01/09/06 Put chocolate in New Years resolution

Are you as tired as I am of all the dieting advertisements and articles urging us to get back in shape after New Years. Come on it's only the second week of January, So go ahead, finish up the box of chocolates, because I have just learned that they are good for you. Really. Recent studies have concluded that dark chocolate, (the expensive stuff) has more antioxidants than tea or berries or red wine. If that isn't cause to pause, a new study suggests that sumptuous rich dark chocolate, (can't you just taste it) actually improves smokers blood vessels. Using cigarette smokers as guinea pigs a cardiologist in Zurich found that while dark chocolate doesn't cure the effects of nicotine, smokers often have poor vascular function, and this chocolate did improve. Forget about the boring tread mill my news years resolution is to up my antioxidants, so yippee, it's fine red wine and rich dark chocolate, for me in 2006 . I'm Susan Allen and this is Food Forethought. Source: New York Times 12/27/05