The Secrets to Choosing Better Chocolate | S4E3 (E033)
Are you a chocolate lover? Have you gone crazy for cacao? Then, this episode is for you!
We’re diving into all things chocolate, all things cacao. Is there a difference? We’ll let you know!
This might be one of our favorite topics of all time, plus with the holidays coming up, chocolate is on the mind, right? But, if you’re trying to make better wellness decisions, cut back on the sugar, or support small, local, and ethical businesses, then it’s time to get educated and choose wiser. Thankfully, there are better alternatives and we’re breaking it down for you so you’re armed with tips and tricks on how to find and eat better-for-you chocolate. It’s true! The good stuff offers health benefits, so there’s no time to wait! Let’s dig in!
In This Episode
Health benefits of cacao (2:55)
One clue to getting better chocolate (3:41)
Magnesium content in chocolate (3:52)
Benefits of magnesium (5:06)
Theobromine as a primary stimulant in chocolate (6:40)
The world of craft chocolate (10:11)
Ingredients to look for in chocolate (15:43)
Brands to look for (17:27)
Inclusion bars v purest bars v confections (24:16)
What I recommend for people looking to cut down or avoid sugar (25:45)
A recipe for period hot chocolate (26:40
Bulletproof cacao recipe (28:20)
Resources Mentioned
Shop the Wellness Optimizing Journal
Join the Optimized Wellness Community
Submit your question for the show!
Transcript
Toréa Rodriguez 0:00
I don't know about you, but Black Friday sales have already started. And now you don't even know which Friday is Black Friday. But if you're looking for a very special guest for a friend, family member or a loved one, and you know that they might want to put wellness at the top of their list, and I'm gonna suggest my wellness optimizing journal. This is a perfect companion to anybody who is wanting to optimize or better their own health and wellness. It's beautifully illustrated, and it's got lots of guidance that you can customize for your particular needs or their particular needs. Need to get yourself one. So the link to purchase is in the show notes, I promise you. It's a really special gift.
Toréa Rodriguez 0:49
Welcome to the Wildly Optimized Wellness podcast. I am your host, Toréa Rodriguez. And I’m joined by the lovely co host, Evie Takacs. Both of us are Functional Diagnostic Nutrition practitioners and we love working with women from all over the world, through our virtual programs, helping women not only feel better, but actually achieve that vibrant, no holds barred version of themselves, they’ve been missing for a long time, and how we actually get there. Well, that is what this show is all about. Now, please keep in mind that this podcast is created for educational purposes only and should never be used as a replacement for medical diagnosis or treatment. And if you like what you hear today, we would love for you to hit that follow button, leave a review in Apple podcast, share with your friends, and keep coming back for more. Let’s start today’s adventure shall we?
Toréa Rodriguez 1:48
So welcome back, everybody, today is probably going to be about one of my favorite topics of all time, and that is chocolate, and we know that the holidays are here or at least they're coming up out very rapidly and a lot of times chocolate is gifted as a gift. And we will reach for the sugar for various different reasons and we also wanted to just kind of give you guys some deeper information in terms of why chocolate can be an absolute superfood and benefit your health, and how can you choose better chocolate and not reach for the big conglomerate Nestle's of the world. So.
Evie Takacs 2:28
Yes.
Toréa Rodriguez 2:28
Yeah,
Evie Takacs 2:28
Yeah.
Toréa Rodriguez 2:29
Let's talk about some chocolate, shall we?
Evie Takacs 2:31
Let's do it. I'm excited. When you brought up this topic, I was like, this is genius. Such good timing. Everyone likes chocolate, or at least gifts it or has some story to it, especially this time of year, I have a whole new appreciation of chocolate after visiting you, which that was like mind blowing to learn all the things about it. So I'm excited that you get to now share this with the listeners.
Toréa Rodriguez 2:54
Yeah, this will be a lot of fun. Let's tackle kind of the the health benefits, right, because we know chocolate typically is prepared as a candy. And that's usually how people consume chocolate. And so because of the sugar, it can get demonized, I guess in a way of like, Hey, that's not really good for you. And really, it's it's not the chocolate or the cacao, it's the sugar that's not really good for us. So you know, in terms of eating chocolate on a regular basis, I typically don't recommend it unless you are eating something that is a much higher percentage of cacao. And thankfully, we've gotten to a point in our marketing and packaging where you can see for the most part, you can see the percentage of cookouts and that's a takeaway, right? There's like, if you're buying chocolate, make sure that there there's a printing of the percentage of cacao because at least that's one clue that you're getting better chocolate. But there's other health benefits to chocolate, right?
