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Thanks! The results were what I expected and depressing, but at least now I know.

by SllX 3y ago

crazygringo 3y ago
What were you expecting? I personally can't see any kind of pattern anywhere at all, except dark chocolate is (logically) higher. Also, one-time testing isn't going to reveal much. Since different manufacturers are constantly getting different batches of beans from different farms, wouldn't the heavy metal content in any chocolate bar be essentially random? E.g. Cadbury's might be low in April, high in May, and then medium in June.
- Obscurity4340 3y ago
  Makes you wonder if there's any way to "synthesize" whatever it is that makes cacao make cacao or something to the effect of the way various opioids and flavors are already synthesized en masse, although obviously in the opioid case we're probably not gonna get around having to grow poppies forever.
  - kleton 3y ago
    Okra is vaguely related to cacao, and you can process the seeds to some sort of ersatz substance with similar flavor compounds, but it lacks the saturated fats with a melting point similar to human body temperature that makes chocolate interesting.
    - soperj 3y ago
      So just add bacon fat?
      - Obscurity4340 3y ago
        > Shhhhhhh! — Nestlé/BigNesqwik
  - chongli 3y ago
    High quality chocolate has a ton of different flavours in it. It’s extremely complex. Just like coffee, tea, wine, beer, vanilla, spirits, cheese, mushrooms (and so on; basically any luxury food). We can’t synthesize what makes these things taste good because it isn’t just one compound, it’s thousands. Even something very basic you can make at home, such as caramel, can’t be synthesized. From a very simple precursor (white sugar aka sucrose) you apply heat and the result is thousands of complex molecules. This is why caramel tastes good (like an actual food) but plain white sugar tastes pretty bad (because it’s just an ingredient).
- pbhjpbhj 3y ago
  Don't you fix these things by using the market, fine Cadbury an extra 5% pa of gross revenue if any bars are found with > N ug of any particular heavy metal. Tax all companies an extra X% if their products are in the bottom quintile for 2 consecutive years. Maybe don't fine them if they can show a person who eats their products at the 99% level, for a lifetime, would be below the level of toxicity -- the CEO can eat that much of the metal to demonstrate they're convinced that the toxicity figures are correct! In theory the chocolate producers will get a lower price unless they do what they can to reduce heavy metals. Of course the farmers get screwed in places where others have shipped their heavy-metal lawn waste ...
- SllX 3y ago
  Some level of uniformity that the issue is about as universal as it sounds across brands based off the description in the article. It is, and that kind of sucks. I mentioned this to a friend earlier and he said something along the lines of “yeah I thought this was pretty well known” so… I didn’t get the memo anyway and I am a somewhat frequent consumer of very dark chocolate.

Thanks! The results were what I expected and depressing, but at least now I know.

by SllX 3y ago

Thanks! The results were what I expected and depressing, but at least now I know.

What were you expecting? I personally can't see any kind of pattern anywhere at all, except dark chocolate is (logically) higher. Also, one-time testing isn't going to reveal much. Since different manufacturers are constantly getting different batches of beans from different farms, wouldn't the heavy metal content in any chocolate bar be essentially random? E.g. Cadbury's might be low in April, high in May, and then medium in June.

Obscurity4340 3y ago
Makes you wonder if there's any way to "synthesize" whatever it is that makes cacao make cacao or something to the effect of the way various opioids and flavors are already synthesized en masse, although obviously in the opioid case we're probably not gonna get around having to grow poppies forever.
- kleton 3y ago
  Okra is vaguely related to cacao, and you can process the seeds to some sort of ersatz substance with similar flavor compounds, but it lacks the saturated fats with a melting point similar to human body temperature that makes chocolate interesting.
  - soperj 3y ago
    So just add bacon fat?
    - Obscurity4340 3y ago
      > Shhhhhhh! — Nestlé/BigNesqwik
- chongli 3y ago
  High quality chocolate has a ton of different flavours in it. It’s extremely complex. Just like coffee, tea, wine, beer, vanilla, spirits, cheese, mushrooms (and so on; basically any luxury food). We can’t synthesize what makes these things taste good because it isn’t just one compound, it’s thousands. Even something very basic you can make at home, such as caramel, can’t be synthesized. From a very simple precursor (white sugar aka sucrose) you apply heat and the result is thousands of complex molecules. This is why caramel tastes good (like an actual food) but plain white sugar tastes pretty bad (because it’s just an ingredient).
pbhjpbhj 3y ago
Don't you fix these things by using the market, fine Cadbury an extra 5% pa of gross revenue if any bars are found with > N ug of any particular heavy metal. Tax all companies an extra X% if their products are in the bottom quintile for 2 consecutive years. Maybe don't fine them if they can show a person who eats their products at the 99% level, for a lifetime, would be below the level of toxicity -- the CEO can eat that much of the metal to demonstrate they're convinced that the toxicity figures are correct! In theory the chocolate producers will get a lower price unless they do what they can to reduce heavy metals. Of course the farmers get screwed in places where others have shipped their heavy-metal lawn waste ...
SllX 3y ago
Some level of uniformity that the issue is about as universal as it sounds across brands based off the description in the article. It is, and that kind of sucks. I mentioned this to a friend earlier and he said something along the lines of “yeah I thought this was pretty well known” so… I didn’t get the memo anyway and I am a somewhat frequent consumer of very dark chocolate.