With the exception of a lovely chocolate fudge cake, I hate white/milk/dark chocolate. Perhaps it’s because my second last molars both on the mandibles and maxillary didn’t develop properly and I get extreme sensitivity. I just don’t enjoy chocolate.
On the plus side, I can’t get enough of really sour candies. I live here in Western Europe and it seems that sour candies aren’t as popular and the ones that are on the shelf are pathetically sour (in comparison to the ones in the US). The ‘Sour’ Skittles here taste like eating sugar in comparison to the American ones. I do enjoy though the sour gummy worms they have.
People who detest chocolate are a rarity but I’ve met one. One of my daughter’s friends (a boy) avoids eating it. I’ve seen him trying various items (such as chocolate cake or ice-cream) only to spit them out in disgust.
I don’t hate chocolate, but I definitely don’t love it. My go-to candy treats are also along the sweet and sour lines. My wife loves chocolate, her go-to is the Dove chocolate morsels. They could sit in a drawer for a month and I wouldn’t touch 'em. But a pack of Starburst would be gone in no time.
How would you describe your experience with chocolate? How would you describe the taste? Do you find the taste displeasing? What’s the darkest percentage chocolate you’ve had? The very high percentages have more of a bitter taste. If you like sour, you might like 90% dark or something.
For me, chocolate is almost like a drug with a very subtle effect. So although I do like the taste, it also has a pleasing feel in my body much like a drink of alcohol. It’s not exactly the same thing, but I’m using the comparison to help you understand why I like chocolate.
If you don’t find the taste appealing, it might be the way you react to certain flavors. Are there any common foods which you don’t like the taste of? Certain things like broccoli and cilantro actually have different tastes to different people. For example, some people will say cilantro takes like soap or sweat. It has to do with their DNA and how they process certain flavors.
Back in the '80s, I gave my then-girlfriend a pound of Godiva chocolates for her birthday/Valentine’s Day.* For some reason, she felt compelled to mention this at a seminar or group session she was attending, noting that chocolate contains (or releases; I don’t remember) the same chemicals that make orgasms so pleasing.
One of the men in the group said “Wow, you must be in heaven right now!” :o
*Cost me $40, which back then was A LOT of money for me!
Plain hunks of chocolate, like Hershey bars and Easter bunnies, are safe from me. It doesn’t gross me out, and if I found myself in rough company I could eat it with a smile and appear to fit in, but I don’t consider it worth the effort to unwrap, bite, chew, and swallow it. But if you layer it in roughly equal parts with a firm caramel or add it to baked goods that’s straight up kryptonite.
Mrs. Mahaloth dislikes all chocolate and has since she was a child. Her mother even tried to give her different chocolate things, but she disliked all of them.
I’ve explained to her that chocolate ice cream, a Hershey’s bar, brownies, and white chocolate are all really different, but it makes no impact. She dislikes everything chocolate.
chocolate is OK, so long as it’s halfway decent (i.e. not Hershey’s or that waxy stuff much Easter candy is made of) it’s just not my preference when I feel like indulging in sugary treats. I’d much rather tart candies, the more sour the better. Left unchecked, I’ll eat Shock Tarts or Warheads until my tongue feels like I’ve been licking car batteries.
does she dislike bitter flavors in general? for some people (e.g. legitimate supertasters) no amount of sugar can mask the bitter components of many foods, chocolate included.
You are not alone. I’ve had people reject a chocolate when offered because they don’t like it.
(I expect that many of those who don’t like it may not broadcast it and just say “no, thank you” because they would be sick of being pestered about it and get “what?! How can you not like chocolate - everybody likes chocolate!!!”. If I’m right, then there could be many who don’t like it than those who volunteer that information when rejecting an offer).
I like it, but I don’t gobble in quantity. Like one of the posters above, I don’t really have a sweet tooth and would rather “proper food” or a savoury snack than a sweet one.
One thing I might ask someone who doesn’t like chocolate is what chocolate they have tried. There’s a world of difference between a cheap box of milk chocolates or an overly-sweet chocolate bar and some lovely dark chocolate from a quality manufacturer.
I love chocolate, and prefer it pretty dark. I much prefer rich foods to sweet ones in general.
The Celtling, however, can not bear chocolate in any form, including white chocolate. Even as a toddler she burst into tears at a mouthful of chocolate birthday cake. But from early on she would also sneak sips of my coffee, which is just plain coffee, no milk or sugar. So I don’t think it can be the bitterness.
The closest I have ever seen her to enjoying something slightly chocolaty was a Red Velvet cake she liked. It was a supermarket cake though, and I couldn’t discern any actual cocoa in it either.