Evie Takacs 3:51
Yeah. So the one that I always think about with myself and I'll talk to clients about is the magnesium content in cacao right. So magnesium, is a really important mineral that most people are not getting enough of.
Toréa Rodriguez 4:05
Definitely not.
Evie Takacs 4:05
It's rich in our soil. And because of the way agriculture has changed, and how we're just like pushing food out so quickly in the soil health has changed and declined over the years, we're just not getting as much magnesium naturally through our food. And so you can boost that with supplements, which I do recommend and think can be great. I take myself, but you can also get it in what I call yummier ways which is going to be through cacao. So.
Toréa Rodriguez 4:30
That's right.
Evie Takacs 4:31
Cacao powder. I don't know a big popular one that people have most likely seen as I think it's like like Navita or the Navitas or something like that. I forget the brand name.
Toréa Rodriguez 4:39
Yeah,
Evie Takacs 4:39
But it's a bag of it and you can buy it at most health food stores. And it'll say like there's three times more magnesium than whatever, like cacao is really high in that. And so I always think of that as like, Oh, I'm I'm loading up on some minerals I'm deficient in so I love it for that benefit. And then I also want to share a little bit of how I use that later on for different parts of my cycle. Mut the first thing I think of immediately is magnesium content.
Toréa Rodriguez 5:04
Magnesium.
Evie Takacs 5:05
Yeah. Which, for people who don't know, magnesium is really beneficial for multiple things. It's very calming to the central nervous system, it can help with GI issues. So if you're having, you know, maybe constipation or diarrhea or like a lot of gas or bloating or pain, or cramping, magnesium can help there's different forms of magnesium, which, you know, I tend to personally gravitate more towards glycinate. I know citrate can be very helpful for GI stuff, but you're going to want to find the one that works better for you. But again, good for nervous system, bring your body down, bring yourself into parasympathetic, the cramping, the bloating, the stomach issues, bowel issues that can be beneficial. And then tied to that I also look at that in the benefit of your hormonal cycle. So if you are experiencing PMS, magnesium can be really beneficial, especially if it's like headaches, or cramping or just kind of like uncomfortable abdomen pain, magnesium is a great thing. And most women who are going to be going through PMS are already craving some sort of chocolate, right? And so And is it really surprised, like if you think about it in that way, if your body is craving chocolate, you're really craving magnesium. And so it's like, let's give yourself more of that magnesium. And you can do it in a yummy form of using cacao, you know, in the chocolate bar, or doing cacao powder, which I actually make. I call it my period hot chocolate. So make a hot chocolate with cacao powder.
Toréa Rodriguez 6:27
Yeah,
Evie Takacs 6:27
When I'm on my period, and that kind of like serving the chocolate craving, but then also serving like PMS. Let's get this under control. Let's give my body what it needs.
Toréa Rodriguez 6:35
Yeah, I mean, cacao itself is called food of the gods. And there's a reason why because there's a lot of different compounds and micronutrients that are in chocolate or cacao chocolate technically is the term for the end product of what we've made with the cacao bean. But there's lots of different polyphenols. In cacao, there's lots of different minerals, like magnesium like what you were talking about. And then there are other compounds. Some of them are stimulant like compounds. Most notably, it's the theobromine. So a lot of people will avoid chocolate because they are afraid of the caffeine content. And I'm using finger quotes for those who can't see me right now. There is some caffeine in chocolate but the primary stimulant is a compound called theobromine. And theobromine is a vasodilator. So it can help with the headaches. That's what's really helping with any kind of headaches. So oftentimes, I will reach for a dark piece of chocolate when I feel a headache coming on. And that will get me some magnesium and electrolytes because electrolytes are really key for headaches as well as it's that vasodilator. So this is why over the counter migraine medicine with the caffeine the major caffeine in it, I can't
Evie Takacs 7:50
Excedrin
Toréa Rodriguez 7:51
Excedrin. Exactly. And that's why right is because caffeine and those kinds of stimulants are vasodilators, and that's why it had the caffeine in it. So anyway, cacao can be amazing for our health in that way. It's really the downsides are the sugar that it gets associated with. And almost always it's made into a sweet thing.
