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Culture

There's a fascinating reason European chocolate tastes better than the American version

"Is that why some chocolate burns?"

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A woman enjoys a piece of chocolate. A man doesn't like it.

Here's the thing: even the worst chocolate, at least for a chocolate-lover, is usually tolerable. Obviously, taste is subjective and there are plenty of people who actually prefer American chocolate over its European counterpart.

That said, an American on Reddit posted a pretty heavy statement on the subreddit r/CasualEurope: "European Chocolate has ruined me." They write, "I always heard online that Europeans hated American chocolate, saying that it tastes of bile. I ignored such things, to me it always tasted fine. Then along came an opportunity, 6 months of working in Denmark. It just so happens that my work had a chocolate jar, every day after lunch I'd have two pieces, tasted good, never thought much of it."

- YouTube www.youtube.com

This takes a turn. They continue, "That was, until today. I'm back home for the holidays, my mom put out a candy dish of Hershey's kisses. Don't mind if I do. But as the chocolate melted on my tongue I knew something was off. The distinct taste of vomit. I had escaped the matrix; my eyes now open to the truth. Is this a blessing? A curse? I myself don't even know. The only truth I do know is that American chocolate will never taste the same."

The comment section is riddled with explanations, and they seem to know their chocolate. One explains, "European chocolates are required by law to have at least 14% dry milk solids while the US only requires 12%. European chocolate is also slightly richer because it's required to have at least 3.5% milk fat. In the US, the minimum is 3.39%. European chocolate ALSO has a higher requirement for cocoa content — aka the ingredient that gives bars their deep, chocolaty flavor. These differences might not seem so big, but taken together, they add up."

But they're not done. "Also worth noting? When it comes to the American chocolate standard-bearer (hi, Hershey's), some say the biggest perceived difference in chocolate quality might come from its use of butyric acid — which makes chocolate last longer on shelves but gives it a 'tangy' flavor that many Europeans find totally off-putting." One even asks, "Is that why some chocolate BURNS?"

- YouTube www.youtube.com

"Tangy" is a nice way to put it. In a recent piece for The Takeout on Yahoo! Life, author Moriah House asks, "Why do so many Europeans hate Hershey's chocolate?" House notes, "By and large, the consensus among European (and generally non-American) Hershey's reviewers seems to be that it tastes more like sawdust than chocolate, or less generously, that it tastes like vomit. This might sound unnecessarily harsh, but there are some legitimate reasons that Hershey's bars may be an acquired taste."

While, obviously, Hershey's recipes are kept under lock and key, House insists there's evidence which "suggests that Hershey's chocolate contains butyric acid, a compound that is also found in, well, vomit. Before you get too grossed out, butyric acid is also found in parmesan cheese and many other things that many people find delicious."

Of fascinating note, it's also pointed out that perhaps Americans (and everyone worldwide) don't notice an off-putting taste or smell because of the nostalgia factor. In other words, we're just used to it. "The taste-memory connection should not be underestimated—studies have shown that comfort food is more related to memory than actual flavor. Considering that chocolate is a highly emotional and nostalgic food, the sweet memories associated with your childhood favorite chocolate probably have a not insignificant impact on how you perceive its flavor."

- YouTube www.youtube.com

There are, of course, other reasons the chocolate tastes different: sugar and fat content, and surprisingly, where the cocoa beans themselves are sourced. On GourmetBouquet.com, they explain, "American chocolatiers tend to use beans from South America, while Europeans, such as those in Great Britain, often use beans from West Africa instead."

While plenty of people have chimed in to say they in fact love American chocolate, the Europeans got a backup with this from this Redditor Down Under: "Mate, I'm here to tell you it's not just Europeans who don't like American chocolate. Us Aussies hate it too. And our chocolate (at least the mass-produced, supermarket stuff) isn't the greatest by a long shot!"

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Pop Culture

Brit shares the one-word 'dead giveaway' that American actors can't do an English accent

“There is one word that is a dead giveaway that an English character in a movie or a TV show is being played by an American."

via Warner Bros Discovery

Peter Dinklage on "Game of Thrones"?

When it comes to actors doing accents across the pond, some Americans are known for their great British accents, such as Natalie Portman ("The Other Boleyn Girl"), Robert Downey, Jr. ("Sherlock Holmes"), and Meryl Streep ("The Iron Lady"). Some have taken a lot of heat for their cartoonish or just plain weird-sounding British accents, Dick Van Dyke ("Mary Poppins"), Kevin Costner ("Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves") and Keanu Reeves ("Bram Stoker's Dracula").

Some actors, such as Tom Hardy (“The Drop”) and Hugh Laurie (“House”), have American accents so good that people have no idea they are British. Benedict Townsend, a London-based comedian and host of the “Scroll Deep” podcast, says there is one word that American actors playing characters with a British accent never get right. And no, it’s not the word “Schedule,” which British people pronounce the entire first 3 letters, and Americans boil down to 2. And it’s not “aluminum,” which British and American people seem to pronounce every stinking letter differently.

