Nutritional balance of sugary chocolates

The nutritional balance of sugary chocolates was studied by Pérezgonzález in 2011¹. He found that a sample of chocolate bars, chocolate blocks and bonbons currently available in New Zealand shared a similar nutritional profile characterized as being low in protein, high in fat, high in saturated fat, low in fiber and low in sodium (Pérezgonzález, 2011b²). Chocolates with extra source of sugars (eg, added caramel) differed from other chocolates in also being high in sugars and high in carbohydrate (see profile in illustration 2).

On average, sugary chocolates have a nutritional balance of BNI 128.26s, being particularly unbalanced towards excess of sugars.

Illustration 1: Nutrition information (sugary chocolates)

BNI	128.26s	0.00

Food, 100g	2011	Ideal
Protein	3.9	23.2
Carbohydrate	69.5	63.9
Sugars	57.0	< 11.6
Fat	19.0	12.9
Saturated fat	12.1	< 5.2
Fiber	0.0	7.0
Sodium	0.103	< 0.465
Kcal	464.6	464.6
kJul	1943.9	1943.9

Illustration 2: Nutritional profile (sugary)

60%		*
55%		*
50%		*
45%		*
40%		*
35%		*	*
30%		*	*
25%		*	*
20%		*	*
15%		*	*
10%		*	*
5%	*	*	*
mid	p	c	f	fb
max		s	sf		na
5%		*	*		*
10%		*	*
15%		*	*
20%		*	*
25%		*	*
30%		*
35%		*
40%		*
45%		*
50%		*

ideal % = grey cells; actual % = asterisk (*)

International standards

Sugary chocolates show small changes in their indexing across different international Recommended Dietary Intakes (RDIs), with the US/CAN index showing the largest discrepancies, namely because US/CAN standards allow for more sugars to be consumed (see illustration 3). Overall, however, all nutritional indexes are high and relatively similar to each other, which indicates that the nutritional composition of sugary chocolates would be deemed highly unbalanced in different countries.

Illustration 3: Nutritional balance across different RDIs (sugary chocolates)

Sugary chocolates	average	128.26	128.26	98.26	128.26	124.26

Product100g	Company	BNI	WHO	US/CAN	AUS/NZ	UK
Perky Nana mighty	Cadbury	102.96	102.96	72.96	102.96	98.96
Mars	Mars	124.31	124.31	94.31	124.31	120.31
Mars caramel	Mars	124.85	124.85	94.85	124.85	120.85
Crunchie	Cadbury	132.34	132.34	102.34	132.34	128.34
Whittaker's rum & raisins	Whittaker's	132.64	132.64	102.64	132.64	128.64
Pixie caramel	Nestle	139.13	139.13	109.13	139.13	135.13
M&M's milk chocolate	Mars	140.53	140.53	110.53	140.53	136.53

Correlations between indexes are also perfect and statistically significant. This suggests that the nutritional balance reported by the BNI™ index matches that of other nutritional standards. (Said otherwise, that sugary chocolates and bonbons tend to form a similar hierarchy when indexed using different international standards).