Evie Takacs 8:13
Which cacao itself is not really sweet, right? Isn't it more bitter?
Toréa Rodriguez 8:17
It? Well, it? It kind of depends on what stage you're tasting it in, right? And it also depends a lot. So cacao is very special in the sense that if you've ever gotten into craft coffee, or wine or anything like that, cacao is the same in terms of its the flavor that comes from it. It's very influenced by the environment in which it's grown and handled. So it has a lot of that terroir, if we're going to steal a term from the wine industry, there's a lot of terroir in it. So some strains of chocolate can have more bitter notes to them just naturally, and some are going to be sweeter. And you're gonna get a lot of these different flavors. And I think the reason why though bitter comes to mind with 100%. Chocolate is because of the overall chocolate industry has kind of muddied the waters. We don't know where things are coming from. And so the bigger companies like the Nestle's and that kind of thing, they're buying cacao from a lot of different locations, and then mixing them so that the flavor is more consistent from batch to batch in these large scale productions. And therefore we're losing kind of track of where that stuff is coming from. And that flavor profile usually is fairly bitter at the straight up cacao bean. And so that's why as a confectioner, primarily Nestle is going to be a confectioner. They're just going to cut that with a bunch of sugar, right? And so that's how it ends up being that way. So the byproducts of that industry are selling baking chocolate, or cacao powder, which has all the bitter notes. So that's typically what people think of When we say like 100% Chocolate, they're thinking like baker's chocolate and it's bitter as all bitter. It tastes pretty nasty, to be quite honest. Yeah,
Evie Takacs 10:08
yeah. Okay. But something that
Toréa Rodriguez 10:10
I've learned is this whole world of craft chocolate, and craft chocolate has people in it that are skilled enough with flavors and either just knowing the craft of like how to roast it and how to treat the beans in a way that you can literally have 100% Chocolate and it tastes sweet and smooth. And it's amazing. It's a whole different experience. That's what I brought some props. So yeah, so 100% Chocolate rate, and that's through craft chocolate, which is a whole different ball of wax than talking about the Halloween candy that sold 50% off the next day after Halloween is over, right? Yeah.
Evie Takacs 10:51
How did you get into craft coffee? Or craft chocolate? Craft coffee has
Toréa Rodriguez 10:57
its own story. Yes, another podcast episode. But craft chocolate. So gosh, I'm trying to think of the timeframe exactly when this was this was right about the time that I was becoming an afghan. So about 10 years ago, my husband and I would visit these different farmers markets. And we found a farmers market in Palo Alto, California. And just adjacent to it was this little tiny hole in the wall called the chocolate garage. Literally, it was a garage converted by this wonderful woman, her name is Sunita de Terrell, and she runs the chocolate garage. And she really just, I mean, she's a biochemist at heart and was working on brain science, actually. But she really fell in love with the world of cacao and craft chocolate. And so she was sharing this information and trying to educate people on what what's the difference between craft chocolate, and you know, a larger name chocolate, and a lot of it had to do with just the industry as a commodity, right? Cacao has grown and then it's exported from these various different equatorial band countries. And a lot of times that leads to not paying people fair wages and leads to labor that includes actual slavery. And you know, there's a lot of middlemen in the process. So the people actually doing the work of growing the cow, they get removed from that whole process, you don't really know who they are. And then it gets sent to this huge distribution center. And then it gets sold as a commodity, basically. And so there were all these different things within the cacao industry that she was trying to educate people on. But at the same time, there's a whole bunch of people that really love cacao for what it is and the different kinds of flavor profiles that you can get from it. And so they've fallen in love with it. Now they spend their time developing their skills, and learning about the different farmers and the regions and the environments in which these are grown to try and bring these flavors out as they work with the chocolate to make their their bars or make their confections or whatever it is. So I learned a lot of my knowledge from Sunita through the chocolate garage and eventually got to a place where I can volunteer for her and started teaching some of this myself. So that's kind of how I got into it. But you know, me, I'm a biochemist, I totally geek out on this stuff. Yeah. And when I find something that I want to like, go deep on. That's kind of what I do. So I spent a lot of time just learning the different makers and understanding different regions and different flavor profiles and that kind of thing. And that's how I got into it. So
Evie Takacs 13:36
Yeah,
Toréa Rodriguez 13:36
Now I spread that love with my friends.
