Ben Gilbert: uncertainty

Transcript context

…Totally. Back to Hershey. He, of course, learns about all of this as he’s building his new chocolate company there in Pennsylvania, and he decides that he’s going to make milk chocolate too, except he’s not a chemist. He doesn’t employ any chemists. He basically has no idea what he’s doing. For years, he just experiments via trial and error to try and find a way to produce milk chocolate. He builds a huge new factory in what would become Hershey, Pennsylvania, like the town of Hershey, Pennsylvania. He’s basically betting it all of, I am going to figure this out, and I am going to bring chocolate and milk chocolate to America at scale. Finally, after a couple of years, he does hit on a method that works for producing milk chocolate. However, it’s not quite as scientific as what you were just describing, Ben. In the process, effectively, the milk does spoil a little bit, which is why I’m sure all of our European and other international non-American friends who are listening to us here and are saying, Hershey’s, that is so disgusting. I have no idea how all you Americans eat Hershey’s chocolate and why it tastes sour if you’re not used to it, this is why. It is sour. There are two versions of the story, and we don’t know which one is true. Either way, David, it leads to this thing that you’re talking about, which is there’s a little bit of a funk or a little bit of a sourness in Hershey’s chocolate. That is just what Americans are used to. To Americans, that’s chocolate. Account number one, and this is all in the Cadbury book that I just mentioned. "After a series of laborious failures, Schmalebach, who was a scientist working with Hershey, seized on the initiative and tried a slow evaporation of non fat milk over low heat. He succeeded in reducing the water content of the milk and added the sugar to create a sweet, creamy concoction with no hint of a burned flavor. Better yet, they found that the mixture could be blended with the ingredients of the cocoa bean without spoiling to produce a smooth milk chocolate. Hershey was thrilled. Slightly sour, but distinctly original. The perfect American chocolate bar." There’s a second view, which is that Hershey happened to acquire a large batch of milk powder from Europe, which has slightly soured by the time it crossed the Atlantic. Reluctant to waste such a large amount, he used it to make chocolate and found that it sold well. Company officials have always denied that soured milk powder played any part in the company’s formula. Amazing.…

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