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Chocolate purists alarmed at change in food's standards

...Mars has even launched a division called Mars Nutrition for Health & Well-Being, which markets chocolate products with explicit health claims.Guittard, whose family has been making chocolate since 1868, said some big chocolate manufacturers favor the proposed change in regulations because they want to keep prices down on key ingredients by using less expensive vegetable fat, which can contain trans fats, instead of cocoa butter.

That scares him.

Cybele May, a playwright, whale-watching enthusiast and Web editor in California, has been encouraging people to write the FDA with posts on her blog at candyblog.net.

"Suddenly, we are worried that the chocolate bar isn't the same anymore and we don't know why," May said.If the change is approved, products would still need to contain chocolate liquor, the ground-up center of the cocoa bean.

But a confection such as PayDay Chocolatey Avalanche - which doesn't contain cocoa butter - would be able to call itself PayDay Chocolate Avalanche.

It seems like a small distinction, but to people like Guittard and May, it is not.An FDA spokeswoman said if - stressing, if - the agency decides to consider changing the standards as requested in the petition, the process would take several years.For their part, chocolate makers aren't saying much.

Kirk Saville, a Hershey's spokesman, said it was "premature to speculate on any changes before the process is complete." He was more expans...

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Chocolate purists alarmed at change in food's standards