While most people usually think of chocolate as a food --- and a delicious sweet food at that --- they probably don't think that it contains substances that have the same effects as some medications. And people certainly are not likely to put chocolate in the same category as amphetamines. However, chocolate does have some drug-like characteristics and can affect the heart.
About Chocolate
Chocolate is made from a tree called Theobroma Cacao. The dried, fermented meat of the cacao bean that comes from this tree is used to produce chocolate liquor. The trees only grow in a limited range close to the equator, so cacao farming is limited to West Africa, Central America, parts of South America and the Caribbean Islands. Chocolate manufacturers use the chocolate liquor to create bittersweet baking chocolate, which contains the hardened liquor and no other additives, as well as eating and cooking chocolates, which also have varying amounts of the liquor plus sugar, cocoa butter and lethicin.
Chocolate Compounds
Chocolate is surprisingly complex. It contains more than 300 different chemicals, a number of which are stimulants. Caffeine, theobromine, and phenylethylamine are three of those stimulants; phenylethylamine is actually chemically related to amphetamines. The caffeine in particular can have an effect on the heart. According to Art Pollard, founder and head chocolate maker of the Amano Chocolate Company, dark chocolate will contain more caffeine than any other form of chocolate, because it contains more of the cocoa solids in which the caffeine is found. While exact recipes vary, Pollard says that a pound of 90 percent dark chocolate contains about 816 mg, while an ounce --- a more likely serving size --- contains about 102 mg of caffeine. From the standpoint of caffeine, eating a 1 oz. serving of chocolate is about the same as drinking an 8-oz. cup of brewed coffee.
About the Caffeine in Chocolate
Biologist Neal J. Smatresk, dean of the College of Science at the University of Texas at Arlington, has studied how caffeine works in the human body. He reports that caffeine blocks or breaks down chemical messengers; one of these is cyclic adenosine monophosphate, or cAMP. By stopping the breakdown of cAMP, caffeine makes the body release two other neurotransmitters, norepinephrine and epinephrine. These increase the rate and force at which the heart muscle contracts. Smatresk's research appeared in the February 1999 issue of the "Scientific American" journal.
Considerations and Warnings
While chocolate is not a high-caffeine substance, both Art Pollard and the Mayo Clinic note that some people are more sensitive to the effects of caffeine, and that people who have heart conditions or are otherwise not in good health should consider restricting caffeine intake. The Mayo Clinic reports that more than 500 to 600 mg of caffeine a day can increase heart rate and cause nervousness or insomnia --- that would be the equivalent of eating about 5 to 6 oz. of dark chocolate.
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