Aren't They Supposed to Melt in My Mouth?
Has Mars, Inc. changed the recipe for M&Ms?
Aren't they supposed to melt in a mouthful of hot coffee? They used to. Popping a few M&Ms, followed by a swig of hot coffee, used to be one of the sublime pleasures of cheap vending machine fare. Now the price has gone up a quarter, and the sensation's just not there.
They taste the same. They look the same. They still weigh in at a whopping 240 calories per bag. But they're not melting. I just timed it: forty-five seconds to suck the candy coating off, and the thing still keeps its shape, even when gently pressed against the roof of my mouth with my tongue, and despite the fact that my mouth is still warm and moist from hot coffee. Shameful!
This reminds me of my attempt to melt chocolate chips in the microwave. I don't have a double-boiler. I finally managed to rig one using an old sauce pan and a small metal mixing bowl, but a previous attempt involving two nested sauce pans didn't work out so well, and I moved the warm chocolate to the microwave. (Yes, I know chocolate's flammable - learned that years ago, trying to make S'mores in the microwave. Slowly and carefully, that's my motto.) Anyway, I spoon the semisweet morsels - already warm from the ineffectual rigging of the two sauce pans - into a bowl, which I place into the microwave, and...
You ever watch instant oatmeal cook in the microwave? You know how it puffs up, doubling or tripling in volume, until it looks like the Blob that Took Over the World? Yeah. So that's what the chocolate chips did. But they never exactly melted, not in the sense one usually thinks of "melted chocolate." They melted just fine, oddly enough, once they were added to the cookie dough mixture. And the ones that were added last, the ones that weren't supposed to melt completely - the ones that were supposed to remain "chips"? Those melted in the warm dough, turning my cookies into miniature lava cakes. Mind you, I'm not really complaining about that.
But I do want my original consistency M&Ms back.
Comments
I like to savor them 'cause I don't want to let myself have too many. ;-)
Have you tried the dark chocolate variety? Probably would melt even more slowly...
Dark chocolate variety?
You're not helping my Sparkly resolve to stay under 1550 calories a day! @#$%! Nope, haven't tried those yet.
I eat them one by one...two by two...small handsful at a time. I let them melt slowly in my mouth (or used to, back when they'd do that), or bite them in half and chomp into their chocolatey goodness. I mix them with coffee, sometimes with fruit. Such a versatile little treat.
Dark chocolate variety, you say? I'm just savoring the thought of that...
I dunno. But here's how I eat M&Ms: I pour a handful. Read a few pages of my book. When the M&Ms are so melty that the hard candy shell has started making crackling sounds (and discoloring my hand) then I eat them.
One-by-delicious-melty-one.
Also, you should know: Peanut BUTTER M&Ms are to die for.
sigh.
(loved the your past few posts by the way. Can't comment publicly tho. Twas worth a read or two, definitely.)
@beba: "To die for"? I think not. Creamy Jif and a liberal sprinkling of Nestle semi-sweet morsels. Now, that's "to die for." Or Nutella on a warm Eggo waffle.
I hate us all.
@Bee: See above. And I just had a good dinner, too, dammit. I'm confused - this isn't a public comment? I love Godiva truffles, too. And pretzels, but not together...
I'm going to put it out there that M&M's just don't taste the way the used to taste. I suspect that there was once lard, heroin, liquor in them that prevents us from having the same sort of enjoyment today. I also suspect that our puritanical history compels us to find whatever people enjoy and hop up legislation against it.
Can't I have butter? Is that so wrong?