so, chocolate.

This is one of those things where I'm not cool enough to like the Sophisticated Thing. It's like, I don't know, Victorian/Edwardian lit. I honestly do not like Trollope because reading him makes me feel like I am reading the court minutes of some impossibly dull technical disagreement while being repeatedly hit on the forehead with a teaspoon. I honestly do not like Jane Austen because reading her makes me feel as if I am reading the briefs of some impossibly dull technical disagreement re. marital disputes, or possibly Potential Discourtesy. I am not awesome enough to enjoy these works of literature.

I am also not awesome enough to enjoy dark chocolate.

Dark chocolate is just dandy in things. Pain au chocolat is way better with dark than milk chocolate. Similarly, chocolate chips for things like cookies, brownies, or cake are much more effective when they're dark, because the sweetness of the matrix containing them makes up for the bitterness of the chocolate, and the sharp flavor goes much further. I've even had good results making ghetto Mexican Chocolate per sixties cookbooks with melted dark chocolate chips. But for eating?

No.

Cadbury's Dairy Milk, the real thing, not the knockoff you can buy stateside under the sold-out "Cadbury" marque, is to me the acme and delight of milk chocolates everywhere. Lindt's Excellence Extra Creamy Super Awesome Kawaii Milk is absolutely delectable but it tastes much more like honey than chocolate. Guylian's milk/white/praline fruits de mer are certainly worth committing felonies for but they don't compare to the real thing. Dairy Milk is chocolate heaven.

And I do feel chastised and disenfranchised when I see all these chichi chocolate bars in grocery shops and CVS. 60% Cacao. 67% Cacao. 80% LOCK UP YO WIVES, LOCK UP YO CHILDREN Cacao. 95% OH MY GOD THIS SHIT IS GOING CRITICAL Cacao. It all tastes like the astonishing disappointment we experienced as children when we opened up the Hershey's Cocoa tin and stuck a moistened finger into the rich and wonderful-smelling powder: bitter as ashes, bitter as aloes.

Maybe one day I will become cool enough to like Classic Literature and dark chocolate. For now, I cling to my Dickens and my Dairy Milk, and the rest of you can go screw.