I LOVE chocolate – fudge cake, fudge, frosting, M&Ms, 3 Musketeer Bars. You name it. Each has a particular association for me.
As a youngster, my family vacationed in Charlevoix, MI, a lovely resort spot on Lake Michigan. In their downtown was a fudge shop named Murdick’s. We would wander over, watch them make the fudge and buy some to take back to our room in the guest house; always chocolate for Dad and me, butterscotch for my mother. She didn’t like chocolate. I knew there was something wrong with her. Years later we discovered the same Murdick’s fudge shop on Martha’s Vineyard. I enquired. The manager confirmed that it was, indeed, the same. The store in Northern Michigan had been run by two brothers who had a falling out, so one came to our little island in the Atlantic Ocean to start his own shop. We can now buy the same velvety delicious fudge from my youth on our vacation island.
In college, the best item on the menu at the Student Union was the fudge cake. Since I was always dieting, I got it for lunch with skim milk to save calories. One must drink milk with chocolate cake. It’s in the rule book. My senior year, once Dan and I were serious, we bought a little black and white TV for my dorm room and Betty Crocker chocolate frosting to eat while watching TV. We had two spoons and just ate right out of the can; we could not devour the entire can in one sitting. I had a little fridge in the dorm room too. Looking back, it is amazing that I maintained my weight at 90 pounds.
Once married, we lived in a roach-infested apartment in Waltham, MA across from a supermarket. On Sunday mornings, Dan ran across the street to get the Sunday paper and a 3 Musketeer bar for each of us which we would savor as we read the paper. Good times.
Birthday cakes, wedding cake…always chocolate. None of this white cake. And what is Red Velvet? I wore a red velvet dress on my 10th birthday, but that is certainly not an allowable flavor for cake!
Four and half years ago, as I approached my 60th birthday, I looked in the mirror and didn’t recognize myself. Despite my sweet tooth, I had always been slim, but time had caught up with me and I didn’t like the profile of my body that looked back that day, so that summer, I worked with a trainer on exercise and diet. I became a gym rat and gave up my beloved sugar. I lost 18 pounds and looked great. Chocolate was only for very special occasions. But after four long years, I grew bored and motivation lagged. My husband always has sweets around the house. I can usually avoid the ice cream, but lately, I’ve been dipping into the M&Ms and, though I am in the gym six days a week, I see the damage the sugar is doing. So, it is back to the spartan eating for me. So long chocolate. I still love you, but I love a slender body more.
Betsy PfauRetired from software sales long ago, two grown children. Theater major in college. Singer still, arts lover, involved in art museums locally (Greater Boston area). Originally from Detroit area.
Several of your lines—notably your mother, the rule book, and red velvet cake—had me laughing out loud! What I have learned in my sixty-odd years: A square or two of really good, dark chocolate overwhelms my sweet tooth, contains only a couple dozen calories, and banishes any remaining cravings for Three Musketeers, M&Ms, or even chocolate frosting.
I was in a light mood when I wrote this…wanted to try some humor. Glad it worked! Thanks for the advice about good dark chocolate, John. Right now, all is banished, but I will try to have some around after I’ve taken off the 4 extra pounds and can once again indulge my cravings.
Drinking skim milk with chocolate cake to be mindful of the calories. I totally understand that logic!
Made perfect sense to my teenaged self!
Enjoyed the story. Have never been thin, but I could identify with everything you said, otherwise.
Thanks, Rosie.
Betsy, chocolate has always been a huge temptation for me too, but only dark chocolate. Also ice cream with chocolate chunks in it. I love this funny side of you – I agree with John, I was laughing out loud.
Glad I could give you a good laugh…we could certainly use one around now!
Ms. Pfau, I admire your honesty in confessing your fall from grace into a vat of chocolate. I think that took great honesty and I’m guessing you’ve avoided considering your tragic demise as a sin ;-).
And I have been researching the milk-and-chocolate-cake legislation. You’re right! It’s in the book.
Not a sin – but delight! Glad we read the same rule book!
Loved the story, Betsy, as you wove your happy (can we call them amorous?) adventures with chocolate throughout your life. And I have always wondered whether the Betty Crocker people thought that a lot of people might eat their frosting straight from the can; no cake needed. Thank you for confirming that that is a thing. And, as others have noted, your reference to the coupling of milk and chocolate being in “the rule book” is a hoot (and correct).
That said, you didn’t lose sight of the downside of being a chocoholic – -weight gain — thus underscoring the implicit theme of the prompt: that no temptation comes without its perils if one does not resist. But it still sounds to me like, in the long run, you’ve had your (chocolate) cake and eaten it, too.
Well, John, at this point in my life, as the metabolism slows to a crawl, I can’t have too much of that chocolate cake and eat it too. I do find that if I indulge it does go straight to my waist and hips so I need to be much more careful these days about indulging. Sad but true. That doesn’t diminish the love, indeed, sometimes the cravings burn hotter.
Oh, Betsy…so glad I came upon this older story thanks to our new section “Past Stories You Might Have Missed”! I can definitely relate. I’ve been a chocoholic for as long as I can remember…and have always preferred dark, or semi-sweet as it’s sometimes called. My aha! moment came when, several years ago, while in Hawaii, I found myself in front of a shop called “Chocolate For Breakfast.” What a revelation…you mean other people eat chocolate for breakfast?!? What had been my guilty pleasure suddenly, in my eyes at least, became permissible and so I now indulge openly. And my doctor says since it doesn’t appear to be hurting me, why stop now. And I still love it with milk (2%).
Glad you are a chocolate lover too, Barb. I confess, never considered having it for breakfast (my kid loved Count Chocula cereal, but could only get it around Halloween). Visiting Patti and John (founders of this site) in their first apartment right after John finished his PhD at Stanford, Patti and I had some of her homemade cheesecake for breakfast, figuring there were a lot of eggs in it. Sounded reasonable, right? Sweets for the sweet…