Chocolate for Survival

Richard Bottomley, who has worked in Antarctica, says: “Your body knows what it wants! If you’re a chocolate eater, then your brain knows that chocolate is a great source of fats and sugars. When we’re cold, our body metabolizes either stored or consumed sugar. This process produces heat. Chocolate is a good source of simple sugars, which can be easily converted to heat — easier than breaking down stored glycogen from the muscles or liver and much faster than breaking down stored fats.”

There are a lot of reasons why chocolate is a good survival food. It’s energy-dense, providing high-calorie, long-lasting energy from fats and carbohydrates. It also contains protein, vitamins, minerals, and beneficial antioxidants, which support bodily functions and morale. Its high caloric content in a small, portable package makes it a practical, effective source of fuel during emergencies or extended periods without food. 

Chocolate in the Field

Ninety percent of the cocoa bean is digestible, comprising 40 percent carbohydrates, 22 percent fat, and 18 percent protein. Chocolate contains substantial amounts of vitamins A, D, B2, as well as vitamin E and K, calcium, thiamine, riboflavin, iron, phosphorus, linoleic acids, and phenylethylamine. For a food that is often regarded as a junk food or pleasure food, it’s really pretty good for you.

A study conducted at the Harvard School of Public Health indicated that people who eat from one to three chocolate bars a month live almost a year longer than those who do not eat chocolate. In fact, chocolate is a quickly assimilated, nourishing energy food. Chocolate was taken on all the American and Soviet space flights, onto all modern battlefields, and it was taken to Mount Everest on the Hillary expedition. Chocolate goes with many backpackers, hikers, and hunters on their field trips. And because chocolate is compact and long-lasting, it’s also an ideal item for your food storage and possible barter.

Which type of chocolate should one choose? For survival purposes, dark chocolate is preferable to milk or white chocolate, because it contains a higher percentage of cocoa, fewer additives and sugars, and a greater concentration of beneficial antioxidants. 

Composition of Chocolate Products

Not All Chocolate Is the Same

Chocolate pods are produced on a smallish tree, grown and harvested in a region 20 degrees below and above the equator. The pods — maybe a foot long — contain white beans. Once picked, these beans are allowed to ferment for a few days or longer, whereupon they take on their characteristic chocolate aroma and brown color. Once dried, the beans are then exported and typically processed with modern machinery. However, it is certainly possible to process your own, as it’s often done today in Mexico.

During the normal manufacturing process, the beans are first “conched,” which means that heat and grinding pressure are applied to produce a thick liquid called chocolate liquor. When this chocolate liquor hardens, bitter — or baker’s — chocolate is the result. This is indeed bitter, and most people don’t care for it as is since it has no sweetness.

When this baker’s chocolate is then subjected to great pressure, both a liquid and solid result. The liquid is cocoa butter, and the solid is cocoa. Cocoa butter added back to baker’s chocolate in greater amounts results in bitter-sweet, semi-sweet, or sweet chocolate, three more grades or types of chocolate. The addition of milk creates milk chocolate. Sugar, vanilla, and various other ingredients are often also be added. Some of the “designer” chocolates can have hot chilis added, as well as a great variety of nuts, raisins, and even dried fruits.

White chocolate, however, is a misnomer. If a product contains no cocoa, it’s simply not chocolate. Cocoa is the absolute necessary ingredient of any true chocolate product. So-called “white chocolate” is made from the cocoa butter, but because it contains no cocoa, it is technically not chocolate at all. And, in some cases, if they didn’t even use cocoa butter, but just some cheaper oils, it has no business being called any kind of chocolate.

Since there are so many factors from start to finish, no two chocolate products have the exact same properties. In other words, when you try to answer the question “Is chocolate good or bad for me?” you cannot do so without precisely defining what you mean by “chocolate.” Chocolate really can be good for you, though the products which add white sugar are typically not ideal for your health. Fortunately, when you read medical studies of various “good” or “bad” effects from chocolate, they usually tell you what type of chocolate was fed to the test subjects, and, in some cases, the brand of chocolate as well.

Chocolate can be fattening if you consume a lot and are sedentary. A small 12-ounce candy bar typically contains about 220 calories. The raw bean does contain high amounts of theobromine and caffeine, but these oil-soluble stimulating alkaloids are largely lost during the processing. An average ounce of bittersweet chocolate contains from 5 to 10mg of caffeine, compared with 100 to 150mg of caffeine in an average cup of coffee. As for cavities, at least three separate research centers have revealed that the cocoa powder within chocolate contains a substance that actually inhibits cavities. 

