Chocolate milk certainly appears to be this week’s A-list beverage.

Not only is an expensive campaign championing its virtues, the New York Times claims it may help reduce inflammation.

In case you’re wondering what inflammation has to do with health, many degenerative diseases are intensified, if not directly caused, by cellular inflammation.

So does chocolate milk deserve such health claims?  Depends on your definition of chocolate milk!

The study referred by to the New York Times was carried out by Spanish researchers and recently published in the renowned American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

Alas, a review of the study reveals that participants weren’t exactly drinking chocolate milk.  They were drinking skim milk with cocoa powder.

As far as I’m concerned, this is an “apples and oranges” situation.

The 40 grams of cocoa powder that certain participants were drinking on a daily basis contained 7.6 grams of fiber, a day’s worth of iron, as much potassium as a medium banana, and a high amount of polyphenols and flavonoids.

Commercial chocolate milk, meanwhile, offers less than a gram of fiber per eight-ounce serving and nowhere near that amount of potassium or flavonoids.

These are two very different beverages!

For the record, it is no surprise that cocoa powder offers health benefits due to its high antioxidant and flavonoid content.  This study only helps to strengthen previous discoveries of its health benefits.

As far as I’m concerned, if it’s cocoa’s health benefits you are looking for, you are better off utilizing it in a healthy dessert recipe.