Food Value of Milk Chocolate.
The value of milk as a food is so generally recognised as to need no commendation here. When milk is evaporated to a dry solid, about 87.5 per cent. of water is driven off, so that the dry milk left has about eight times the food value of the original milk. Milk chocolate of good quality contains from 15 to 25 per cent. of milk solids. Milk chocolate varies greatly in composition, but for the purpose of calculating the food value, we may assume that about a quarter of a high-class milk chocolate consists of solid milk, and this is combined with about 40 per cent. of cane sugar and 35 per cent. of cacao butter and cacao mass.
ANALYSIS AND FUEL VALUE OF MILK CHOCOLATE.
| Energy-giving power. Calories per lb. | |||
| Milk Fat and Cacao Butter | 35.0 | = | 1,480 |
| Milk and Cocoa Proteins | 8.0 | = | 149 |
| Cacao Starch and Digestible Carbohydrates | 3.0 | = | 56 |
| Stimulants (Theobromine and Caffein) | 0.2 | ||
| Mineral Matter | 2.0 | ||
| Crude Fibre | 0.3 | ||
| Moisture | 1.5 | ||
| Milk Sugar and Cane Sugar | 50.0 | = | 930 |
| 100.0 | = | 2,615 | |
It will be noted that the food value of milk chocolate is even greater than that of plain chocolate. It is highly probable that milk chocolate is the most nutritious of all sweetmeats. It is not generally recognised that when we purchase one pound of high-class milk chocolate we obtain three-quarters of a pound of chocolate and two pounds of milk!
[1] Hygienische Rundschau, 1900, p. 305.
[2] Die Bewertung des Kakaos als Nahrungs- und Genussmittel, 1906.
[3] See West India Committee Journal, p. 55, 1917.