Eating chocolates is bad for you!

January 25, 2006 7:42 PM

So I am living in a hotel for the past month. Every day the maid leaves a standard hotel branded chocolate on my bedstand. Every night when I arrive I put the chocolate on a drawer.

So now I have a drawer filled with 20 chocolates or so. And I was wondering - what would be worse for my health? If I ate them one by one every night (as I am "supposed" to) or all at once in a chocolate binge?

If I eat one every night I am definetely having 100% of the chocolate digested into my system. If I eat 20 chocolates at once, maybe some of it wont be digested and just forwarded to my intestines.

It's one of those questions only AskMeFi can answer.

posted by falameufilho to health & fitness (21 comments total)

Well, you're better off doing it night by night, since eating 20 chocolates all at once will spike the heck out of your blood sugar.
posted by zek at 7:49 PM on January 25, 2006

Use them to bribe people in the office.
posted by polyglot at 8:02 PM on January 25, 2006

The implications are literally staggering. If you're asking whether eating enough chocolate would leave your innards, um, well glazed so that the balance of the chocolate would just zip on through, I have two responses (IANAD or N(utritionist)):

1. Wouldn't the stomach acid keep on breaking down the chocolate for processing and absorption farther down? I mean, it's not like a washing machine with a pre-set stomach cycle and intestine cycle...

2. If not, would you really want to see the result of chocolate successfully navigating your digestive system intact? I shudder.

Can't wait to see the 'best answer'.

On preview, here's an unsolicited idea for doing something with them: if you're still in the hotel, or, better, staying in another for a while, leave the chocolates on your pillow one-by-one in the morning with a "thanks!" note.
posted by socratic at 8:05 PM on January 25, 2006

Dude, I couldn't even wait 20 minutes to eat a chocolate, let alone 20 days. You need a little note that says, "No chocolates, thanks!"
posted by MrZero at 8:07 PM on January 25, 2006

Ah shit, just eat the fuckers in one big binge and be done with it. But you'll probably get a bit of digestive distress depending on the cacao content and it'll probably keep you awake. I'm still wondering how a normal human being wouldn't have inhaled all twenty as they were left and every one off the maid cart as well.
posted by docpops at 8:08 PM on January 25, 2006

Eating 20 at once would definitely be different for the simple reason that the calories you take in must be roughly equal to the number of calories you burn, or you gain weight.

In a given day, the variation of how much energy you use is probably enough to take care of one chocolate - it's not going to be so many calories that you've got to go run laps to exert that much energy.

20 at once, however, will screw with your blood sugar as mentioned above, and also will be way too much for your body to just shrug off. Will you gain weight from it? Maybe not. Maybe you'll just get jittery and end up burning the calories some other way. More than likely, however, you'll feel a little ill from the mass quantity of sugar in 20 chocolates.
posted by twiggy at 8:18 PM on January 25, 2006

It's better for your teeth if you eat them all at once because the sugar will stay in your mouth for a shorter period of time. Of course, how your stomach will feel after is a whole other issue.
posted by booizzy at 8:21 PM on January 25, 2006

But you'll probably get a bit of digestive distress depending on the cacao content

I'd link to that NEJM article from 1984 titled "Hydrox Fecalis", but I can't find an abstract online. It'll probably come around again when Girl Scout Thin Mints hit the streets in a month or more.
posted by gimonca at 8:22 PM on January 25, 2006

I can tell you right now, that if these are the size of Andes mints, I've had way more than 20 at a time with no ill effects.

Of course, I'm 18/male, and have (apparently) a digestive tract of steel.
posted by devilsbrigade at 8:38 PM on January 25, 2006

Rubberband a $5 bill to each one, or at least a few of them, and then give them to homeless people on your way to work.
posted by caddis at 8:42 PM on January 25, 2006

Well, eating 20 small chocolates will spike your blood sugar which in itself isn't a bad thing, but not a good thing either. Your insulin level will rise and you may feel tired and lightheaded for a while.

