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Healthy Valentines Treats

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Chocolate is the ultimate taste of love. In addition to its incomparable flavor, chocolate delivers a delicious boost to our health. And what better way to say "I love you" than with a mouth-watering gift that just happens to be healthy too? Here's how chocolate and a few other star ingredients make for doubly scrumptious treats:

Chocolate: In addition to great pleasure, one of our favorite flavors also helps protects us from heart disease and some cancers while boosting our immune system too. This is due to a widely studied plant chemical called flavonoids.

Of course pouring sugar and heavy cream into a gooey chocolate batter negates a lot of these healthy benefits. But knowing the right kind and proportions of other ingredients to add makes chocolate shine with luscious flavor plus the added dose of great health.

Ounce for ounce, cocoa powder also contains the highest concentration of antioxidants compared to other foods. This vitamin-type substance helps slow the aging process. Be sure to reach for natural or nonalkalized when buying cocoa powder. That's because the alkali added to Dutch-style powders neutralizes or inactivates many of the antioxidants that make cocoa so healthy in the first place.

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