Recently I was talking with a friend who owns an organic chocolate company. I mentioned I was snacking on some raw cacao nibs and he cut me off in mid-sentence: “I wouldn't put that stuff in my body if you paid me!”

Why would he say that? Dark chocolate, especially raw cacao has been touted as part of the new pantheon of superfoods: full of incredible health-boosting, mood-lifting nutrients.

It's not what's in your cacao that's a problem, it’s what's on it. You’ll be shocked to learn that in many cases, cacao harbors biohazard-levels of dangerous bacteria like staphylococus aureus, e-coli and salmonella.

How can this be?

Cacao gains its full, delectable chocolate flavor through fermentation.

That fermentation takes place where it’s grown, right there in the jungle; standard operating procedure is to spread the beans out on the ground, cover them with banana or plantain leaves, and let natural yeasts and bacteria of the jungle work their magic.

It sounds idyllic… but out in the open jungle for days, lots of other things can get muddled up in the process, including rodent and bat feces, insects, and anything else that can crawl, fall, or blow in. Most buyers don’t care, because they know the beans will be roasted before being processed into cheap mass-market chocolate bars. The high heat sterilizes the beans, and that’s good enough for them.

But if you want the full antioxidant health benefits of dark chocolate, with all the natural enzymes and delicate nutrients that are degraded by cooking, you'll want to eat your cacao raw...

...so standard procedure isn’t good enough. Certainly, buying any old beans or nibs isn’t going to cut it. Because in the rush to cash in on this superfood trend, too many distributors are cutting prices by cutting corners, risking your health for their bottom line, and passing off unhealthy beans and nibs as a healthy food.

If you scan the web or the raw food section of your local market, you'll find a bewildering array of raw cacao nibs and powders, but none make any promises about their purity or processing.

Fortunately, if you dig a little deeper, and search for companies that verify the integrity of their sources, you'll be able to find truly raw cacao that's totally contaminant free.