Evie Takacs 13:38
Yeah, well, there's a lot more to it than I thought, like when I came to visit you and you were like, we're gonna do chocolate tasting, I was like, Oh, perfect. And then you bring out this, like craft chocolate. And I'm like, Oh, this is serious, like, this is legit. And then you start talking to me about this came from the same place, or it came from different places, but processed the same or, you know, vice versa. And it was like, Do you taste the difference here and there's like a proper way to taste. And so I have this new appreciation now of cacao that again, I was just kind of thinking like, it helps with period headaches and like making hot chocolate with it. But now it's like really interesting, because I've been looking at all these these snap, yeah, chocolates at the store. And I'm like, Nope, don't see the percentage on that one that's not quality, or you know what I mean? So it's really cool to think about in that way.
Toréa Rodriguez 14:22
Yeah, yeah, I think you know, the one thing that I share with all my friends about trying to identify what's a craft maker versus I'm not crap maker, and it comes down to a couple of things. One is, I mean, the percentage point is helpful to understand how much sugar and extra additives are put into the final bar that you're about to eat, but it doesn't really like just having a percentage doesn't say ooh, craft maker because I think even Hershey's now has percentages on their bars right? So definitely not a craft maker. But one thing that I really look for is I look for the ingredie against themselves. And I want it to be just like anything else that we talk about with food with our clients, we want to have it be the least processed version that we can. So if you see like cacao liqueur, and cacao powder, and cacao butter as separate individual components, we know that that came from a highly processed situation where they're basically separating out the cacao powder from the cacao butter, which is the fat or the oil that comes off of it as its ground down. And so now we don't really know where that's come from. So there's less of a transparency in terms of where it's coming from. So I just look at the ingredients. And that usually will tell me whether or not it's a craft maker. So if you're finding cocoa beans, and sugar, or cocoa beans and sugar, and maybe a little cocoa butter added back in, then that is more of a craft maker style. And so the other thing that I tell people about is sometimes the makers will actually talk about where they're getting the beans from, and maybe even who they're getting the beans from. So sometimes they will highlight which farm from Venezuela that they got the beans from, or sometimes they'll let you know that it's from a particular region that lets you know that this maker has established a relationship with those people to be able to get those beans, which is a whole different thing than just getting it from a commodity house. So that's what I look for.
Evie Takacs 16:32
Yeah, so simple. You said, you know, three main ingredients, right? Maybe it's like the cocoa beans, sugar, maybe cocoa butter added. But most of the time, it's just like the cocoa beans and the sugar usually would be a good start. Yeah. And at least we know, because when I came back, I visited you in Bend, Oregon. And when I came back to Cincinnati, the first thing I did when I went to Whole Foods was like the chocolate aisle. And I was like, what do we have? And we didn't have a lot of craft chocolate there because I sent you a picture. And it was a lot of like name brand stuff. And so that's there's like a whole nother section that it didn't explore yet, which I guess I could. But so that's thing too is like these things typically aren't going to be sold in regular stores or markets. Like they might be like the one off thing that's there. But that is also the reality. So although I did find out because we looked into it, there is a craft chocolate maker in Cincinnati, which is really cool. So I'm excited to check that out ways to go. Yeah, yeah, that'd be really cool. But what are some resources that you would have or maybe names or brands that you could call out or kind of say like, check this out? This is going to be great no matter what, just so people who want to explore this know where to go?
