This article was written in 2022 and updated in 2023. Maybe a community like Today I Learned would be a better fit?
YAIL.
Years ago I learned.
The Cad in Cadbury is Cadmium.
Choose dark chocolates with the lowest levels of heavy metals. CR’s tests found five chocolates—one each from Mast, Taza, and Valrhona, and two from Ghirardelli—with relatively low levels of both lead and cadmium. Eight more are lower in only lead, and 10 others in just cadmium. Only five bars—one each from Green & Black’s, Lily’s (owned by the Hershey company), and Trader Joe’s, and two from Theo—were higher for both heavy metals.
Kinda crazy to think about pregnant ladies getting dark chocolate cravings now. At least some brands were decent though.
They think they crave dark chocolate but actually crave that glorious cadmium
The children yearn for the mines
Not my chocolate. I will never eat chocolate again barring a major, major industry overhaul after seeing John Oliver’s segment on it.
And if you want to keep eating chocolate and stay in the dark about why you really shouldn’t, never watch it.
There do seem to be a few ethical sources for it; I know Tony’s says they “try, but can’t guarantee” it comes from ethical sources, but there are some single origin chocolate makers out there, although they’re more expensive.
That’s an issue John Oliver brought up. Even the ones that try to source it ethically can’t guarantee it and I just don’t want to risk being complicit in that.
Sure, we all take advantage of people in other ways all the time, but this seems like an easy thing for me to stop doing and try to make the world just a tiny bit better… or at least feel a tiny bit better about my part in it.
Oh good, watching now. It’s my new diet idea, learning to revile all comestibles
Yeah, I totally agree with that. The single origin makers can guarantee that it’s collected ethically though since they get their cocoa from one source, which is something I didn’t see in the John Oliver segment and had also sworn it off. I haven’t looked into it much past the one farm I went to in Hawaii that I’ve been happy to buy from recently, but I do think there are others that can guarantee it.
I feel the same way about cocaine. There have been reports of murder in the cocaine trade.