Is Dark Chocolate Keto Friendly?

A ketogenic diet is a scary thought for chocolate lovers. After all, who wants to give up your favorite sweet treats in order to lose a few pounds?

But if you have a sweet tooth, there’s still hope!

Keep reading and I’ll answer the all important question: is dark chocolate keto? Plus, you’ll learn my favorite keto friendly dark chocolate brands. (If you’ve been around the keto community – it’s not what you think).

If you love chocolate as much as me, one of the first questions you asked when starting a low carb diet is, “Can you eat dark chocolate on keto?”

Coming from a girl who lost more than 100 pounds on keto (while eating dark chocolate daily), I’d say yes – dark chocolate is keto! That’s great news for those times you need a little chocolate.

The bad news – most “keto-friendly chocolate bars” have upwards of 11g net carbs for just a few dark chocolate squares. Sadly, the carb count starts adding up when chocolate cravings kick into high gear.

Is Lily’s Chocolate Keto?

Many keto dieters gravitate towards sugar free dark chocolate, like Lily’s sweets. Even though Lily’s doesn’t have much sugar, sugar-free chocolate can leave you feeling gassy and bloated. This is mostly due to the sugar alcohols found in keto friendly dark chocolate brands.

I don’t know about you, but all day keto farts from a tiny bit of sugar alcohol isn’t worth the keto-friendly label!

(Not true, Lindsay Lohan, not true)

Consuming bars low in grams of net carbs doesn’t mean too much when your body is a big old ball of stress. If you’re like a lot of keto dieters, your body will find it difficult to digest processed foods made from man-made food chemicals.

Since overly processed chemicals aren’t real foods found in nature, your body doesn’t understand what to do with them. This stresses your body out, which makes digestion difficult.

Also, many sweeteners leave behind a bitter taste. The ones that don’t are highly palatable, which isn’t necessarily a good thing.

In reality, artificial sweeteners are hundreds of times sweeter than the small amount of sugar found in dark chocolate. When your body receives these ultra-sweet signals, sugar cravings kick in. Then – you’re more likely to eat the entire bar.

Lily’s Dark Chocolate vs. The Best Organic Dark Chocolate

Let’s take an in depth look at Lily’s chocolate nutritional information compared to Green & Black’s Organic 85% dark chocolate.

A serving size of Lily’s dark chocolate bar (30g) contains 16 total carbs. When you subtract sugar alcohols (4g) and total fiber (9g), you’re left with 3 grams net carbs.

A serving of Green & Blacks 85% dark (30 g) contains 11.3 total carbs. This version has 3g fiber and no sugar alcohols. That puts the net carb total at 8.3 grams.

Even though Lily’s has less net carbs (3g vs. 8.3g), Green & Blacks has less total carbs (11.3g vs. 16g). While many keto dieters count net grams, most of their bodies are counting total carbs. This is especially true with processed food, like dark chocolate on keto.

Unfortunately, the story doesn’t get any better for Lily’s chocolate chips – which clock in at 16g of total carbs per ounce. This includes 3g of stomach cramping sugar alcohols.

Not only will you have less digestive upset when processing the real sugar in dark chocolate, but with regular chocolate your body is less stressed due to less keto farts.

A quick keto math lesson to demonstrate this point:

Poorly digested foods = A Stressed Body

A Stressed Body = Cortisol Spike

Cortisol Spike = Fat Storing Mode

Fat Storing Mode = you don’t lose weight, even when a product claims only 2g net carbs 🤯

While most keto products proudly display net carbs, in my humble keto expert opinion – keto products filled with sugar alcohols aren’t the best options for weight loss on a low-carb diet. Be especially wary of any product that mentions net carbs.

Just because the net carb content is low, that doesn’t make it a good option for keto.

We teach our students to avoid the dreaded keto weight loss stall by counting total carbs. This is A MUST when you eat keto-friendly processed foods. Not counting all of the carbs can stall weight loss completely for some dieters.

Can You Have Dark Chocolate on Keto?

So what’s an at-the-end-of-her-wits-I-just-want-some-freaking-chocolate keto dieter to do?

Obviously milk chocolate bars aren’t the answer. At the same time, unsweetened chocolate – like the 95% and above versions, won’t cut it for most dieters who are conditioned to expect a high dose of sweetness with dessert.

