Dear White Chocolate,

You aren't. 

And some Truth-in-Advertising laws must be being broken every time a white "chocolate" bar is sold. You can't just call a product whatever you want. By that logic I have a white Ferrari in the driveway and a white Rolex on my wrist. 

It could be argued that white chocolate is a victimless crime. Everyone knows what white chocolate really is, and so people who like real chocolate know not to buy it, leaving the faux-product to its natural customer base- diabetics with a death wish, ex-fire-breathers whose tongues have been burned out, and passive-aggressive types who like to give backhanded gifts that say, "actually I hate you."

I was four the first time I ate white chocolate. It came in an Easter basket and I was so excited. I already knew how delicious chocolate was, and now I was going discover a whole new genre of the rich, savory stuff.

Just as in people, the white version has a sickening, artificial sweetness while lacking the 
rich complexity of the darker variants.

It took a few seconds for the flavor of the white chocolate to sink in. The smile on my face slowly faded. The sparkle in my eyes dulled. I started to gag just a little bit. And a little part of my childhood innocence... died in that moment. I remember thinking, "Does this mean grandma and grandpa don't love me anymore?"

So yeah, I guess if you consider traumatizing children and stealing the innocence and joy from kid's lives to be victimless, then white chocolate is a victimless crime.

That hollow-eyed, slack-jawed, furrow-browed visage of permanent confusion is usually a hallmark of the elderly. 
I walked around with that expression on my face for several days after trying white "chocolate" for the first time at the age of 4. 

"White chocolate" is the most most deceptive food misnomer I've run across since that time I inadvertently entered a Rocky Mountain oyster eating contest. And it's almost as big a sham as the juice scene at most grocery stores. I can't tell you how many times I've brought juice home from the store only to notice the fine print, "15% juice." 15% JUICE? How the fuck can 85% of a carton labeled "juice" not be juice? How about I pay for it with 85% counterfeit money, you fucking shysters. If I wanted to buy a carton of water, food coloring, and high-fructose corn syrup plus a few drops of juice, I'd look for a carton labeled "Water, Food Coloring, and High-Fructose Corn Syrup Plus a Few Drops of Juice." When I buy a carton that says "Mango Pineapple Juice" on it, I expect the entire contents of said carton to be the mother-fucking juice of mother-fucking MANGOS and PINEAPPLES. 

People love to create new, bullshit versions of things, usually by taking the original thing and adulterating it in some way. Take white gold for example- jewelers mix in some nickel with normal, yellow gold, then they plate it with rhodium and act like they discovered a new element. White gold isn't a thing; it's just normal gold that's been fucked with.

I'm told white chocolate is made with cocoa butter. I don't know what that means. As far as I'm concerned, butter comes from milk and milk comes from cows, not cocoa beans. The same goes for soy milk, by the way. I don't know what's in cartons labeled "soy milk" but I know it's nothing bearing a relation to milk. 

You can't just take any component or byproduct you want from something and say it's a white version of that original thing. Imagine you're invited to a cook-out and you accept because the host promises to serve steak and you love steak. You show up, you crack open a beer, you chat with the other guests for a while, you work up a powerful appetite. Finally the host calls you all outside to the grill and announces that dinner is ready to be served. He flops down a white steak on everyone's plate and tells you to chow down. You take a bite of this interesting-looking "steak" and it tastes like someone mixed a bull semen slurry with freshly-churned bovine ball butter made from the sweat of an ox's nutsack on a hot day. Your host then confirms as much. Obviously, you'd be justified in killing this person. And that's exactly what I've been trying to explain to the DOJ over the last three years while staying in countries that don't have extradition agreements with the U.S. I'm sorry you had to die, Jerry, but "are you an adventurous eater?" doesn't constitute fair warning before serving someone ball butter in my book; not by a long shot.

Sebastian Braff


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