Inevitably, I think most of my entries will be about food. Food is a very important part of my life. It is so deeply connected with me, that I even do it for a living. I am a Food Technologist. I love most aspects about food and, I could not, not do a single entry about it. It would make me feel incomplete. I love chocolate. I think it is even my favorite food!
When we were very young, my dad used to record our voices as a way of tracking our growth. About once a year he would sit us in front of a small cassette player, press the red button and ask us questions. Often we would volunteer to sing a song, or tell a joke, but mostly he would ask us about school and stuff. One of the earliest conversations went like this:
DAD: We just had your birthday, didn´t we?
ME: (in a very very young voice) yeth
DAD: And how old did you turn?
ME: (silence)
DAD: The recording can’t see your fingers, you have to tell us with your voice
ME: Four
DAD: And did you have a birthday party?
ME: Uh-huh
DAD: What did you like best about your party?
ME: The piñata…
DAD: Really? The piñata? And what was…
ME: (Fiercely interrupting) NO WAIT… THE CHOCOLATE!!!!!
DAD: (Tries to hide his laughter)
And that is the best proof that I like chocolate since I was four.
I love the milky creamy sensation it gives you when it slowly melts in your mouth. I love the slightly bitter taste, the comfort it makes you feel. I love after taste it leaves in your toungue and if it wasn’t so fattening, I would have it all the time. And I mean ALL THE TIME.
As a kid it didn’t really matter what kind of choclate it was, or what form it came in. However, as I got older I started noticing some chocolate tasted wrong. It didn’t seem as creamy and it went all funny in my mouth. I learned to scrutinize labels and found that marketers can be very deceiving. Most snacks make you think you are getting chocolate, but if you looke closely it really says “chocolate flavored covering” This usually means you are eating shitty stuff half assedly disguised as chocolate. I hated and ranted about that for a long while, until I just entirely gave up and stopped buying Nestle and Hershey bars, and to this day I actually won`t go anywhere near the stuff. Also, white chocolate? Is not chocolate! Cocoa beans are dark brown. WTF? I developed a way of assuring any choclate I had was good, by always choosing for dark, semi-sweet chocolate. Unfortunately in Mexico, you could almost only get that kind of chocolate in specialty stores, and because of this people thought I was really picky. Again, nobody understood the importance of REAL chocolate and even worse, the importance of GOOD chocolate. In the eyes of everyone, I was just picky.
Now that I live in a country of chocolate loving people, where the average person eats 1.6 bars a day, I feel understood. Not only that, but my choosing-only-dark-chocolate technique has backfired! Dark chocolate here is too bitter! Now that I don’t really have to worry about quality, I have been trying all kinds of chocolate- even the white kind- and find that all ranges taste wonderful. No wonder I’ve gained like 15 pounds since I got here. Chocolate here is everywhere, and even Harrod’s has a special chocolate bar, where all the items in the menu include the wonderful stuff. I am waiting for my birthday to go and try it… ooooohhhhhhh, drool.
Erm.. so in conclusion, I love chocolate, Chocolate is good, and yes I am picky because if I am going to eat something that is going to make me fat? It better be damn good.
When we were very young, my dad used to record our voices as a way of tracking our growth. About once a year he would sit us in front of a small cassette player, press the red button and ask us questions. Often we would volunteer to sing a song, or tell a joke, but mostly he would ask us about school and stuff. One of the earliest conversations went like this:
DAD: We just had your birthday, didn´t we?
ME: (in a very very young voice) yeth
DAD: And how old did you turn?
ME: (silence)
DAD: The recording can’t see your fingers, you have to tell us with your voice
ME: Four
DAD: And did you have a birthday party?
ME: Uh-huh
DAD: What did you like best about your party?
ME: The piñata…
DAD: Really? The piñata? And what was…
ME: (Fiercely interrupting) NO WAIT… THE CHOCOLATE!!!!!
DAD: (Tries to hide his laughter)
And that is the best proof that I like chocolate since I was four.
I love the milky creamy sensation it gives you when it slowly melts in your mouth. I love the slightly bitter taste, the comfort it makes you feel. I love after taste it leaves in your toungue and if it wasn’t so fattening, I would have it all the time. And I mean ALL THE TIME.
As a kid it didn’t really matter what kind of choclate it was, or what form it came in. However, as I got older I started noticing some chocolate tasted wrong. It didn’t seem as creamy and it went all funny in my mouth. I learned to scrutinize labels and found that marketers can be very deceiving. Most snacks make you think you are getting chocolate, but if you looke closely it really says “chocolate flavored covering” This usually means you are eating shitty stuff half assedly disguised as chocolate. I hated and ranted about that for a long while, until I just entirely gave up and stopped buying Nestle and Hershey bars, and to this day I actually won`t go anywhere near the stuff. Also, white chocolate? Is not chocolate! Cocoa beans are dark brown. WTF? I developed a way of assuring any choclate I had was good, by always choosing for dark, semi-sweet chocolate. Unfortunately in Mexico, you could almost only get that kind of chocolate in specialty stores, and because of this people thought I was really picky. Again, nobody understood the importance of REAL chocolate and even worse, the importance of GOOD chocolate. In the eyes of everyone, I was just picky.
Now that I live in a country of chocolate loving people, where the average person eats 1.6 bars a day, I feel understood. Not only that, but my choosing-only-dark-chocolate technique has backfired! Dark chocolate here is too bitter! Now that I don’t really have to worry about quality, I have been trying all kinds of chocolate- even the white kind- and find that all ranges taste wonderful. No wonder I’ve gained like 15 pounds since I got here. Chocolate here is everywhere, and even Harrod’s has a special chocolate bar, where all the items in the menu include the wonderful stuff. I am waiting for my birthday to go and try it… ooooohhhhhhh, drool.
Erm.. so in conclusion, I love chocolate, Chocolate is good, and yes I am picky because if I am going to eat something that is going to make me fat? It better be damn good.
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