The best solution to help women stick to keto when chocolate cravings strike is to choose a high quality dark chocolate bar. Keep in mind, the higher percentage of dark chocolate you choose – the less sugar you get.

As an added bonus, you can melt dark chocolate with a healthy fat like coconut oil to get a quick chocolate fix that also burns belly fat!

What’s the Best Dark Chocolate for Keto?

I use 90% Lindt chocolate in keto fat bomb recipes since a European chocolate bar is thought to have less mold in their popular chocolate brand.

If you’re not sensitive to mold, there are plenty of other high quality chocolates you can choose to fit into your keto lifestyle. When looking for the best choice of chocolate, choose a type of chocolate that’s 85% dark or higher.

If this is still too bitter for you, you can start with 70% dark on keto, and work your way up. Just keep this kind to a special occasion since 70 dark chocolate is higher in total carbs.

It’s also important to remember the less often you eat sweeteners like stevia or Swerve, the more your palate will adjust to less sweetened foods. That means dark chocolate tastes even better when you skip highly sweetened sugar-free dark chocolate and other overly sweetened keto treats.

Other things I look at when choosing a high quality dark chocolate is whether or not it’s fair trade certified. Since many cocoa products are unethically sourced, I prefer to spend my money on companies who don’t promote child labor.

Some of the best companies include:

Endangered Species
Green & Black’s Organic
Simple Truth Organic
Thrive Organic Dark Chocolate
Hu Fair Trade Simple Dark Chocolate

How Can I Eat Dark Chocolate on Keto?

Now that we’ve established high quality dark chocolate is your best bet vs. a keto chocolate bar that boasts of net carbs, how does dark chocolate fit into low carb diets? After all, 2 measly squares of even low carb chocolate still contains around 4 grams of carbs.

The best way to understand how much dark chocolate you can fit into your keto meal plan is to track keto macros in a food diary, like Cronometer. If you have carbs leftover at the end of the day and you want to nosh, then you are allowed dark chocolate on a keto diet. Just be sure to keep your total carbs in the macro range that’s right for you.

The best dark chocolate for a keto diet is when you melt chocolate together with coconut oil to make coconut oil fat bombs that help you burn fat. The high fat content, combined with dark chocolate as the main ingredient, is helpful when it comes to faster progress on your keto journey.

If you haven’t quite fallen in love with all of the health benefits of coconut oil, you can also melt dark chocolate with other good fats, like nut butters. Keto Reese’s Cups are the perfect example of a keto dark chocolate recipe that can help you kick sugar cravings.

This dark chocolate fudge recipe makes being hungry on keto a thing of the past. The healthy fats help you burn more fat too!

Dark Chocolate FAQs

How many carbs in dark chocolate?

The amount of carbs depends on the brand of chocolate you buy, as well as the percentage of dark chocolate listed. Check the label of the dark chocolate you buy to determine the total carbs.

What dark chocolate is allowed on keto?

While most keto dieters drift towards a keto chocolate bar filled with sugar alcohols, I believe a high quality dark chocolate bar is better tolerated on a keto diet. The best type of dark chocolate to shoot for is 85% or higher. Use your macro tracker to determine the right amount of dark chocolate for you.

Where to buy keto chocolate?

You can buy a high quality dark chocolate at most specialty stores, like Sprouts, or at online retailers like Amazon or Thrive Market.

How can I sweeten dark chocolate?

While you can melt dark chocolate and mix in keto sweeteners like monk fruit extract, the best way to train your palate to enjoy real food like dark chocolate is by limiting artificial sweeteners in your plan. Once your palate adjusts, you’ll learn to love the taste of dark chocolate.

Does dark chocolate stop ketosis?

As long as you stay within your total carb limit for the day, dark chocolate will not stop ketosis for most people.

The Dark Chocolate Keto Diet Wrap Up

While it’s up to your body’s total carb limit to decide how much dark chocolate you can eat on keto, the good news is dark chocolate is keto friendly for most people. While dark chocolate already has a ton of health benefits on its own, you can reap even more fat loss rewards when you combine it with other healthy fats.

If you’re ready to learn how I ate dark chocolate daily, while also losing 100 pounds on a keto diet, check out the Keto Quick Start Course. You’ll learn all of my keto tips and tricks to make weight loss a breeze!

This is the same course that’s helped hundreds of women finally lose weight – even when keto previously stalled their weight loss efforts.