DNA

I do not claim to be alone in my love of white chocolate. In fact, I think it’s genetic.

For many years my little sister and I have daydreamed that one day all chocolate bars will have a white counterpart. Of all the chocolate bars that line the shelves of the newsagent, we most often lament the absence of a white chocolate Mars bar. I am more than partial to caramel and am certain that the combination would be a winner.

Imagine my and the Milky Bar Kid’s initial excitement and subsequent misery when this was released:

Oh how it mocked us! 

For those of you unfamiliar with this jingoistic variant, inside the white wrapper that holds so much promise is a plain ol' milk chocolate Mars bar.

Anyway, about six months ago, said younger sister decided that her life’s calling was to become a baker. She liked cake, after all – how hard could it be? She bought sackfuls of ingredients and set to work.

Sticking to the classics, she started with rocky road, fairy cakes, and biscuits topped with marshmallows and Smarties.

But can you guess what she then did?

Yes, she removed the milk chocolate from a Mars bar and covered it in white chocolate!

Sadly the result wasn’t quite what it set out to be (there is a technique to cooking with white chocolate that unfortunately she hadn’t mastered), and her spell of bakerdom lasted no more than 24 hours. 

But for her dedication, I salute her!

Introduction

I love white chocolate.

I cannot predict the future meanderings of this, my first blog, but one thing’s for certain: white chocolate rocks my world.

I cannot abide those who gripe: “But it isn’t even real chocolate”. True, it contains cocoa butter rather than cocoa paste and the elusive cocoa liquor, but it comes from a cocoa bean nonetheless. The status of white chocolate is - a simile that I seem to use frequently - like that of an artist: if it says it’s chocolate, it is chocolate. More to the point, why on earth should any of this matter when the fare in question is a silky nugget of unadulterated joy?

Whilst planning my first entry I have been struck by the disconcerting realisation that my fondness for white chocolate runs deeper than I originally thought.

Take my boyfriend.

If they hadn’t noticed until now, those who know the boy in question will suddenly realise that he bears an uncanny resemblance to the Milkybar Kid.

 A bearded 6’3” version with slightly trendier specs, but a version nonetheless. Ivory skin, a shock of impossibly blond hair, not to mention a penchant for cowboy hats. For now I will refer to said boy as MBK partly to gift him the air of mystery that he has always desired, but also because I love an initialism (more on my linguaphilia in another entry).

Example 2: the wooing of MBK and me

Almost exactly 5 years ago, a more-than-an-acquaintance-but-not-quite-a-friend did me a favour. I had returned to London for the Easter holidays during my final year of university. Settling down to write my dissertation I realised that I was missing one vital book. Knowing that MBK, a co-linguist, was spending the holidays at university, I sweetly asked if he would be able to go to the library, find the book and post it (if one can flutter one’s eyelashes in a text, I was certainly guilty). I would, naturally, reimburse him for the postage but obviously I would understand if it was too much bother. Whether out of boredom or something more (reimbursement indeed), MBK set out on a mission and the very next day the much-needed hardback was in my hands.

Grateful, I decided to send him a token of my appreciation. The gift of choice: a limited-edition White KitKat Chunky.

Five years on, I still remember his response to this frankly excellent present. A text message:

“You are quite possibly the best person ever”.

And so it started.

Fastforward half a decade.
MBK and I are minibreak addicts. Whenever we are abroad, we love to seek out white chocolate editions of commonplace chocolate bars. As romantic as it would be to attribute this pursuit to our white chocolate beginnings, the simple truth is that we both love the stuff. England is severely lagging behind the rest of Europe in the white chocolate stakes (a white chocolate steak… now there’s a thought), so we like to make the most of what’s out there.

October 2009: we had been in Berlin for no more than 15 minutes when a passerby caught my attention.

In awe, I turned to MBK: “I SWEAR that person was just eating a WHITE TWIX”.

“Are you sure the wrappers aren’t just different here?” MBK asked tentatively, himself too scared to indulge my fantasies.

But I know white chocolate when I see it. I would not rest until I was sinking my teeth into biscuit and caramel with a white chocolate coating. Thankfully the search was not lengthy. On the very same day, in an unremarkable newsagent in a subway station I struck white gold.

We bought eight, and vowed to return at the end of the trip to stock up.

I hasten to add at this point that I’m not even a big fan of the Twix. In terms of what you can stick inside some chocolate, I would always pick a wafer over a biscuit. But A WHITE CHOCOLATE TWIX? Totally different story.

On our recent trip to Barcelona we picked up these goodies:

The verdict: both are excellent, but the Milka disk wins by sheer weight alone. Thick (I’m talking about a good 3.5mm), creamy white chocolate covering a milk-chocolate sandwiched wafer. Words cannot do it justice.

It goes without saying that the white chocolate digestive too is a delight. I certainly wouldn’t kick one out of bed for eating... itself? 


That being said, would it have killed them to add just a bit more white chocolate? I certainly wouldn’t describe it as a coating; a smear at the most. 

And thus ends my very first entry of my very first blog. Surely that warrants a treat…