Toréa Rodriguez 17:37
Yeah. Well, the first thing I would say is avoid getting your chocolate from the drugstore or from the major chain food stores, like Safeway, and yeah, Samco and those kinds of things, because you're not going to find craft makers there. There are some craft makers such as detailer. For example, Dick Taylor is a craft maker that's located in Arcata, California. That's way northern coast California. Really cool shop. If you guys ever make it through Arcata, California, go check them out really cool shop and really wonderful people, human beings, but Dick Taylor and his, their company, it's if I remember right, and you might need to fact check this. But I think it's two partners that have created dictator chocolate, but they've worked really, really hard to be able to scale craft chocolate without ruining the quality, or the transparency and where they get their beans, but to be able to scale it to show up in places like Whole Foods. So the fact that you can find Dick Taylor chocolate in Whole Foods is a big deal from like the craft chocolate world, because oftentimes when people scale, they need venture capital funding, or they need additional funding, and then they ended up getting bought out by big chocolate, and then you know, the quality starts to go downhill from there. So you know, I would start to seek out where else can they find it. So it used to be that there wasn't really a online retailer of a lot of different craft chocolate, there actually is now there's one called Bar and Cocoa and we'll put the link in the show notes. Bar and Cocoa. They're on the east coast somewhere, but almost every maker that they put on there as a maker that I either familiar with or know their practices and know a lot about them. That's probably the first one that's made it available for a lot of people to be able to order the stuff online. But I would say See if you can seek out these cute little shops and towns that are going to have craft chocolate, and maybe something else. So for example, in Portland, Oregon, there's a place called The Meadow and The Meadow has all these different salts and chocolates, and that's their shop and it's a super cute shop and it's a lot of fun to go in. Because when you can go into a shop like that that has a lot of craft Because oftentimes, they will allow you to taste some of the chocolates that are there so that you can get a sense of what you like and what you don't like. You can talk to them about the different makers, that kind of thing. That's why I really like going into a local shop if you can find it, but you kind of have to seek out craft chocolate, and something else maybe.
Evie Takacs 20:19
Yeah,
Toréa Rodriguez 20:19
So yeah, it's not the easiest thing to find. It's not like you just have a bunch of craft chocolate companies hanging out.
Evie Takacs 20:27
Yeah. Well in How did you know? Because I told you, oh, there's this place in Cincinnati. I feel like they're probably craft chocolate. How did you know that? Based on their website? What are things that you can read? Like? Is it going to say we are craft chocolate company? Like what or is it where they've sourced their beans from, like, what are clues that someone could look for?
Toréa Rodriguez 20:45
Typically, they're going to be either telling stories about where they're getting their beans or highlighting farmers, or, you know, a states where they're getting their beans from, you'll see that on some of the websites, you'll also notice that there's an attention to detail in terms of their most craft makers that I've visited are very proud of their craft, it requires specialized equipment, specialized training, it takes a long time to really get all of the different steps. Because if we look at the steps of cacao from the tree itself, and the pod that grows on the tree to get into a bar, there's at least 15 or 16 steps, and I'm probably missing a couple steps in that whole process. And so to be able to fine tune your craft and be able to at the end of it has something that tastes really good, right? Because it's really easy to kind of mess it up. It's really easy. There's so many different things going on. So a lot of times, you'll see stories about the the process, and they're proud of their process, you'll notice those things. So like Dandelion Chocolate, for example, is very proud of the process that they've been able to develop, and they too, have started to expand and get a little bit bigger. And instead of going into Whole Foods, they're actually expanding their production locations. So now they've got San Francisco, California, and they have a couple locations in Japan. And so they're expanding into other countries and experimenting with different kinds of beans, you will oftentimes see so for example, this bar that I'm holding up is from a maker that is in Toronto, Canada. So a lot of times you're going to see makers that are going to be in lots of different places worldwide, that cacao is not actually grown. So that means that it's cacao comes from equatorial regions on our planet, that cacao, they have to get it from somebody. So if they're definitely telling you where it's coming from, you could look for an origin on the packaging. And if it's telling you the origin, then that's another way that you can figure this out like Fruition. Also east coast. I think New York, maybe
Evie Takacs 22:58
Okay.
Toréa Rodriguez 22:59
Yes, New York Fruition is from New York. I love her Rishon because these guys have figured out the they've cracked the code on 100% cacao that tastes really, really good.
Evie Takacs 23:09
Okay,
Toréa Rodriguez 23:09
And this one right here has origin Dominican Republican Peru. So they're blending two different types of beans together to get the flavor profile and the ingredients organic cacao beans. The other thing to look for is batch numbers. Because it's all going to be small batch stuff. This isn't going to be large scale production type stuff.
Evie Takacs 23:31
Okay, that makes sense. Yeah.
