Chocolate oh chocolate. Yet again

Reflection:

I revisited the essay and tried to clean it up a bit. I worked out and basically created a new introduction that would encompass everything I want to include in this paper. My word choice and how I structured the paragraph made it a better introduction than the previous draft. I went from a personal anecdote/statistical/factual beginning right into describing the class activity. There were no breaks and that spiky part flowed smoothly:

"This sweet comes in many varieties and from many companies. Recently, I have had the opportunity to try several brands of chocolate and compare their characteristics. I was amazed to find out that the chocolate brands I tried are very similar to one another."

I continued with my apparent problem to the end of the paragraph where I neatly tied in what I was going to write about, my thesis.

"Chocolate, so simple a food and apparently so monotonous actually comes in countless different varieties and flavors. The answer to this puzzle involves the composition, different ingredients, and even the history of chocolate."

The intro now introduced the piece way better than its predecessor in the previous draft. Not to mention, it had a decent flow to it.

I next proceeded to beefing up the class activity part of the essay and correcting my conclusion. Each of the class activity paragraphs, of which there are five, are all larger in size as I further explained the differences between the brands. In particular, I delved deeper into the tastes of the brands and further described the differences.
Here is the first drafts description on the tastes:
"Even when placed in the mouth, the four brands were identical. All were somewhat hard to bite into, but once in the mouth, they crumbled and melted creating a sticky sugary mess. The only difference came in the taste. The four companies made their mark here. Hersheys had a more bitter taste. Dove melted fast and featured a milky, sugary taste. Godiva and Lindt both shared a distinct condensed milk flavor."

Here is the new and improved paragraph on tastes:
"Even when placed in the mouth, the four brands were identical. All were somewhat hard to bite into, but once in the mouth, they crumbled and melted creating a sticky sugary mess. The taste of this mess, however, defined the chocolate and separated the different companies. Lindt and Godiva both featured a refined taste. The milky sugary cocoa taste clearly stood out and made the taste buds moan for more. Dove had a more typical chocolate taste. The milk part was rather dull while the chocolate flavor shined. Hershey’s had the most distinct taste of all. The milk, chocolate, and cocoa flavors were very clearly present. However, Hershey’s chocolate produced a rather unpleasant aftertaste. Be it from over usage of one of the primary ingredients or another cause, but something stuck to the back of the throat and tasted bitter."

I definitely used more detail.

History is definitely not the major part of the paper, as it once was. I shortened out unnecessary information, like the long description of how a chocolate bar was created (as mentioned in the previous posting about this paper)

After several rereads I realized that including history and composition does not mix too well with the class activity and the requirements set for this paper by Mrs. Basko. It's almost like I'm writing two separate essays, one on the composition and history, and one on the class activity. This split comes in the third paragraph when I go from the composition to introducing the class activity:

"The different tastes and flavors of chocolate are determined by the combinations of amounts of cocoa butter, milk, and sugar. All the different companies around today have capitalized on different combinations and by adding distinct ingredients, like raisins or almonds. This play on combinations and ingredients has produced the multitude of variations that stock stores worldwide. As part of a class activity, I have had the pleasure of tasting chocolate from four different companies: Godiva, Lindt, Hershey, and Dove." The bold shows the sudden shift in the paper

This split does not kill the paper, all it does to the paper is hinder it's flow. If I was to revise the paper again, I would attempt to get rid of this split by attempting to tie in the class activity better with the composition.

The new conclusion is very short and simple but it ties everything together. I would only change it by adding more statistics. Thats pretty much It.


Heres the new draft:


