Chocolate Taste Tests
Dear Reader,
I’d hoped to avoid an excess of personal stories, as I prefer the substance of these pieces to be outside my idiosyncrasies, but then I receive comments from readers that suggest the stories are valued, simply as a framework for working through the ideas on their own.
This, of course, brings us to today’s subject: developing one’s reading tastes.
I suppose you might consider today’s topic an extension of some earlier posts: “Stretching Your Boundaries,” “Read, Just Read,” and “Reading Ratio, Reconsidered.” In fact, in “Read, Just Read” I even talk about taste. I have actually written that word in no fewer than seven posts already, though how much I delve into reading taste certainly varies.
None of those pieces have been about developing one’s reading tastes, aside from in outline. And I’d not intended to write today’s piece but for two things. First, a student reminded me that she was more focused about reading thing she’s interested in, and we happen to share an affection for chocolate. Second, my dad told me that his favorite chocolate is no longer his favorite chocolate, which, after my months of searching and great delight in acquiring once again, was a wee bit deflating.
(I should mention, before we begin, that there are a host of books on this subject. An almost oppressive number. If one wished to hear from every self-published yahoo on Amazon, one could probably acquire a taste-making book for every month of the rest of one’s life. I’ve largely avoided reading books of this sort, as they usually mention something of Shakespeare’s significance and why the respective author’s interpretation of T.S. Eliot is definitive and other ways of imitating that guru’s ponderous aesthetic. Oh, and also to read a list of books so expansive that you're immediately suspicious the author hasn't read them yet either...
I mostly jest. I think most such books are friendly in a benign sort of way. And a single such book is probably helpful for novice readers trying to make sense of a burgeoning desire to read and experience “the great books” and similar works. It’s just that there are an overwhelming number of the taste-making books. Encountering them feels like being the youngest of forty cousins and having them and each one of your aunts and uncles and parents and grandparents—heck, kick in a family reunion of fringe relatives—and all of them seem to know what’s best for your life. The competing advice becomes simply paralyzing.
I do have a large sampling of these books on my shelves, as they seem to proliferate used-book sales. For fifty cents each, I don’t mind adding to my collection of reading curiosities. And yes, I’ll be attending to that set of reads someday in this series, but not for many months.)
So, chocolates.
For various and sundry reasons I won’t get into here, I started doing chocolate taste testing with some of my nieces and nephews last year. The activity has been such a hit that one wee nephew requested we have a taste test on his birthday. (By activity, I mean gobbling chocolate.)
These nieces and nephews are all under the age of ten. Initially, descriptions of what they taste were echoed around the table, so the opinion was essentially unanimous as was the description. As many of the chocolates were dark chocolates, the most common description was “bitter” with “I think there’s some cherry?” as the second most common. “Tart” was only added about midway through our experiment, even though many of the original “bitter” chocolates were actually tart, not bitter.
The youngest of these nieces and nephews does not describe them, beyond facial expressions and echoing her siblings’ words. This lack of skill is not all bad, as she also has not fully realized that her portions are pea-sized and therefore much smaller than everyone else’s. To her credit, she has learned to wait for everyone else to have theirs before eating hers and that is remarkable enough.
I should note that my nieces and nephews are, like all children, sugar fiends. This is important context for the information that’s coming next. The nieces and nephews that have been doing these taste tests not only eat but enjoy 100% cacao chocolate bars. (Not to be confused with cocoa, which is the product you get after roasting the cacao.)
Now, if we’d tried the 100% cacao bars at the outset, they would have blanched and probably refused to participate in any more chocolate taste tests—quite wisely, I might add. I must admit that I was shocked that they enjoyed the 100% cacao. That they tried the 100% was even an accident: I thought they were having a bar that had blueberries in it. So, super tart but still some sugars. That was not, however, the chocolate they scarfed down, quite willingly and merrily.
I’ve officially corrupted the youth.
