Shea Butter Food
The Chocolate Controversy

As far as shea butter food is concerned, it has been found that shea butter from Africa when it is very oily makes up an important part of African cuisine and the African people prefer this oil when preparing their foods and shea butter is also used as a base for a number of soups and also is used in chocolates as well.

For long, shea butter has been linked with foods and in the African Continent this association has been very extensive as well as diverse, and to illustrate the point, there are even early accounts from the very early days when Cleopatra was living in Egypt when there were many caravans that bore jars and jars of the immensely cherished whipped shea butter for her personal use.

A Part Of African Cuisine

There is a lot that is working in favor of using shea butter and foods because it is used as well as consumed in many oil blends and also is part of the process for making margarine, confectionary items and of course, is otherwise used in cosmetics.

However, because shea butter is rich with vitamin E you can expect to live longer when you think of shea butter and food working well within the digestive system and the vitamin E also protects from rancidity. When you think of shea butter and food and consider its use in the chocolate industry you should be surprised to learn that it is used to complement cocoa butter.

In the countries of Asia and also in Europe there are manufacturers who are substituting cocoa butter with Shea butter and this is not a recent phenomenon; rather, this form of using shea butter and food has been happening for thirty long years and the debate has also now begun in the United States about using shea butter and food especially in chocolates because American manufacturers seem to have been bitten by the European and Asian bug.

The reason given by manufacturers as to why shea butter and food is being used is that it cuts costs for the manufacturer and thus the consumer will also benefit by paying less for his or her chocolates. This, despite the Food and Drug Administration not permitting manufacturers to use shea butter as a substitute for cocoa butter.

Thus, though shea butter food are OK as far as the vitamins are concerned, when it comes to using it in chocolates the benefits are less than obvious and you should check whether the chocolate you are eating does have shea butter or not.

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