I only wish for chocolate on Valentine's Day.
Oh, who am I fooling? I only crave chocolate on that day, plusSweetest Day, birthdays, major holidays.
All right, all right. I only yearn for, desire, salivate after andobsess about chocolate on all of THOSE days, plus weekends and a fewminor holidays. And, um, the second Tuesday of every other month, and...
OK. Fine. Here's, finally, the truth: I only think about and wishto consume chocolate on days ending in 'y.'
Other than that, my thoughts are chocolate-free.
However, considering Valentine's Day is all about chocolate -- oh,I know, officially it's about romantic mushygushy stuff, but really,it's about chocolate -- I thought it was time to do a bit of researchinto chocolate. To, perhaps, discover WHY I love it so.
The first thing I learn is that apparently I've been eating theWRONG chocolate all this time. Maybe it's because I apply remarkableself-discipline and relegate my chocolate-eating to only those daysending in 'y,' and thus have not had sufficient time to explorevarieties of chocolate.
You see, I've just been grabbing chocolate bars of a certain brand-name ending in 'y' off store shelves all these years and enjoyingthem mightily, but my research assures me that this brand -- in fact,other common brands -- are just too waxy. (There's that ending in 'y'thing again. Seems to crop up often in chocolate-y discussions.)
Plus, they don't have enough cacao in them -- as in cacao beans --which is not the same thing as cocoa, which is derived frompulverizing roasted cacao beans into a powder. But REAL chocolatedoesn't involve cocoa, but instead parts of the (roasted?) cacao beanitself and conching and tem bean itself, and conching and temperingthe proper procedure for which there is apparently a great deal ofdebate.
You see?
I'm a chocolate nincompoop.
Still, I took heart from my research when I started reading aboutall the great HEALTH benefits of chocolate!
Aha! I thought. Even ill-tempered chocolate (of the sort I've beenconsuming all this time) should provide some of these benefits,right? Such as promoting healthy blood pressure, curing depression,reducing PMS, increasing calmness and happiness, curing the commoncold, explaining the mysteries of gas-pricing.
(OK, I made that last one up.)
But it turns out that all those great benefits come from'flavanols' (I'm not sure what these are. The chemical that giveschocolate its flava?) in cacao beans ... and guess what?
'Flavanols' can be destroyed in processing, so not all chocolateproducts keep much of the flavanols.
So, until the Surgeon General starts labeling chocolate bars:'Congratulations! You have just purchased a flavanol-rich chocolatebar that will make you younger, wealthier, healthier and happier!Have a nice day!' there will be no real way to know which chocolatebars are actually good for you and which are just tasty. Or waxy.Depending on your cacao-sensing ability.
I guess I've only learned one thing, after all, in my chocolateresearch.
The only real 'why' for eating my favorite chocolate-barsending-in-'y' is because I enjoy them.
But only on days ending in 'y.'
