do not eat any artificial sweeteners anymore except Stevia, they cause terrible digestive problems. I am much better off with regular candy and chocolate. chocolate is something I eat every meal now. Candy I only eat trying to raise my blood sugar mostly smarties and sometimes skittles but I usually use juice.
I don’t really have trouble bolusing for fruit at all in small amounts and I can eat my homemade yogurt now too.
The surprise is that I can actually eat a fair amount of chocolate with each meal now and I’m doing pretty good. I do have a very much increased basal a lot of the time now, I need a lot more the past 3 years. But the chocolate also has helped me to gain weight back that’s what I was just discussing with Cde. However I suspect if I stop eating the chocolate I’m just gonna lose the weight again. I had lost a lot.
It has been a horrific 14 years or so. The best thing would be to get rid of this all together and just eat like a normal person again. another horrible thing is I feel like I’m starving all the time and it’s getting worse again.
I eat any natural food that I want. Potatoes and fruit are all good.
I avoid processed carbs and refined sugar. I also try to avoid fat and oil, even vegetable or olive oil.
I agree with your statement about artificial sweeteners, I used to eat them a lot, now I just don’t use any. I will use small amounts of sugar when I really want it.
I have always relied on yogurt to help with gut health. I’m trying to avoid eating too much dairy because of fat content, and I’ve found a few good alternatives.
Since I got my a1c lower in the past 2 years, 5.9 is my average now, I have been slowly gaining weight. I need to figure it out. I used to be a runner which made it easy.
Chocolate morsels in various Trail Mixes. Also like Nestle chocolate morsels, but have been buying peanut butter morsels instead. Chocolate is too easy to overeat/binge on. Like mixed peanut butter and chocolate too. Key is limited amount (grams).
I was buying the Swiss Miss 60 pack box from Bj’s but now with shrinkflation, the 60 pack box recently went to 50 packs. These packs can be made with either water or milk. I don’t want the extra carbohydrates that come from preparing this mix with milk so I microwave a cup of water, then when hot add the mix + some baking Splenda. I know, fake sugar vs milk, in the long run which is worse? It tastes kinda gross just made with water but adding the Splenda adds a lot to the flavor.
Ok i briefly glanced over the replies, lindt and stuff chocolate is chocolate and stuff. Dark chocolate like the 85% and above is very healthy. A square a day as they say. As for regular chocolate, a doctor a while ago recommended that i use Sunspire, the brand name, chocolate. There was another that she mentioned, but i forgot the name. I did try the Sunspire and thought it was very good. She recommended it and she was very much into what types of foods are healthier and better for diabetics. I won’t argue about this, but thats what a doctor specifically recommended to me.
I ended up having proteineuria (protein that was not expelled by the urine) in my kidney and also calcium oxalates in my kidney. I had never heard of oxalates. I thought I was eating a healthy diet. As it turns out, foods that contain the most oxalates are spinach and almonds. Dark chocolate was moderate as our nuts and peanut butter. Who knew? Not me.
This looks like an old discussion, but since dark shocolate has been my favorite confection since I was 8 years old, twenty years before my diabetes manifested, I thought I’d add my 2 cents.
I’ve tried every generally available brand sold in the US since I first tasted Hersheys Dark and Mars Bars in the 1950s. Chocolate has always been part of my daily diet, and since I was diagnosed I’ve gravitated toward “whole” chocolate instead of coated candies and choclate without other flavorings like mint or berry.
I have acute sense of taste and smell and tend to avoid highly seasoned foods, so what I like may not match others’ preferences, so let me tell you what I think of the most common commercial chocolates for reference from least good to best.
Briefly, I like Hershey’s chocolates the least, all their products including “special” dark chocolate tastes burnt and off. Ghiradelli tastes chalky. All Nestles chocolates have a spoiled milk aftertaste. Dove is ok but not special enough to justify its price. Russell Stover has good dark chocolate but only as a coating on filled candy except in small, expensive sampler bags that are hard to find between holidays.
I rank Aldi Choceur Dark Chocolate, with or without almonds between Dove and Stover If you like their favor profile, they may be the best value. At $1.49/150g they are a staple in our diet.
imo They have the best balance between dark and sweet at 49% cacao.
Each bar is divided into 15 blocks. The almond variety blocks have 55 Kcal, 5g fat, 2.7g carb (fiber deducted ), 16mg calcium.
If your prefernces run harsher, higher concentration varieties are available.
