Hi everyone. I'm new to The Chocolate Life so I hope I'm doing this correctly!

I'm looking for a source of theobromine that's extracted/removed from cocoa beans, i.e. not synthesized.

Does anyone know a good source for this ingredient?

Barb

updated by @barb-stuckey: 06/29/23 16:49:02

Callebaut was trying to commercialize something akin to this a few years ago, but it was never commercially available and it's terribly expensive (it's callebaut, after all...). I've not seen it anywhere else. If you're handy, average theobromine in shells is 2%, you can do a water extraction followed by a crystallization and produce it yourself.

I am intrigued, what would you want it for?

Me too! what can you do with?

a "RED-theobromine-BULL"

anti-depressant nasal spray?

anti oxidant body oils?

what else.... with 200 kg of shell per month it could be intersting....

Extraction: boil in water and then boil the water down? would it "kill" the theobromine?

No.

You can do the same with tea and extract the caffeine, it was a second year uni chemistry prac. Maybe they should do theobromine too, the prac would smell pretty good at least.

I'm curious too. Why would someone want to extract Theobromine? What use is it?

It's the kissing cousin to caffeine. Stimulant. Also some evidence that it's pretty effective at suppressing the vagus nerve, which is what kicks off the coughing reflex - making it a natural cough suppressant.

Side note: you've heard not to feed chocolate to your dog as it could kill them - it's the theobromine that does this - small amounts can easily put a dog into cardiac arrest. Horses too, for that matter.

I also read on Wikipedia that it works very well for reducing blood pressure (provided you don't exceed the LDL50). Seeing as I have high blood pressure, I could technically make a special "Brad" chocolate, eat it regularly (like that's tough to do already! haha!), and do away with my expensive meds. Theoretically....

Seeing as I have a few hundred lbs of shell, how does one boil them down and crystalize the theobromine from the residual? This is VERY intriguing!!!

Thanks.

Brad

a million $ question

I have no direct knowledge of it's use for bp reduction - however, since caffeine is also a diuretic, given the structural similarities between it and theobromine, i suppose theobromine could also be a diuretic. Again, i have no direct knowledge of this application personally, and while the wiki may be right, i've seen far too many things on it that are simply inaccurate for me to trust it as a good source 8-) (i've not looked at it in ages, but the chocolate wiki, for example, was (is?) riddled with inaccuracies).

I would unequivocally NOT make a 'tea' from the shells and drink that. You're going to get all sorts of unwanted nasties that you absolutely do not want to ingest. The entire point of crystallization is purification. At some point, you're going to need a separation step to help discriminate the theobromine from the other water soluble stuff - if you went straight to xtallization, sure you'd xtallize theobromine, but also precipitate out lots of other stuff.

Brad if you want to reduce blood pressure naturally, hibiscus tea is very good apparently (Wiki again). I looked into it becausea couple of Aussie cacao growers started eating the whole beans straight out of the pods, pulp bean everything. The cacao beans they grow up there are very purple. Anyway they found they were able to ditch their blood pressure meds. This could be a combination of the theobromine as well as the complex mix of anthocyanins found in the purple beans - the same anthocyanins that are found inhibiscus tea, which are the blood pressure reducing agent. I did read on this further and it was a particular two anthocyanins that were the best - as far as I can remember.

So Barb, any update on your research?

can anyone tell me what do i need /how to / crystallize theobromine ?

Hi Brad,

is it a case or all of the chocolate maker/ business owner suffer from high blood pressure?

Something to do with the fact we have been eating too much chocolate and our heart is used to pump under theobromine effect/push?

It might sound stupid, but i always been running on "high" (chocolate, figurative!!), now being a business owner that has turned into something more stressful.

If what we eat is what we are (and i eat very healthy) is the chocolate the potential cause of high pump work?

any thought anyone?

Nino