Use the pulldown menus to visit other Food Central sections:
Recipes ---------- Today Recipe Swap	Resources ---------- Additives Alcohol Beer Beverages Coffee Dairy Fat Fruit Grains Herbs Italian Meat Organic Seafood Snacks Southern Sweets Tea Veggies Vitamins	Restaurants ---------- Atlanta Baltimore Boston Chicago Dallas Denver Detroit Fort Worth Houston Las Vegas Los Angeles Miami Minneapolis New Orleans NYC Orlando Philly Phoenix Pittsburgh Salt Lake San Antonio San Diego San Fran Seattle St. Louis Wash, D.C. ---------- Amsterdam Athens Bangkok Beijing Berlin Brussels Cairo Copenhagen Dublin Florence Frankfurt Hong Kong London Madrid Mex City Montreal Moscow Munich Nairobi Paris Prague Rio Rome Singapore St. Pburg. Sydney Tokyo Toronto Vienna Zurich

LOS ANGELES (CNN) -- At the American Chemical Society's annual meeting last week, a researcher partly funded by the Mars candy company reported to colleagues that chocolate contains several different "flavonoids," the compounds believed by some to inhibit heart disease.

Other researchers have already suggested that chocolate contains flavonoids, but the research presented Wednesday in Anaheim went further.

Dr. Harold Schmitz, of the University of California Davis, said, "What we found is that these individual flavonoids in some of our chocolate products actually have significantly different antioxidant activities."

Studies over the last few years have focused on antioxidants, such as vitamin E, because scientists theorize that the compounds may help neutralize the fatty plaque that clogs arteries and leads to heart attacks.

Two large dietary studies reported in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1993 did show the risk of coronary artery disease decreased in women and men taking vitamin E supplements. But the results are still considered preliminary.

The health buzz about chocolate

The idea that chocolate might in some way be good for one's health was given steam in December 1998, when a study in the British Medical Journal Lancet reported men who ate chocolate and candy lived almost a year longer than those who abstained.

It was based on a Harvard University School of Public Health survey of 7,841 men, and it was quickly questioned by other scientists.

And in Spain last year, researchers at a cocoa experts meeting said cocoa contained more than 600 chemicals that may help fight cancer and heart disease, and could also help protect the human immune system, fight rheumatism and combat stress.

The flavonoids, reportedly found in chocolate, are also the chemical found in red wine, and respected studies have linked consumption of red wine to a lower risk of heart disease and stroke.

Reuters contributed to this report.