Aptly named the “love drug” or “food of the gods”, you don’t have to tell us twice to eat more chocolate. And no other dessert ingredient even comes close to containing the same outrageous health benefits.
We’ve dished on the many health benefits of cacao in our superfood spotlights and thrown our favorite bean into endless recipe features. Now let’s talk the hard stuff: literally, the pure chocolate bars we love.
Find one of these six incredible bars to add to your own chocolate stash – and here’s a refresher on why this indulgent treat is worth the splurge…
Chocolate has skin-perfecting and energy boosting benefits from minerals like calcium, sulfur, zinc, and magnesium. It is a potent muscle relaxant and promotes a sense of calm. Cacao’s plethora of antioxidant polyphenols, also found in red wine and tea, help to reduce oxidation of LDL or bad cholesterol and inhibit blood platelets from clumping. This complex ingredient even has the power to single-handedly boost our mood and enhance our sexuality – we don’t call it the love drug for nothin’:
the love drug
Phenethylamine (PEA)
Present in small quantities in chocolate, phenethylamine stimulates the nervous system and releases opium-like compounds, endorphins.
PEA increases the activity of dopamine, a neuro-chemical directly associated with sexual arousal and pleasure. PEA acts as an antidepressant and produces the same brain chemistry as when we fall in love.
Anandamide
Anandamide is another compound in cacao similar to amphetamine that increases excitement, alertness, overall mood and relieves depression. Its name is derived from the Sanskrit word, ananda, meaning bliss and produces an elated feeling of euphoria.
6 Ways To Take The Love Drug
Most of chocolate’s health benefits are greatly diminished when chocolate is processed. Reach for a bar using cacao in its natural state.
Compartés x Pressed Juicery Bar |
Inspired by Pressed’s date-sweetened almond milks, this dairy-free bar is loaded with almond and date pieces, vanilla, and handcrafted South American sourced dark chocolate. Covered in vanilla bean mandalas, we can’t say the packaging doesn’t add to the overall desire of this tempting bar. We can’t wait for the other juice inspired bars to come!
Zennbunni Chocolates |
We can’t get enough of this adorable couple’s dairy and refined sugar-free chocolates. Completely biodynamic and sustainably-sourced, with a collection of inventive herbal and medicinal blends, each flavor tells a story of its creation and health benefits. We love Spirit Weaver combined with hibiscus flower, blood orange and elderflower, and Rejuvenation, infused with sea buckthorn, camu camu, schizandra, pearl, calendula flowers, carrot seed and chamomile.
Kiss of Venus: Chocolate of the Goddess |
Not only is this chocolate sourced from some of the finest wild heirloom Ecuadorian cacao, its chocolatier, Julia, enhances its benefits with unrefined sun-dried cane crystals, vanilla bean, cardamom, rose otto and pearl powder. Rose otto helps to open the heart to love while pearl powder is known as a beauty tonic that promotes lustrous and clear skin. We can’t get enough!
This brand goes through a careful process to obtain cacao in its unroasted form. A rare treat, unroasted cacao has a more profound effect in the body when consumed.
Pure 7: Stevia Pure7 Dark Bar |
With our health in mind, this chocolate was created without any refined sugars. Using only whole leaf raw stevia powder, it’s completely sugar free, fairtrade, and never heated above 115 degrees. This chocolate only tastes like an indulgence.
Liberty Chocolate: Honey Sweetened Bar |
This chocolate is the real deal. Sweetened exclusively with wildflower honey, it is dairy-free as well as soy-free. Their chocolate is sustainably sourced from organic growers in Peru and still processed in the traditional manner, sun-dried on banana leaves and then dry roasted. Try all their flavors from chai espresso, almond pomegrante and even salted caramel using coconut caramel.
Sacred Chocolate |
Founded by raw chocolate pioneer, David Wolfe, this bean to bar wildcrafted chocolate company is known for their exotic flavors combining raw chocolate with medicinal and nutraceutical properties. All 18 flavors are worth exploring, but we’re loving Holy Hemp, made with hempseed and medicinal CBD hemp oil, Holy Ca Cow, a creamy chocolate made with grass fed raw whey protein and maple syrup, and Immuno Mushroom, packed with immunity boosting mushrooms such as chaga, turkey tail, reishi maitake and more.