Pharmaceutically Active Compounds In Chocolate

Hard Truths About Sugar

The culprit in the case of cavities is not chocolate, but sugar. Milk chocolate, for example, contains 55 percent sugar by weight. And, most often, chocolate is made with white sugar, a substance that can affect you physiologically in a way similar to cocaine. In most cases, the worst thing about chocolate is that it can contain too much white sugar, depending on the type. Most commercial chocolate products list white sugar (in any of its various guises) as the primary ingredient.

One way to sidestep the detrimental effects of so much white sugar in chocolate is to make your own chocolate products by mixing cocoa (or bitter or baker’s chocolate) with honey or other natural sweeteners. There are a few commercial chocolate bars which contain no white sugar, but these are not yet common, and cost up to three times as much as others with white sugar.

Negotiate With Nibs

Talk to anyone who’s lived through hard times, and they’ll tell you that certain basic commodities were hard to get. This usually includes such items as coffee, sugar, tobacco, alcohol, and, yes, chocolate. These might seem like vices, but chocolate is the best of the batch, and you’d be able to trade chocolate for other items you need. After all, who doesn’t like chocolate?

Unless you live in the tropics, you won’t be growing your own chocolate. Stock up and store it in a cool dry place. Don’t store it high up in an uninsulated cupboard. Once during a heat wave of over 100 degrees F, I found that all my chocolate had melted. At the time, I’d been storing chocolate nibs in glass jars, so I was left with a block of solid chocolate in each jar. If you purchase the unsweetened nibs — a good choice — store it in a solid container and keep it all wrapped. Store it in the basement if you have one, or in a low spot since heat rises.

Unsweetened baking chocolate is perhaps one of the best ways for chocolate storage. It will keep the longest, and since it is unsweetened, you can melt or shred it and use it any way you wish. The unsweetened blocks are also of a uniform size and are ideal for trading. If you don’t want to bother with the unsweetened chocolate, 85 percent cocoa would be a good next choice in the sense of versatility and trade value. Chocolate, properly stored, lasts almost indefinitely. In time, it develops a white coating and gets harder, but is still edible.

Divine Energy

I made an authentic chocolate drink by steeping the coarsely ground beans of the chocolate plant in warm water and adding a little honey. If historians are correct, this was the type of beverage called “xocoatl,” the drink that famous Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortez found the Aztec emperor Montezuma drinking. I found that once the whole beans were ground and made into a beverage, the drink had the color of weak coffee and was a bit oily. It had a pleasant bitter-chocolate flavor. My experience was that one cup seemed as stimulating as two to three cups of coffee.

Montezuma believed chocolate to be a food of the gods, which was brought to the Aztecs by a healer or prophet who traveled over the waters, possibly Quetzalcoatl. To this day, chocolate is known to botanists as Theobroma, or “food of the gods.” It was widely regarded as an aphrodisiac, a food that gave Montezuma the strength to deal with his many wives. Chocolate is a valuable energy food for active individuals. As with coffee, tea, and even tobacco, chocolate has the ability to enhance our lives when consumed moderately.

Recipes

Traditional Champurrado Beverage

• 4 cups masa
• 2 pieces Mexican chocolate
• 2 tablespoons carob powder (optional)
• Dash of sea salt
• ½ cup Alta Dena eggnog (or other health-quality eggnog)
• Warmed in pot, after chocolate has cooled to approximately 120 degrees F, add 1 cup milk.
• 2 cups water

Mud Balls

• 3 cups uncooked quick-cooking oats
• 6 tablespoons grated dark chocolate
• ½ cup dry milk
• ½ teaspoon sea salt (optional)
• 1 cup currants or raisins
• ½ cup chunky peanut butter
• ½ cup raw honey
• 2 teaspoon vanilla

Put the oats, cocoa, dry milk, and salt into a bowl. Mix well. Add the remaining ingredients and mix together. Mix thoroughly. Then, with a tablespoon of the mix at a time, roll into a ball with your hands. Put into a serving plate and serve. [Recipe developed by vegan chef Prudence Boczarski.]

Shavings

Purchase hard baker’s chocolate. Using a cheese grater, grate some over coffee, hot cereal, or ice cream.

About the Author

Christopher Nyerges is the author of Guide to Wild Foods and Useful Plants and about a dozen other books on ethno-botany, survival, and self-reliance. He can be reached at schoolofself-reliance.com, or Box 41834, Eagle Rock, CA 90041.

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