Also, chocolate contains a mild mood elevator and stimulant called theobromine. Eating all that chocolate may make you sleepy and unable to go to sleep all at the same time. I doubt its very different from drinking a big chocolate shake. If you're anything like me all that sugar and chocolate will make things a little odd for a while and the feeling will go away after twenty or thirty minutes.
posted by skallas at 9:00 PM on January 25, 2006

get an empty candy box and give them to the female of your choice ...
posted by pyramid termite at 9:23 PM on January 25, 2006

When you check out, leave them all neatly arranged on the pillow . . .

Then again, the cleaning staff is only doing their job and it's probably not necessary to mess with them. Chances are, they'd just return them to the bucket from whence they came, there to be distributed other rooms.

Kind of poetic when you think about it.
posted by aladfar at 9:24 PM on January 25, 2006

Given the large amount of chocolate at issue, I suggest taking an analytical approach. First you must realize the optimal method of consumption depends on what you're trying to achieve. To maximize health, simply leave the chocolates in the nightstand for the next guest. On the other hand, if you want to maximize your sugar rush, then eat them all at once after giving blood. Personally, I feel both these methods make poor use of chocolate. They're more suited to Bibles and cocaine.

As a connoisseur, I prefer to maximize flavor per calorie. This ratio is commonly known as the Pleasure Quotient. In my studies, I have devise an ingenious technique ensure a truly remarkable PQ. To begin, my method requires one eat the chocolate first thing in the morning. Consuming the chocolate on an empty stomach not only enhances one's appetite, it also preserves the chocolate's flavor and texture. This effect, properly exploited, allows the last morsel of chocolate to signify not the end of your pleasure, but merely the half-way point. In fact, my patented bi-directional scheme not only doubles your enjoyment, it also cancels the calories. Measured in accordance with the ratio presented earlier, the pleasure is clearly unbounded. Unfortunately, I cannot post the precise details of my method as my research is not yet ready for publication. But do not despair! I have taken the liberty of emailing you a selection of photographs taken from my notes that illustrate the approximate technique. I hope you find them enlightening.
posted by ryanrs at 9:41 PM on January 25, 2006

Lalochezia, I almost spit Orange Soda all over my monitor.

I think that in my case, eating them all at once would cause a bit of a...shall we say...evacuation situation in my belly and I feel like very little of this chocolate would do anything but plummet down & out.
posted by Brainy at 10:14 PM on January 25, 2006

By all at once do you mean like over the course of 5 or 10 minutes, or actually trying to fit them in your mouth at one time?

I cast my vote for the latter!
posted by aubilenon at 12:35 AM on January 26, 2006

Make a smiley face with them and leave them on the nightstand and see what the maid does.
posted by sien at 1:46 AM on January 26, 2006

By all at once do you mean like over the course of 5 or 10 minutes, or actually trying to fit them in your mouth at one time?

Ooo, a Chubby Bunny variant! (Warning: may cause death.)
posted by hangashore at 7:43 AM on January 26, 2006

I dunno about you, but I'd probably get sick of them by piece number 10 (which will probably do no damage).
Another vote for sharing the wealth whether it be officemates or strangers.
posted by like_neon at 8:13 AM on January 26, 2006

I suspect you can eat them all in a binge with little ill effect other than being a little over-sugared. However I advise against trying to get the maids to alter their routine.
posted by phearlez at 9:51 AM on January 26, 2006

I really doubt there's a hell of a lot of chocolate in your chocolates. It is almost certainly a lot of filler and sugars and fats that have been given, at best, a quick glance at a hunk of real chocolate.

My advice: give them out to people you don't like. They'll think you're being kind, when you're actually punishing them.

Then go out and hunt up some Green & Blacks. Or even a 70% Lindt.
posted by five fresh fish at 10:25 AM on January 26, 2006