Toréa Rodriguez 23:33
So I mean, aside from Bar and Cacao, and looking for local shops, those are the kinds of things that I look for when I'm looking at different bars. I check the ingredients, do they have pouches? Do they have origins? Are they talking about the farmers or where they're getting cacao? What are they doing with this whole craft chocolate thing?
Evie Takacs 23:52
No, I love that that's really helpful information and something useful that someone can like, take away and actually look at right because I think that sometimes gets overwhelming of okay, I know that this is probably better for me or better for, you know, people and you know, economically or whatever, but I don't even know how to find it. So that's helpful to know.
Toréa Rodriguez 24:14
Yeah, and there's, you know, there's once you get into it, there's a lot of different things you know, there's purest bars that are just going to be the cocoa beans and the sugar, or cocoa beans and cocoa butter and sugar. Both Dick Taylor and Dandelion Chocolate are known for having really smooth texture without using cocoa butter as an addend so that shines a light on their ability to do the production and like grind the cacao beans in a way to get that texture. So that's highlighting that they're not having to well, tea is very hard word to use, right right here like it's a little bit too harsh, but they're not using the addition of cocoa butter to get that smooth mouthfeel and so those are like straight up bars and then there's what's called The inclusion bars and that's going to be where you're adding things into the bar itself. So puffed rice or salt or nuts or fruit. Even some people will say cacao nibs, which is the crunched up version of the bean and a smaller piece. cacao nibs can be considered inclusion even though it's soy cacao. So that one's kind of on the fence. But those are inclusion bars. So that's when you're adding stuff into to get different flavors, even vanilla being added in would be considered an inclusion. And then there's confections, that's going to be the like truffles and the bonbons and the caramels in the candies. And those are going to be consumption. So you can play around a lot with these different types of craft chocolate to see what you like. And if you're trying to avoid sugar, then just look for the straight up bars that are higher percentage 70%. and higher is usually what I recommend for people. And if you're really focusing in on like blood sugar control, or perhaps you have diabetes, and you need to really manage that, then I would say 80% or higher. And if you can develop a palette for 100% Then you're golden. And there's no sugar in there at all.
Evie Takacs 26:10
Yeah, Cool.
Evie Takacs 26:12
Nice. I love that. I love to give the 100% a try.
Toréa Rodriguez 26:16
Yes. We didn't try it when you were there.
Evie Takacs 26:18
We did try 100% But I would like I want to actually buy it and have it in my house. I had a little bit that you had. I'm almost positive we had 100% together. Yeah, but I have not bought one and like tried to finish a bar.
Toréa Rodriguez 26:29
So I guess one of the easiest ways to enjoy chocolate is is doing exactly what you were talking about me is making your own chocolate drink by getting some cacao powder. How do you make your your hot chocolate your period hot chocolate?
Toréa Rodriguez 26:44
How do you make that?
Evie Takacs 26:45
Yeah, so I heat up milk, whatever milk of choice, right? If you're having dairy milk, if you're having non dairy milk, whatever it is, I'll heat up about a cup of that. It's really personal preference of how much you want. And I'll heat it up over the stovetop and then I will add in like one to two tablespoons of cacao powder. Okay, so again, this is cacao powder, not cocoa powder, there's a difference there is some doing cacao powder. And then I sometimes add like a scoop of collagen powder if I'm having that, or just I leave it like that. And I'll use a hand frother or you can put it in like a blender and blend up nice and smooth. And then for sweetener if you need something to cut that bitterness because cacao powder can be very bitter for someone who's not used to that I would recommend some sort of sweetener like a maple syrup, or you know, maybe even like some honey or something like that. If you do stevia, you could do some of that. I've gotten to the point where I don't need sweetener, which is pretty cool. Because when I first tried it, I was like oh hell no, I need sweetener in this it was too bitter. But I've gotten much more I can take that bitterness now. And I like it. So I don't use sweetener, but I was using maple syrup when I was making it. So it's very simple and again, blended up. It's nice and smooth. And you can just sit on it and know that like you're getting that chocolate flavor but you're also getting like a lot of the benefits of the cacao.
