Gilding the Altoid

January 25, 2007

And now for another entry in our continuing series: Crap I Don’t Need.

What you’re seeing above is the Altoid tin I picked up on a recent grocery store trip. I’m a pretty big fan of Altoids and a compulsive enough eater of them that I try not to keep them in reach. But the prospect of a chocolate altoid was enough to get me to back out of my transaction at the self-check kiosk and ring up another item.

You are lucky. You get a close-up look at the package. I rang them up and was out the door before it registered that these were not chocolate Altoids, but chocolate-covered cinnamon Altoids. Had I noticed, I would probably have at least opted for the peppermint flavor.

Now, cinnamon and chocolate are often paired but I couldn’t imagine these flavors blending well. It’s not bad, exactly, they just don’t blend. First you have a very chocolaty taste. Then the very soft chocolate soughs off—a vaguely disgusting sensation, actually—and you’re left with a cinnamon Altoid. The astringency of the middle bites right through the chocolate and texture which, as you might guess, is actually something of a relief. And I could be wrong about this, but the cinnamon Altoid seems far more soft than usual.

So you have a perfectly good cinnamon mint covered in a mediocre chocolate which adds a slightly gross mouthfeel. At the end I’m left craving another cinnamon altoid but yech. first I have to get that chocolate gunk off it.

Something tells me this was Marketing’s idea.

Posted in Commerce