@benedicttown The one word American actors aways get wrong when doing an English accent
♬ original sound - Benedict Townsend

What word do American actors always get wrong when they do British accents?

“There is one word that is a dead giveaway that an English character in a movie or a TV show is being played by an American. One word that always trips them up. And once you notice it, you can't stop noticing it,” Townsend says. “You would see this lot in ‘Game of Thrones’ and the word that would always trip them up was ‘daughter.’”

Townsend adds that when British people say “daughter,” they pronounce it like the word “door” or “door-tah.” Meanwhile, Americans, even when they are putting on a British accent, say it like “dah-ter.”

“So top tip if you are an actor trying to do an English accent, daughter like a door. Like you're opening a door,” Townsend says.

What word do British actors always get wrong when doing American accents?

Some American commenters returned the favor by sharing the word that British actors never get right when using American accents: “Anything.”

"I can always tell a Brit playing an American by the word anything. An American would say en-ee-thing. Brits say it ena-thing,” Dreaming_of_Gaea wrote. "The dead giveaway for English people playing Americans: ‘Anything.’ Brits always say ‘EH-nuh-thin,’” marliemagill added. "I can always tell an actor is English playing an American when they say ‘anything.’ English people always say it like ‘enny-thin,’” mkmason wrote.

What is the cot-caught merger?

One commenter noted that the problem goes back to the cot-caught merger, when Americans in the western US and Canadians began to merge different sounds into one. People on the East Coast and in Britain pronounce them as different sounds.

“Depending on where you live, you might be thinking one of two things right now: Of course, ‘cot’ and ‘caught’ sound exactly the same! or "There’s no way that ‘cot’ and ‘caught’ sound the same!” Laura McGrath writes at DoYouReadMe. “As a result, although the different spellings remain, the vowel sounds in the words cot/caught, nod/gnawed, stock/stalk are identical for some English speakers and not for others.” For example, a person from New Jersey would pronounce cot and catch it as "caht" and "cawt," while someone from Los Angeles may pronounce them as "caht" and "caht."

To get a better idea of the big difference in how "caught" and "cot" are pronounced in the U.S., you can take a look at the educational video below, produced for a college course on linguistics.

- YouTube youtu.be

American actors owe Townsend a debt of gratitude for pointing out the one thing that even the best can’t seem to get right. For some actors, it could mean the difference between a great performance and one that has people scratching their heads. He should also give the commenters a tip of the cap for sharing the big word that British people have trouble with when doing an American accent. Now, if we could just get through to Ewan McGregor and tell him that even though he is fantastic in so many films, his American accent still needs a lot of work.

This article originally appeared last year.

actors

Pop Culture

Video does a perfect job of showing how American English sounds to non-English speakers

You'll never hear the language the same again.

via Brian and Karl/YouTube

Karl Eccleston and Fiona Pepper star in "Skwerl."

If you are a native English speaker, it is probably hard to imagine what people who don’t speak the language hear when you are talking. “Skwerl,” a short film by Karl Eccleston and Brian Fairbairn, attempts to demonstrate what English sounds like to people who don’t speak the language.

The film was created in 2011 for Kino Sydney, “a monthly open-mic night for filmmakers” based in Sydney, Australia. Since being posted to YouTube 12 years ago, it has received over 52 million views.

The short film stars Eccleston and Australian actress Fiona Pepper as a couple whose special evening is disrupted when underlying relationship tensions creep up.

Warning: Strong language

Here's a sample of the script:

THE MAN

So I ran to yourk around the wash today.

THE WOMAN

Oh?

THE MAN

Yeah. That doll's areen blunderface. Can berave that mory alpen john. Joo flan by the long blatt call?

THE WOMAN

Yeah. I coon by the mex areen. Oh you bleed that pribadium by the ronfort line today?

The video received some thoughtful reactions in the comments section. The SkyWolfie6655 summed it up perfectly: “As an English speaker, it feels like I SHOULD be understanding this and I'm just not, like I've heard them wrong or something, this is really well done.”

The film also connected with people who learned English as a second language. “Man, that's exactly what I used to hear when I was younger, before learning English properly. This is actually quite nostalgic,” another wrote.

The video also is an excellent example of what people with a disability may hear even if they speak the language. “This is kind of what it feels like to have auditory processing disorder,” HorseFace1044 wrote. “It's super frustrating because you can almost get what the person is saying, but not quite enough to understand what in the world they are talking about.”

This article originally appeared two years ago.

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Family

I bet you don't know the real history of the gin and tonic. It's crazy.

Turns out your favorite drink might have a super-weird history.

This story is about gin and tonics. But it starts with Britain taking over India.

Actually, it wasn't even Britain that did that at first. Let's back up even further, to where the story actually starts, which is with a trading company in the 1600s called the British East India Company.