When it comes to developing reading taste, I don’t think we’re striving for enjoyment of 100% cacao, though school reading can often feel like that. (The reason you can develop an appreciation for 100% cacao is if it’s truly quality chocolate—once you’re used to appreciating the bitter overtones and other flavors from, say, a 72% dark chocolate—you can appreciate the flavors of the cacao itself and your brain is more attuned to the delicious fats in the chocolate, instead of focusing on the sugar buzz. I’m not saying anyone should get to this point, just that it can be done.)
One of the things you have to do in a proper taste testing, whether it’s fine coffees, adult beverages, or chocolates, is to have a palate cleanser or a standard for comparison or both. I have no idea what would be a palate cleanser in our reading context, nor do I particularly care, so I’ll assume our analogy breaks down on that point. But standard for comparison? Oh yes, our analogy is fully functional on those grounds, so I’ll continue accordingly.
School reading is often intended to build up your taste—you’re given a relatively wide range of reading and also a few “anchor texts” by which all others are judged. Unfortunately, we’re usually given the impression that our teachers’ tastes are to be universally applied. And if we don’t agree with our teachers’ tastes, well, then it’s all phooey.
I can’t say that I can completely resolve this tension. I wrote on differing responses quite recently, so maybe that offers some framework, though that piece was more intended for those sharing reading with others, not those who’ve accepted the recommendations.
Without getting too deep into the teacher-student tension, I’ll put this here: classroom instruction can be great for developing taste, but it isn’t necessarily the source of a reader’s standard for comparison. That standard for comparison can absolutely be developed or discovered outside any classroom.
I don’t particularly enjoy the phrase “standard for comparison,” and when I’m doing chocolate taste tests with the nieces and nephews, we call our standard “the base bar,” so from now on I’ll discuss “base reads” instead of “standard for comparison.”
I also prefer this phrasing because our “base bar” isn’t necessarily anyone’s favorite—it’s simply the best bar by which to reset our palates and help us evaluate the more exotic bars in the mix. (It is, as a matter of fact, both my favorite and one niece’s favorite. Of course, a maple and nibs chocolate bar is a fairly distinctive bar in its own right.)
We use the base bar for comparison to the other chocolates, re-centering our taste buds after each unique chocolate and readying ourselves for the next. We can use a base read (or several) to re-center our literary and intellectual tastes.
I have friends who use The Great Gatsby for this purpose; I will never use The Great Gatsby for any such purpose. I also don’t begrudge them their base read. I actually celebrate the fact that they have one!
Other skilled readers have a collection of base reads—ranging anywhere from two to twenty, depending on how eclectically they read. The important thing about a base read is that it gives you some reference point, some sort of anchoring, by which you can evaluate and appreciate other reads.
You’re otherwise left with saying that every read is the greatest, just like suggesting every chocolate is the greatest. (And if you think that’s true, I suggest you try some 100% cacao without warmup and see 1) if you like it just as much as every other chocolate and 2) if you can respond with anything but a disgusted “ugh!”)
Our chocolate taste tests are loosely arranged by theme: fruit infusions, coconut backboned, crunchfest, things of that nature. So we have roughly four chocolates at each taste test, including our base maple and nibs bar.
(The only chocolate that is really hard to place well in any tasting is also the one that has a specific reading pairing, a certain Pink Sea Salt that was described by New York Magazine as possessing a “deep, dark, mysterious flavor with hints of cherry; and a finish as long as a David Foster Wallace footnote.” Much like DFW’s writing, the pink sea salt chocolate is kind of its own thing.)
Now my dad’s experience with these chocolates is not so formal. That is, he splits part of a bar every once in a while with my mom. Or rather, she splits it with him. There isn’t some grand ceremonious taste-testing adventure.
Still, he’s had a healthy twenty different types in the past year alone—Ginger Snap (legit tasted like the cookie), Bourbon Cask Aged, Herbes de Provence. His favorite, though, was the Lemon Coconut Cream, an appreciate shared by his eldest granddaughter.
Lest you think the only chocolates I and my family consume are from Raaka, that is not the case. But they are my favorite chocolatier, one I discovered only last year. And so new releases from them are fun events. The discontinuation of the lemon coconut cream, however, was not a fun event.
