Where's the Chocolate?

I do not remember Grandma making anything with chocolate. She was more of a molasses person; Grandma Mae was a divinty diva. I wondered if chocolate was even available during that era. Why didn't my grandmother's bake or offer chocolate?

In 1893, Milton Hershey attended the Chicago International Exposition where he bought German chocolate-making machinery and began making chocolate-coated caramels. In 1894, Milton started the Hershey Chocolate Company and produced Hershey chocolate caramels, breakfast cocoa, sweet chocolate and baking chocolate. It WAS available!

It has been a cold winter in North Dakota. Comfort foods have been high on the market list. To make a real chocolate pie I needed cocoa. Much to my surprise, the Hershey can advertised as filled with antitoxidants. "You have probably heard the good news about the natural antioxidants found in tea and certain fruits like berries and grapes. Similar natural antioxidants can be found inHersheys cocoa".

It is a paper like can now, with a full plastic lid, unlike the cans we remember which where metal with a circular metal lid in the center. The product, however, remains the same bitter dark powder.

On cold nights in Minnesota, much like last night, the family watched television on the black and white floor model RCA Victor. At some point in the evening Daddy would ask if there was any chocolate. Of course, there was no box of candy or candy bars in the drawer. He would go to the kitchen and mix up cocoa, sugar, butter, a little milk and cook it hard. Of course it was not melted slowly nor was the sugar allowed to desolve. The mixture would be turned out unto a greased oval platter and placed outside on the snow bank to harden. It froze therefore it was hardened. Then, our family each with a spoon would eat away from the edges until the platter was empty, or we were full of sugar and cocoa. It was a community time for us, all huddled around Daddy who held the plate. OH FUDGE!

Mother never made fudge, yet she patiently made frosting for chocolate cakes and chocolate drop cookies. The frosting was creamy and lacked the granules of Daddy's snow fudge. In my youth, one got to lick the spoon, (beaters) or the bowl. You didn't get both. WHAT A TREAT! I am hopeful all of us still are lickers and scrapers. My children where; I am hopeful my grand daughter is too.

Lloyd and Ella Anderson went to Thief River Falls from Rosewood on Saturday mornings to buy groceries. Before they went home, they would stop at the apartment where we lived. I had learned early that Lloyd had a sweet tooth and was especially fond of brownies. Everything I made during that era was a recipe out of a cook book including the brownie recipe and frosting method. Lloyd would come upstairs and have a gooey brownie and coffee and we would bring 'lunch' to Ella in the car, as she was not able to do stairs at the time. It may have happened once or a dozen times, I just remember him saying, "Oh this is good".

My favorite story about chocolate, is also my most frustrating one. I had made pinatas for the children in the neighborhood one Christmas. I filled them with wrapped chocolate and hung them in the closet so the tissue paper on the pinata wouldn't crush. Bud, who was sensitive to any chocolate seemed to be looking bluer under his eyes and did a lot of nose saluting. I did not put chocolate+Bud= symptoms until I cleaned his room and found dozens upon dozens of candy wrappers under his bed. I would also discover the pinatas were nearly empty. Later, he would eat all the chocolate out of his sister's advent calendar. Was he after the antioxidants? (Tongue in cheek).

I have just learned a new purpose for cocoa. Shirley's grand daughter was in a half time program during a basketball game. The children played the part of orphans. Cocoa was used to 'dirty them up'.

Tell you what I will do. I will clean the bathtub and make a huge vat of fudge and all of you can come and help stir. What are we using for heat, you ask. Warm thoughts, of course.

e