08 November 2007

Double Chocolate: Uncovering the myth

I'm not certain when "double chocolate" began but I'm assuming it was the late 70's or early 80's when everyone started getting fat. Around the time we saw the rise of all these crash & burn fad diets would've probably been around the same time a term like "double chocolate" would've been coined.

Double Chocolate is such a blatant psychological term. It implies more; more chocolate! Why would I want these regular chocolate cookies when I can have the DOUBLE chocolate cookies, right? Well, sure, but chocolate is a flavour. So once that cookie hits your tongue and sends the message to your brain that says "chocolate" that's as far as it goes. Your tongue and brain will not specify when there is a DOUBLE chocolate flavour. A taste is a taste. It can only happen once. Chocolate is chocolate. Vanilla is vanilla. Could something be DOUBLE VANILLA? Nope.

Double Chocolate is like saying "Tomato sauce, now with more tomatoes!" I only taste the general flavour of tomatoes, I have no goddamn idea how many tomatoes I'm tasting because my tongue tastes tomatoes tells my brain tomatoes and I think "Oh, yum". If I saw "Double Tomato Sauce" on the shelf in the supermarket I'd laugh.

I compare Double Chocolate to the bullshit clearance sales at a department store. Often times when stores have these drastic "70% or 80% OFF" sales they'll spend the night before frantically marking everything up so that the original price is more than normal.

So you'll think you're getting 80% OFF on that thirsty beach towel but really you're paying the same price if not MORE! It's all psychological and therefore evil. Tell me "DOUBLE" chocolate and I may think "OH WOW I NEED THIS. 2 is better than one, right? RIGHT!"

Fact is you can't double, triple or quadruple a flavour like chocolate or vanilla or strawberry; it's just a bullshit marketing trick. Sure you can have chocolate ice cream with chocolate chips in it or strawberry ice cream with strawberries in it (great, now I'm starving) but the taste will still be singular. Chips Ahoy would boast about they bet you'd bite a chip or "now with more chocolate chips" - awesome - cool - I love chocolate chips but it'll still taste like chocolate. I can only process one level of chocolate at a time.

You wanna gimme a chocolate mint something? Cool, my brain will process chocolate and mint nice and evenly. I have the facilities to process that sort of data, but double chocolate? It can't happen. We simply haven't evolved enough yet as human beings to appreciate and differentiate and navigate the depths and labyrinths of the Rubicon that is double chocolate. The factories are able to create this Frankenstein of flavour but our taste buds just aren't advanced enough yet to meet up with the technology. Perhaps our children or our children's children will be able to appreciate the double chocolate phenomenon.

originally posted here on July 23

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