Combining some drinks with food can have a positive effect
Scientists have found cocoa can help reduce some of the negative impacts of fatty foods on the body.
It’s difficult to split foods into binary ‘good’ and ‘bad’ categories. Fats, sugar and carbs are all essential parts of our diet, with risks arising when they are eaten in excess or as part of an unbalance diet.
Too much fatty or processed food can have a negative impact on your cardiovascular health in particular, increasing the risk of heart disease.
But scientists have found that drinking the right drinks with some unhealthy foods can lessen their negative health impact when it comes to stress and vascular health.
In research published in the Food & Function journal, 23 healthy people with an average age of 22 were told to eat more fat and sugar than recommended by a doctor. They also ate diets low in fibre.
For breakfast they were given two croissants with 10 grams of salted butter, one and a half slices of cheddar cheese and 250 ml of whole milk.
After that, half of the participants drank a low-flavanol cocoa drink (about 5.6 mg), and the rest drank high-flavanol cocoa (695 mg).
The low-flavanol drink was prepared with an alkalized cocoa powder, whilst the high-flavanol drink was prepared with a non-alkalized powder. Both drinks were made by dissolving 12g of cocoa powder in 250ml of whole milk.
After an eight-minute rest, the participants had to take an eight-minute mental stress task in the form of an oral arithmetic test. This caused their heart rate and blood pressure rose significantly, mirroring the effect of daily stress.
The researchers found that those who drank the low-flavanol drink had a decrease in vascular activity for up to 90 minutes. However, those who had the high-flavanol drink only suffered a decrease for 30 minutes.
Brachial flow-mediated dilatation was “significantly higher” following high-flavanol cocoa compared to low-flavanol cocoa 30 and 90 minutes after the stressful period.
The point of the study was to mimic how people will often eat fattier, more unhealthy foods during stressful periods, like revising for exams. Severe stress can damage our veins and endothelial function, and fat consumption slows down the recovery from this, affecting vascular health.
But products with flavanols, scientists have found, can protect against this effect.
They wrote: “In summary, flavanols can counteract declines in endothelial function induced by consuming fat in the context of stress, but do not impact cerebral oxygenation. These findings can have important implications for flavanol-rich dietary choices to protect the vasculature from stress.”
Lead author Dr Catarina Rendeiro, Assistant Professor in Nutritional Sciences, said: “We know that when people are stressed, they tend to gravitate towards high-fat foods. We have previously shown that fatty food can impair the body’s vascular recovery from stress. In this study, we wanted to see if adding a high-flavanol food to the fatty meal would alleviate the negative impact of stress in the body.”
Study first author Rosalind Baynham, a research fellow, said: “Flavanols are a type of compound that occur in different fruits, vegetables, tea and nuts including berries and unprocessed cocoa. Flavanols are known to have health benefits, particularly for regulating blood pressure and protecting cardiovascular health.”
For the best health benefits, Rendeiro recommended people look for minimally processed cocoa powder when shopping. Drinks such as green tea and black tea are also high in flavanols. Two cups of black or green tea a day can give you your daily flavanol recommended intake of 400-600mg.
