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The Future Is Now!

The Discovery Of The Century: Chemists Create Chocolate With Half The Fat

by Kellie Foxx-Gonzalez | 4:15 pm, August 14th, 2012


Good news everyone! We don’t have to fear haters snapping their head back Exorcist-style to judge our dietary choices when we reach for a chocolate bar in public anymore! Scientists have discovered a way to cut the fat in chocolate by half through the use of fruit juice. Finally, an adequate solution to the eternal, seemingly unsolvable equation: “Chocolate + ? = Cellulite-less thighs.” Science strikes again, ladies!

Business Insider reports the process involves creating a “Pickering emulsion” synthesis to infuse micro-bubbles of fruit juice into chocolate, replacing the fat and retaining the “the silky smooth,” yet snappy texture of chocolate. Of course, the fruit juice ends up leaving an aftertaste, so researchers suggesting adding a Vitamin C solution to to nullify any lingering fruity flavors.

According to study researcher Stefan Bon, this is “just the starting point to healthier chocolate – we’ve established the chemistry behind this new technique but now we’re hoping the food industry will take our method to make tasty, lower-fat chocolate bars.” After all, “everyone loves chocolate – but unfortunately we all know that many chocolate bars are high in fat.”

Sarcasm aside, what bothers me about innovations like this is that it inevitably leads to a convoluted, shifting, and extraordinarily false dichotomy between the new option and the old option, and the resulting opinions often carry over to the person choosing between both products. I say this as a fat woman very experienced in the realm of dieting and being policed publicly for food choices — if you don’t drink diet soda, you’re not a hip weight-conscious 20-something, if you do, you’re ruining your metabolism/giving yourself cancer/giving into Big Business. Applied to this newfangled fruit juice chocolate, I imagine it would look something like this: “Oh, you’re eating that diet chocolate? Shouldn’t you be eating quinoa/a morsel of Fair Trade Organic 99% dark chocolate/nothing instead?” and “Oh, you’re eating regular chocolate? Shouldn’t you be eating fruit juice chocolate instead?” Can’t we ever win?

Perhaps my bitter switch has been flicked on for eternity, but I just don’t think fruit juice and ascorbic acid chocolate will improve the lives of weight-conscious chocoholics, mostly because eating chocolate while having cellulite is always seen negatively, no matter what kind of chocolate it is. To that end, maybe we could leave the delicious treat that’s been around for 3000 years alone. Or, we could even keep this science!chocolate around– let’s just work on not making ourselves and each other feel like shit for eating as much or as little of it as we want.

(via CNN and Business Insider.)

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  • http://twitter.com/TheWhaler Meg

    I think people should worry less about what people think of them for their choices and worry more about what is actually good for them. 

  • Christine Watson

    Too bad sugar makes you fat (and diabetic). People think anything that’s ‘Fat-Free’ or ‘Low Fat’ ibecomes magically healthier, but that’s just not true.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Christina-Newhall/13307033 Christina Newhall

    Kellie, I’m sorry you hang out with so many jerks. If anyone tries to vocally judge me for my food choices, I do everything short of punching them in the face. Because, y’know, might as well keep the negative reinforcement flying!
    Sounds to me like this diet chocolate will be lower in fat, but probably have more sugar (because fruit juice is kinda pure sugar), and thus about as many calories. It may be even worse for diabetics. And I’m guessing it’ll be useless for melting and baking with. So I don’t think this development is nearly as revolutionary as its PR team is making it out to be.

  • Angel S.

    Dark chocolate is good for you … yes, really, including and especially the fat.  Removing the fat and replacing it with sugar is just stupid. 

     http://www.marksdailyapple.com/why-you-should-eat-and-drink-high-cacao-dark-chocolate/#axzz23Z8zSRaP

  • Anonymous

    I very much doubt that this will taste even remotely like normal chocolate. Part of the reason chocolate tastes good is the fat and the sugar in it. If apples just tasted like chocolate we wouldn’t be having this conversation now.

  • http://www.facebook.com/randomactscomics Jennifer Walker

    What makes chocolate chocolate is the cocoa butter content, aka the fat (which is why most white “chocolate” isn’t really). Removing half the fat doesn’t make it low-fat chocolate, it makes it a chocolate blended with fruit sugars. Indulgences are fine, folks, as long as you balance them with healthier options. Enjoy your chocolate as-is (and, yes, dark is relatively healthier) for what it is. Sheesh. 

  • mildred louis

    I wish people would start to realize that we actually do need fat in our diets. Good fat, mind you, but still, we need fat. Sugar, on the other hand, both makes you dumb and can be just as detrimental to your health as too much bad fat (and then some). I wouldn’t eat this new chocolate even if someone paid me. It pretty much takes away what’s delicious about chocolate and introduces what I hate about most candies. I would also imagine that this would make using chocolate as an addition to baked products a complete and total pain.

  • John Wao

    Now they need to start working on donuts.

  • http://twitter.com/GirlsAreGeeks Girls Are Geeks

    Exactly! This is nutritional nonsense, because it takes a slightly balanced food (dark chocolate actually is balanced!) and takes away the one thing that might bring down your insulin levels and replaces it with something that doctors tell people to avoid. 100% juice is still 100% sugar people, it’s just a slightly different molecule.

  • Anonymous

    No, we’d be having a different conversation.  Probably one about how “chocopples” are horrible immoral genetically modified food, and eating one is supporting Giant Faceless Corporations.  

    Because, alas, scary laboratory candy-apple mutants aside, the author is right that no matter what you eat someone is going to come up with a criticism.

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