Dark chocolate is a functional food and a superfood, due to its high content of flavanols, antioxidants and minerals such as magnesium, zinc, iron and copper.
Secondly, fortifying chocolate with active nutraceuticals creates a pleasurable and especially effective experience: the natural healthy fats in chocolate act as a carrier to improve the digestion and bioavailability of the other ingredients.
As such, The Functional Chocolate Company believes that chocolate is the perfect base to enhance with its unique nutraceutical formulas.
In addition, and perhaps most importantly, rich and tasty chocolate provides a pleasurable way to deliver key ingredients. This makes it more likely that the supplement will be consumed regularly. This can be challenging with less palatable options like pills, tinctures, or capsules.
According to Fortune Business Insights, the global functional food and beverage market is projected to grow significantly. It is expected to increase from $281.14 billion in 2021 to $529.66 billion by 2028, with a compound annual growth rate of 9.5 percent.
While these statistics highlight a huge opportunity, they don’t capture the full range of potential that functional foods can address. This is according to The Functional Chocolate Company.
According to the World Economic Forum, anxiety is currently the biggest mental health problem worldwide.
Similarly, sleep problems affect 80% of Americans, 73% of women are not addressing menopausal symptoms, and more than 55% of people have pain issues, all of which can be addressed through functional approaches.
Dark chocolate
Customers are increasingly looking for new ways to solve these common problems.
In the natural products industry, there is often talk of «pill fatigue»: consumers no longer want to stockpile pills, capsules and powders to meet their daily health needs.
n today’s economic climate, consumers are increasingly seeking products that provide the best value for their money and calories.
Combining ethically sourced chocolate with effective blends of nutraceuticals offers just that.
But what exactly are functional foods, and why are they so exciting?
According to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, functional foods are «whole foods, along with fortified, enriched, or enhanced foods, that have a potentially beneficial effect on health when consumed regularly as part of a varied diet and at effective levels based on meaningful standards of evidence.»
The term «functional foods» is broad. It includes both foods that have a positive impact on health and «fortified foods» that contain additional health-boosting ingredients like vitamins, minerals, probiotics, or nutraceuticals.
Calcium-fortified orange juice is one of the «original» functional foods, well-known and loved by many.
Today, functional foods come in many forms. These range from nootropics to potato chips to adaptogenic coffee, with many other products in between.