Toréa Rodriguez 28:04
Yeah, yeah. And I know we touched with Willis on previous podcast episode and he's got his Loving Fungi drinking chocolate, which is Guatemalan cacao powder, and then he is putting some spices to it some cinnamon and cardamom and that kind of thing as well as the functional mushrooms. I used to make a drink that I used to call bulletproof cacao. And this was back before the bulletproof company was like doing a bunch of cease and desist for using bulletproof coffee in cafes. So I haven't actually talked about this in a long time, but very, very simple idea is you know, taking the Bulletproof Coffee concept. And in a blender, I would place a couple tablespoons, maybe three tablespoons to almost a quarter cup of cacao nibs themselves. And I would dump in some ghee and maybe some whey protein or collagen protein, some kind of protein powder, I would put an unflavored protein powder, I would put that in there and then I would put in hot water in the VitaMix and like blend that up to the point where you're grinding. You're literally grinding in the Vitamix the cacao nibs into Cal powder and then I would grind that up and drink that as my morning beverage for a long time. So that was something that I really enjoyed. I haven't thought about that in a while so I might go back and do that. Now this winter's coming in and I need that nice toasty warm beverage to sip on.
Evie Takacs 29:26
Yeah, I love it's a nice alternative to coffee it gets you you know if you're tired of coffee or tea and again, it's we use the term functional when we were talking to Willis but like it is a functional drink in that way right? Like it's medicinal. I mean I know people that there is a health space you know in another city here in Ohio that the owner of that will hold cacao ceremonies like people like this becomes carrot ceremonial for people absolute so there's a lot of benefits in cacao not just like physically but also spiritually for some people so I don't know much about it, but I do No that that exists. And so there's just so many really cool things that you can do with cacao. And so I feel like now learning more about craft, cacao and craft chocolate, that's like my next tier. And so I'm ready to explore that a little bit more.
Toréa Rodriguez 30:12
Yep, get into the ceremonial cacao. I'm glad you brought that up. Because for a long time, cacao has been a very sacred food of lots of indigenous cultures. And so like Peru, and the Aztecs, you know, they use cacao in these various different ceremonies and rituals. And from what I understand it is a very heart opening type experience to be able to have the consumption of cacao be accompanied by these rituals. So yeah, definitely don't want to take away from that. So there is a little bit of that in like the craft chocolate world, like we're trying to find the balance so that we're not taking away from those indigenous cultures, that things that they rely on for their cultural needs. And at the same time, you know, educate people on choosing better chocolate, because we all love it. But we don't need to, like turn it into a commodity and have people be mistreated for it. So that's really kind of the the take home message. So hopefully, you guys have been inspired to continue your consumption of cacao just in a more healthy form, and have a couple different options and ways to find stuff. And if you need help finding anything, where you find something, and you want us to do it like a double check, like Hey, Evie, Toréa, what do you think about this? Just send us a snapshot. We'd be happy to
Evie Takacs 31:35
Yeah,
Toréa Rodriguez 31:35
Give you some feedback. So.
Evie Takacs 31:37
Yeah, definitely. And hopefully you get to enjoy chocolate in a different way this holiday season. I know I definitely.
Toréa Rodriguez 31:42
Yeah. Awesome. Okay, we'll see you guys at the next episode.
Toréa Rodriguez 31:47
Hey, everybody, Toréa here. If you've liked what you heard today, then I'm inviting you to become a premium member over at the optimized wellness community because membership gets you instant and exclusive access to the full length versions of each of these conversations both in video and audio format. Not only that, but with the community you also get access to seminars, regular Q&As, activities our seasonal challenges and starting in December. Your first month in the membership, you will get a copy of the Wellness Optimizing Journal, we also have a Luminary-tier membership that gets you access to the live top breathwork classes, as well as the visualization library and access to the coaches. Use the link in the show notes. Become a member and join us with the optimized wellness community.
Toréa Rodriguez 32:44
Hey, thanks for joining us for this episode of the Wildly Optimized Wellness podcast. If you’re ready to dig deeper into your health, stop playing the Whack-a-Symptom game, start testing to get better guidance, you can find more about Toréa at torearodriguez.com and you can find Evie at holisticallyrestored.com. Want a peek into what it’s like to work with us? Come join us at our Optimized Wellness Community. You can find the invitation link in the show notes below. And if you have a question for the show, you can submit your question under the podcast section of torearodriguez.com. Finally, if you found something helpful in this episode, don’t forget to leave a review, hit that follow button or share it with a friend. They’re gonna love that you thought of them. Until next time, see you outside!
