"Mars sponsors research suggesting Chocolate feeds your brain"
I noticed a lot of the bigger news sources picked up on this novelty story this week, scientists at the American Association for the Advancement of Science had their annual meet up in San Francisco and one of the topics was a piece of cocoa research sponsored by Mars Inc., But hold on, they sell the stuff don't they ?

Secret Chocolate conclusion
Mars apparently made up a secret concentrated mixture of liquid cocoa and had Ian Macdonald of University of Nottingham give large doses of it to young and healthy females. It can't have been much fun for the ladies because they left in the flavonols, those bitter substances normally removed from chocolate because us consumers don't like the taste.

The conclusion: A possibility that cocoa flavonols may be beneficial in increasing blood to the brain, and this may enhance brain functions. This is a pretty lame conclusion considering Mars claim to have been researching cocoa flavonols for 15 years.

Heart Chocolate
Back in 2002 Mars also funded Marguerite Engler, PhD at University of California, who found that a flavonol-rich chocolate bar eaten once a day for two weeks improved blood flow, but at that time the message was that it might improve your heart.

Dark Chocolate better
As a general rule, dark chocolate and chocolate sold in Europe contains more flavonol, but confusingly the fact that it's dark doesn't mean flavonol rich. Just imagine if we could all be persuaded to eat chocolate bars every day to improve our health, wouldn't that be be great ? For sure it would be great for Mars shareholders, but wouldn't do much for obesity rates.

Beware the headlines
Tellingly, Mars refuses to list the flavonol content on their packaging, whilst continuing to promote this 'hearsay' type of research without clinical trial results to support. Makes great headlines though.