Both my father and his granddaughter have reminded me since last fall that it was their favorite, though the granddaughter has another favorite (also discontinued, of course). When I saw that Raaka had released the lemon coconut cream again this spring, I promptly ordered some.
And then after having one of the bars I gave him, my dad decided to tell me, “You know, the lemon coconut cream isn’t really my favorite anymore.” And I just kind of sat there, pure astonishment on my face. He calmly continued, “It’s just that you’ve introduced me to so many others that my tastes have changed, expanded.”
To be clear, he had been constantly reminding me about how much he’d missed this chocolate. And now he was tossing it aside, quite matter-of-factly.
Here’s the thing: I wasn’t even upset. Why? If you keep sampling good things, sometimes your tastes do change.
Sometimes that means you can down a 100% dark chocolate bar no problem, appreciating what’s there even if it’s not a favorite. Sometimes that means your favorites change. And sometimes, as in the case of my maple-and-nibs-loving niece, you know all the more that your favorite is the favorite.
To develop your taste for particular types of reads, a similar adventuring is necessary. Such adventuring does mean you’ll stumble across some duds and other kinds we’ve explored before in this series.
To give a narrow example from my own experience, I think those of my own acquaintance imagine I enjoy every issue of The Hedgehog Review. I don’t. Some of them I find bland throughout. Others I find spectacular throughout. Others I find as curious as a yacón root chocolate bar. I keep reading them because there are occasional gems, and I keep subscribing because I value the work they do producing such occasional gems. The curious and bland reads, well, there are ways of dealing with those. But contrary to what so many imagine my own reading life to be, I find a large number of them ambivalent and even more complete snoozers.
And that’s just one intellectual magazine, one originally recommended by a great college mentor (whom, I'll note, I was never actually close with). I didn’t try the magazine out until a few years after graduation, and I’m glad that I did. It has also taught me, though, that there’s a particular type of intellectual writing that I find unpleasant and unworthy of further attentions unless its argument is exceptionally keen.
People can expand their taste by reading about food, even chocolates. They can read about food critics. They can read about sumptuous feasts in J.K. Rowling’s favorite, The Little White Horse. (Yes, this contemporary cover is rather discouraging, but the food descriptions in this book are stunning.)
Of course, a person doesn’t need to read about food. There are a wealth of ways through which one can expand (or explore) their tastes. And yes, those tastes can change.
Classrooms are one such opportunity, and they are good because the reader doesn’t get to select the majority of the reading. A little external structure is useful.
But so many other opportunities exist for developing reading taste. Book clubs, book reviews, librarians, library shelves, friends, family, coffee shops, algorithms, podcasts, and more. (Slightly Foxed is one I found just this winter, and I can’t wait until I can start exploring its offerings, perhaps even as soon as this fall.)
The difficulty isn’t usually the opportunity for developing taste, though it’s occasionally that. The difficulty is usually getting started, realizing that a person can’t try everything in a day, nor really appreciate reads in that manner.
Indeed, if we keep with our chocolate analogy, if too much is attempted at once, there’s the possibility of a slight illness. It usually takes more than one day of reading too much to develop any ill effects, but it can be done.
The only small thing left to highlight is that those chocolate taste tests are a social thing—tastes developed and reconsidered through conversation. While reading is quite personal and not something I’d suggest should be otherwise, there is some human interaction necessary as a person develops their taste. Not for every read, certainly, but for some reads.
This can be done by simply reading writers throughout history who read and then reflected upon the same text you’re reading. It can be done in a classroom. It can be done listening to a podcast. It can be done via a book review.
I think the best way is in conversation with friends, though I could be mistaken. But I’m not mistaken in thinking the Maple & Nibs bar is the bestest, and I’ve got a niece to back me up.
Happy reading to you,
Kreigh
P.S. There was apparently a technical error for Tuesday evening’s event with author Zena Hitz. I apologize. Two links were set up, and they were never merged. As I was the initial host, I wasn’t able to navigate what all had gone wrong. But I am sorry for any of you who registered and were unable to attend. If you shoot me an email, I can at least send you a link for 30% off her book.