Ambivalent

by Ela Harrison Gordon
(Alaska)

Before I became a rawfoodist, extra-dark chocolate was one of my power foods. I enjoyed the fact that I could eat a very small amount of it and be satisfied for a long time.

Like you, when I first went raw, cacao wasn't available and I did without it. When it became available (in the form of nibs and whole beans)a few years later, I had a strong fear/bias against stimulants at the time (being natural hygienist) and ate very little of it, found it affected my sleep if I ate it late in the day.

Later, when I got more adventurous (influence of friends ;) ), I discovered that it could stimulate my appetite ferociously if combined with dates especially. I had been anorexic before (and somewhat during) raw, and a mac-nut/date/cacao nib treat I made provided me with my first experience of 'not being able to stop eating' that I can remember. Quite a contrast from my earlier experience with dark chocolate.

After that, I tended to avoid it, and to agree with Corin's conclusion that it is best in very small doses.

But when I helped out in raw kitchens I was often called upon to make chocolate desserts, which I did to rave reviews, without really eating them initially. Then there was a memorable late night after too many long days at the retreat, when I started eating the leftover (fabulous) chocolate cake I had created, ate _a lot_ of it and was bouncing off the walls, to everyone's great amusement. At this point, I was having fun with it.

At this point, too, the cacao powder had become available and over the next year I went through phases of including it in my smoothies and goodies. I always stopped after a while because I found that it made me break out with horrible itching, especially in my 'most personal' area.

I started eating cooked foods again shortly after I got together with my husband two years ago. The very first non raw item I ate was a little piece of 100% cocoa chocolate when we were out in the back-country with very little food, no stove and foul weather. At this point I had been avoiding raw cacao for many months because of the skin irritation.

I have never experienced the skin irritation with non-raw chocolate: however, I have sometimes experienced the appetite stimulation - most notably one time when I made a raw brownie recipe but used non-raw 100% chocolate because I didn't have any raw cacao on hand, and otherwise the few times that I've made the mistake of eating chocolate that's less than 80% cacao.

This all leaves me highly ambivalent about chocolate, whether it's better raw or not raw. The issue of rancid omega-6 becoming trans fats, which I just came across yesterday, is a clincher for me if it's true, though: I'm currently trying to figure out whether the omega-6 is present in any quantity (I know that cacao butter is mostly saturated fat, don't know whether this might protect the omega-6 if the ratio is big enough, etc). But I have heard some people say that raw cacao is more potentially harmful too...

I also wonder whether the skin irritation I had wasn't specific to something about the powdered form: I don't think I ever got it from nibs or beans. I have just bought some raw nibs and am going to experiment, probably keeping the quantities very small and avoiding the crazy appetite stimulation from mixing with sweets.