Swiss Chocolate

Switzerland, to people with a certain gustatory proclivity, must seem like heaven. There is chocolate everywhere, and much of it is supposed to be of the highest quality. Unfortunately for our readers, Rebecca and I aren't big chocolate eaters. We don't dislike it, we eat it, but it isn't an obsession for us the way it is for some people. That means we aren't going to gush about Swiss chocolate at length, and this post will be mostly about how funny some of these wrappers are. Above, the funniest. It was actually quite good. The firm, dense filling made us wonder aloud about how many tons of hazelnuts must be imported every year.
Swiss chocolate is big business, of course, and not just the export market - Swiss people reportedly eat more chocolate than anyone else in the world. I'm not sure if that's true, though, or if tourists in Switzerland just buy a huge amount. In every town center of sufficient size, it seems, there's a bustling candy store. This was the packaged and bar chocolate corner of a large chocolatier in Luzern. The Swiss produce about 150,000 tons of this stuff a year.
One of our favorites was actually this friendly looking bar from a supermarket bin in Bern. It was full of honey nougat, which stuck to our teeth in a great way. The bear was printed on the chocolate too, though more crudely and with a strange, brown leer. Most of this had to be reconstituted in front of the air-conditioning duct in our car after it had been left for a few days in the hot glove compartment.
A more unsatisfying bar, with branding that seems suspicious. It wasn't all that good, despite having a (dubious?) pedigree and bits of cornflake in it. We noticed, too late, the caffeine part of the label. It was eaten a little too late in the afternoon for me - I usually don't drink coffee past one o'clock.
A strange one. I'm not sure why the note about banana-pulp is in English. Also, I'm not sure that they were telling the truth. It was a light, fake-bannana-flavored choco-chew. Not bad, but more perplexing than satisfying.

Finally, our favorite. A curious fact: Ovaltine, the name, is actually a result of a misspelling of Ovomaltine in the British trade registry. The original company was founded in Bern, where it is still produced, and the name has remained Ovomaltine here in Switzerland. Besides the powdered malt-whey drink, the brand also produces a popular chocolate bar. It is crunchy with malt shavings, not too sweet, very creamy and delicious.

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