Now that you’re committed to eating better, let’s talk about the second component of a healthy lifestyle: exercise. Exercise not only burns calories, but it also improves your flexibility and endurance while benefitting your heart. When you work your muscles hard, however, they need to recover afterward — and there’s no better post-workout drink than good old chocolate milk.

You heard right. Chocolate milk. That delicious after-school treat you remember from childhood but had probably given up in favor of high-tech sport drinks or other artificially flavored, chemical-laden concoctions. The thing is, though, chocolate milk’s creamy, delicious flavor may make you forget that it contains some seriously powerful nutrients that can help your muscles recover faster and stronger after a tiring workout.

According to physiologist Joel Stager, professor of kinesiology and former director of the Human Performance laboratory at Indiana University, chocolate milk might just be the perfect post-workout drink because it has double the protein and carbohydrate content of most sport drinks. Stager and his team tested chocolate milk alongside several high-tech sport drinks and found that athletes who consumed chocolate milk performed as well or better than those who drank the other beverages.

This all depends on your level of workout, of course. Any exercise is good exercise in our opinion, so a brisk walk after dinner is better for you than immediately plopping down on the couch to watch TV. But if that’s the limit of your exercise, you may do better with regular milk, which will give you the protein, calcium and other nutrients your body needs without the added sugar of chocolate milk. However, if you’re running, cycling, playing tennis or otherwise pushing your body to its limits, then that extra sugar, which is a simple carbohydrate, can help give you the energy you need to recover after a strenuous workout.