Long story short, the East India Company came to India and they were like, "Oh, hey, is it OK if we put a factory here in this coastal city?"

India was like, "Yeah OK, I guess." But then the company was like "OK, well, how about a shit-ton of factories everywhere? Is that OK?"

And India was like, "Uhh, no, what? Don't do that. We don't like that."

So the company was like, "Oh, OK, no, we totally understand, all good!" And then they sent in their private army to take over a bunch of stuff and claim it as their own. Seriously.

Of course, India ended up fighting back, but then the whole United Kingdom got involved and just took over India, 'cause it was the 1800s and people didn't understand how colonialism was super messed up.

At this point, India was suddenly under British rule. Which the British really liked. Oh, except for the malaria.

Image from iStock.

Things seemed really bad for everyone involved. But then! Someone remembered this tree in Peru that had a special property that helped prevent malaria. "Why don't we grind it up into a powder and call it quinine and all not die?" this person said.

"Good idea," said the British.

England came up with a great plan of giving this new anti-malaria medicine to its soldiers. Smart!

So every soldier now had a daily ration of quinine. But there was one problem: It tasted super bad. Like, really, really bad. It's super bitter. Even if you add water and a ton of sugar, it's still super funky.

Then someone had the bright idea of adding a ton of alcohol to the tonic. Because why not, right? And so the troops were like, "Cool, what alcohol do we have? Oh, here's a ton of gin. Yup, just dump it on in there."

Just duuuuuump it in.

Yup.

Keep going.

And there you have it: gin and tonic.

All the soldiers were like, "Hey, this is actually kind of nice. Also, I'm no longer dying of malaria!"

Image from iStock.

Fun fact: It's not just that it tastes better 'cause it's suddenly alcoholic. Turns out, it's actually chemistry that makes it taste so good. A bunch of the different flavor molecules in gin kind of dog-pile onto the super-bitter quinine and hide it from our tongues, making the whole thing taste less bitter and more herbal!

Yay, science!

Eventually, all the British soldiers in India started drinking the ol' G&T.

Then the soldiers went back home to Britain and were like, "Hey, that drink was actually pretty good." So they went down to the bar and were like, "Hey, can I have this random medicine and gin mixed together, please?"

The bartenders were like, "Okaaaaay." And the soldiers were like, "We're going to drink a ton of these and make them super popular."

And then they did.

Oh, and what happened to India?

Well, suddenly it was the 20th century and that whole colonialism fad turned out to be not so popular anymore, especially with the people who, you know, had their countries taken away from them.

So these people started pushing back against British rule and eventually kicked them out in 1947! Woo!

There you go: the twisted, surprising, colonialism-based story of the gin and tonic.

So clink those glasses to weird history. Cheers!

british

There's a fascinating reason European chocolate tastes better than the American version

"Is that why some chocolate burns?"

Brit shares the one-word 'dead giveaway' that American actors can't do an English accent

“There is one word that is a dead giveaway that an English character in a movie or a TV show is being played by an American."

What word do American actors always get wrong when they do British accents?

What word do British actors always get wrong when doing American accents?

What is the cot-caught merger?

Video does a perfect job of showing how American English sounds to non-English speakers

You'll never hear the language the same again.

I bet you don't know the real history of the gin and tonic. It's crazy.

Turns out your favorite drink might have a super-weird history.

This story is about gin and tonics. But it starts with Britain taking over India.

Long story short, the East India Company came to India and they were like, "Oh, hey, is it OK if we put a factory here in this coastal city?"

At this point, India was suddenly under British rule. Which the British really liked. Oh, except for the malaria.

England came up with a great plan of giving this new anti-malaria medicine to its soldiers. Smart!

And there you have it: gin and tonic.

Eventually, all the British soldiers in India started drinking the ol' G&T.

Oh, and what happened to India?

There you go: the twisted, surprising, colonialism-based story of the gin and tonic.

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JPMorgan offered return-to-office perks that are remarkably similar to the show 'Severance'

We have a small favor to ask of you

british

"Is that why some chocolate burns?"

“There is one word that is a dead giveaway that an English character in a movie or a TV show is being played by an American."

What word do American actors always get wrong when they do British accents?

What word do British actors always get wrong when doing American accents?

What is the cot-caught merger?

You'll never hear the language the same again.

Turns out your favorite drink might have a super-weird history.

This story is about gin and tonics. But it starts with Britain taking over India.

Long story short, the East India Company came to India and they were like, "Oh, hey, is it OK if we put a factory here in this coastal city?"

At this point, India was suddenly under British rule. Which the British really liked. Oh, except for the malaria.

England came up with a great plan of giving this new anti-malaria medicine to its soldiers. Smart!

And there you have it: gin and tonic.

Eventually, all the British soldiers in India started drinking the ol' G&T.

Oh, and what happened to India?

There you go: the twisted, surprising, colonialism-based story of the gin and tonic.