NATIONAL CHOCOLATE COVERED CHERRY DAY

January 3 is National Chocolate Covered Cherry Day.  As true connoisseurs, my friend Mona Lisa and I have an ongoing debate whether Queen Anne, Cello, or Brach's supplies the best product.  She prefers Queen Anne brand and I prefer Brach's. 

One of my holiday presents from Mona Lisa had the admonishment:  "Do NOT open until January 3!"  

Sometimes we have argued about candies  contained in boxes of Whitman and Russell Stover assorted chocolates, but have agreed that there are not enough in those boxes for a true sampling. 

In the 1960s, I was eating a chocolate covered cherry from the bottom of the two layers in a box of Brach's Cherry Cordials.  You know that expectation-- how your salivary glands are anticipating the exquisite sweetness of the cordialing flowing onto your taste buds--imagine the shock as I popped the candy into my mouth, it was as dry as the Mojave.  The candies on the top layer of the box had been divine.  I spit out the offending candy and I broke apart the next piece and it was also DRY and each of the successive ones of the bottom layer were also dry.

I wrote a letter of complaint to Brach's and the Company graciously sent coupons to me for FOUR boxes of Cherry Cordials. Talk about heaven!  Mona Lisa suggests that my being impressed by that good customer service has clouded my judgment.

In the letter, it stated that there had obviously been a problem at "the warehouse" to have caused the problem.

Years later, when it was part of my job to answer customer complaints, you can bet that I used that "warehouse" excuse to my full advantage.