The World Renowned Sticky Sugary Mess

When the word dessert comes to mind, I immediately envision chocolate. This savory delight has been around for nearly 2000 years and it doesn’t look like it will go away. It is so well known that it is safe to say that there are only a select few around today that don’t know what chocolate is. This sweet comes in many varieties and from many companies. Recently, I have had the opportunity to try several brands of chocolate and compare their characteristics. I was amazed to find out that the chocolate brands I tried are very similar to one another. Yet, at the same time, each brand presented a different flavor and left its own impression. How does this happen? My dilemma correlates directly to the rest of the chocolate world. Chocolate, so simple a food and apparently so monotonous actually comes in countless different varieties and flavors. The answer to this puzzle involves the composition, different ingredients, and even the history of chocolate.
A historical perspective on chocolate provides an insight as to why chocolate is so similar, yet diverse. At its start chocolate was actually consumed as a drink, not an edible food source. Sugar wasn’t even used. The Aztecs created a bitter drink from cocoa beans and called it xocoatl. The Spanish were the first Europeans to find out about chocolate when they arrived to Latin America and sampled the local cuisine. According to legend the Aztec king Montezuma welcomed the Spanish explorer Hernando Cortes with a banquet that included drinking chocolate, having mistaken the invader for a deity. Chocolate wasn’t popular at first, everyone hated the bitter taste, but once mixed with honey or cane sugar, it quickly became a Spanish favorite. By the 17th century, chocolate was a fashionable drink throughout Europe, believed to have nutritious, medicinal, and even aphrodisiac properties. It remained largely a privilege of the rich until the invention of the steam engine made mass production possible late in the 18th century. It wasn’t until 1847 that the first modern chocolate bar came into existence. This was largely due to a man called Joseph Fry who discovered that he could make a moldable chocolate paste. By 1868, a little English company called Cadbury was marketing boxes of chocolate candies in England. Milk Chocolate hit the market a few years later, pioneered by Nestle. As can be seen, chocolate as we know it today has actually been around for only about 160 years. With human innovation kicking off right around the time bar chocolate was born, it is no small wonder that the many different styles around today were created. But history alone leaves many blanks. The reasons for chocolate’s similarities lie in its structure.
All chocolate is created the same. The mother of all chocolate is the cocoa plant. The plant itself, if eaten, is actually toxic. From the plant, however, is squeezed cocoa butter. Cocoa butter is a type of vegetable oil that serves as the primary ingredient in every bit of chocolate in the world. The different tastes and flavors of chocolate are determined by the combinations of amounts of cocoa butter, milk, and sugar. All the different companies around today have capitalized on different combinations and by adding distinct ingredients, like raisins or almonds. This play on combinations and ingredients has produced the multitude of variations that stock stores worldwide. As part of a class activity, I have had the pleasure of tasting chocolate from four different companies: Godiva, Lindt, Hershey, and Dove.
The packaging each company used was somewhat similar. Each company except for dove enveloped their product in paper. Godiva went a step further and surrounded the paper with cardboard. Dove, the only exception, put its product into foil and that foil into a bag. Even the color play on the packaging was identical. Dark colors, like black and brown, were mixed with gold and bronze. Only Lindt stood out with white and blue colors. The packaging, however, isn’t the important part. Once you rip it off to get to the good stuff, you hardly ever think about it again.
With the packaging ripped off on the floor, the tasting could begin. On the surface, all the different brands of chocolate from the companies look and feel the same. All four brands featured a smooth, even lustrous, appearance. The only difference came with color. Although predominantly on the brown side of the color spectrum, some brands, like Dove and Hershey, were dark brown while Lindt and Godiva were light brown to regular brown. Feeling them also made no difference. They all shared the same characteristic: smoothness.
Even when placed in the mouth, the four brands were identical. All were somewhat hard to bite into, but once in the mouth, they crumbled and melted creating a sticky sugary mess. The taste of this mess, however, defined the chocolate and separated the different companies. Lindt and Godiva both featured a refined taste. The milky sugary cocoa taste clearly stood out and made the taste buds moan for more. Dove had a more typical chocolate taste. The milk part was rather dull while the chocolate flavor shined. Hershey’s had the most distinct taste of all. The milk, chocolate, and cocoa flavors were very clearly present. However, Hershey’s chocolate produced a rather unpleasant aftertaste. Be it from over usage of one of the primary ingredients or another cause, but something stuck to the back of the throat and tasted bitter.
Of them all, I preferred Lindt. This company did a good job presenting and creating their product. Lindt had that refined flavor you dream about when you hunger for chocolate. Once you had one piece, you immediately wanted another one. The packaging was also unique. Lindt did away from the ordinary gold, brown, and black to feature blue. If walking by a chocolate isle in a supermarket, Lindt packaging would stand out.
As a chocolate lover, I don’t discriminate against the brand of chocolate. I could eat any kind and still receive great pleasure. It is truly a mystery when one such product is so spread out and able to give pleasure to so many. It is even more a mystery when this product is created from very identical means but comes in countless forms. The history, composition, and ingredients used all play a role explaining why chocolate is so alike yet so different.