agave

When it comes to chocolate, it's got to be sweet. We all know that, but why sugar? The sugar that's generally used in most chocolate - even the quality stuff - is refined, which means all the beneficial nutrients naturally present in cane juice are stripped away leaving pure sucrose. This has many advantages for industrial producers as sucrose has almost no flavour but imparts considerable sweetness, whilst also being an effective (and cheap) filler. However, there's a mile-long list of evils associated with refined sugar which is more than enough to convince us that it's a no-no.

Bring on Agave...hurray! A natural syrup that comes from a cactus-like plant that grows in the desert sands of Mexico. Agave nectar (or 'syrup' if you prefer) looks and tastes a bit like honey, but a little runnier. The best bit though, is that it has a very low glycaemic index (GI), which means that there won't be any sugar highs and lows, as it's converted into sugar in the blood more slowly than other sweeteners. Sucrose, for example, has a GI value of about 68, and honey a GI of 55, whereas the value of agave nectar is between 11 and 19.