“So many colours t’was a big treat !
The prison was hard but sweet!
The one inside couldn’t wait to get out!
All you had to do was put it in your mouth!”
Who would have known that a chocolate was made or invented for war and mainly for soldiers! Read on!
One of the best chocolates when we were young (er!) were these cute little button like colourful things filled with chocolate in between!
The sweet and colourful and tasty GEMS!
They used to come is so many colours and there were two types of GEMS eaters! One type who were mostly in a hurry were the ones who would take a bunch and just stuff it in the mouth! They would bite the whole bunch and crack open the shell to get the sweet chocolate as soon as possible!
I was the second type at least most of the times! We used to take one GEM and place it gently on the tongue and slowly enjoy the outer sugar and colour coating! After a few minutes of slowly licking and sucking the coating will slowly melt away to reveal first a colourless (or white shell!) and then the dark chocolate! The tongue will first get coated with one colour which could be either red blue or green or other rarer colours if you are lucky and finally it will become brown!
There were also experts who could crack open the shell and chocolate inside separately! Some used to carefully separate the shell from the chocolate inside and eat them completely apart! Oh the joy of getting that perfect thin crust of candy with the rich thick chocolate inside!
Now of course my kids are more interested with the Exported version of Gems or M&M’s! These were the original chocolate candies which as history goes was made for war!
Forrest E. Mars, Sr was the son of the candy giant, Frank C. Mars, the creator of the Milky Way and 3 Musketeers candy bars! Forrest left his father’s company to start his own after their personal war (not the war that lead to the invention but maybe a start nevertheless!) .
It’s said that during his travels, he came across soldiers during the Spanish Civil War eating small pellets of candy-covered chocolate and that’s what gave him the idea to start his own!
Now during the start of the Second World War, sugar was in short supply in the USA and was therefore rationed. However, there was one company that got away with endless supplies of sugar: Hershey!
Hershey Corporation would provide chocolate for the troops (a delicacy and moral booster for them while they were out in the field!). Now Mars knew this and used this upper hand to make his new candy creation happen!
Now one more issue left! How to make the chocolates resistant and melt proof to an extent! Since they were in a war in the tropical climate! The solution: M&M’s patented candy coating! The candy became a hit with soldiers for their convenience and mobility. After the war, the candy still swept the nation and how!
Now each M is the initial of a different person. One is Forrest Mars and the other is Bruce Murrie, son of the founder of Hershey’s! Since it started a tsunami of counterfeit sweets, they printed the letters on the candy as a proof of genuinity! The two sides with the two Ms! Two side reminds me of the awesome portrayal of Two Face by birthday celebrity Tommy Lee Jones though his best is of course Men In Black and The Fugitive!
Now better to stay away from sweets and instead have a sweet dream!
Shubh ratri!
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