Cocoa powder can be used in so many ways; you can buy cocoa powder from a retail store and make a semi-sweet chocolate at home through some easy procedures. Remember, a semi-sweet or raw chocolate comes with little or no sugar and they contribute little calories to your daily diet. Cocoa powder itself is obtained from cocoa beans by first cleaning the beans and then partially drying them before roasting at high temperatures. Cocoa powder is obtained from the milling and separating cocoa butter from the liquid. Cocoa butter is used for making chocolate while the liquid is further processed to obtain other products including the powder.
Aside semi-sweet chocolate, you can also make some snacks at home with cocoa powder. The final quality and flavor of the chocolate you make will be determined by the type of cocoa bean flower you use. A high quality cocoa bean powder will be needed if you want to make snacks like candy, you can consume your home made chocolate in many ways, and you can eat them raw, break them into pieces and add them to your desserts. You can also consume your chocolate pieces with some vegetables.
To make a half-sweetened chocolate at home from your cocoa powder, you will need 3 table spoon of butter, ½ cup of cocoa powder, 2 table spoon of sugar, cup cake pan, aluminum cupcake liner, microwave safe bowl,and your mixing bowls or containers.
Simply add 3 table spoon of butter in your microwave safe bowl, and heat slightly for about 1 minute {the heating temperature should be less than 100 degrees Celsius} , quickly put the bowl away from fire and add the ½ cup of cocoa powder and add the 2 teaspoon of sugar and mix thoroughly until the chocolate makes a smooth appearance and texture.
Use your aluminum cupcake liner to line the inner portion of the cupcake pan and gently pour your chocolate inside. The chocolate liner should be filled until it is 3/4th full. Let the cup cake pan containing chocolate cool down a little and place the pan in the refrigerator until it becomes semi hard cool. Remove from the refrigerator after some few hours and gently remove the cupcake liner containing the chocolate and slightly peel the liner from the outer portion of the chocolate and your home made low sugar chocolate is ready to be consumed raw.
One more ‘bliss’ chemical to be found in the chocolate is lipid anandamide. It is there in brain whenever we feel great. The Anandamide is as well called “chocolate amphetamine” since it causes some changes in the blood pressure & blood sugar levels and leading to the feelings of alertness and excitement. Anandamide works very like amphetamines for increasing the mood as well as decrease depression, however it isn’t addictive such as caffeine or else illegal with the undesirable side effects like amphetamines. The Anandamide is unique in the resemblance to THC, chemical found in the marijuana.
Good news is even though anandamide in the chocolate helps in making feelings of elation, effect isn’t same as THC in marijuana. This will take around 25 pounds of the chocolate to attain the ‘high’ similar to marijuana & nausea will overpower feelings of bliss. In chart raw cacao powder is in the top of antioxidant listing with 4 times an amount of the antioxidants as Berries. The Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity rate was developed by US Department of Agriculture for measuring effectiveness of the antioxidants to absorb the free radicals, which cause cell & tissue damage.