For the majority of dark chocolate on the market (whilst it has “beneficial” properties towards health) the resultant process it has to endure to end up as Cacoa reduces the natural antioxidants by 70%-80%, At the moment i’m using (ie-experimenting 😀 ) with a variety of dark chocolate from our supplier (callebaut) called Aticoa (catchy….huh 🙄 )that reduces this figure to 20%, from independant data it appears that just 8g-10g of this chocolate per day will supply over 100% of the recommended intake of antioxidants – whether this is just marketing bullshit i remain to be convinced but as they are a Billion£+ company i doubt they’d not do the research beforehand.
I’m also working (alright…..buggering about really 😀 ) with single estate/plantation Porcelana cocoa beans – these are the premier league of cocoa and a poor analogy could be made with the very top quality champagne grapes, if you don’t know how to treat them then you should leave well alone but if you get it right then it’s worth it, if you have to ask how much a bar? – you can’t afford it.
And as for dark chocolate cacao content? – it has to be at least 70%, no more than 85% otherwise the bitterness is hard to distinguish from the aroma and taste.