valentine’s day

14 posts

Valentine’s Day Candy Review: Russell Stover Heart-Shaped Assortment

Perhaps there are Valentine’s Day candies that are more predictably tasty: for example, the Reese’s Peanut Butter Heart, whose pliant chocolate and dense, salty interior excite your taste buds just as pleasurably as they did at Christmas, when they came in the shape of a tree; at Halloween, as a pumpkin; and Easter, an egg.

There are V-Day candies that are perhaps more unidentifiable with any other day: candy conversation hearts, for example. But those marry the flavors and mouthfeel of an Edwardian spinster’s tooth powder collection with the kind of creepy suggestions you’d find in a collection of crazy and creative ways to ask someone to prom.

But the very best Valentine’s Day candy is an assortment of chocolates, each morsel an adventure, just like romantic love. And to me, the quintessential V-Day assortment is Russell Stover’s Assorted Fine Chocolates, you know, the one in the red heart-shaped box with the cellophane. Nothing says “I cherish you” like waxy American chocolate crammed with corn syrup. Continue reading

QOTD: How Do You Celebrate Valentine’s Day?

Cyanide and Happiness, a daily webcomicThis Friday is Valentine’s Day, a holiday combining pagan festival with the honoring of Catholic martyrs,  including a young priest condemned to death for officiating illegal marriages under Claudius II. Lore goes that he befriended his jailer’s daughter and left her with a letter that closed with “From your Valentine” before his beheading. Over time, the day has evolved into a date to celebrate romance in literature, popular culture, and sales on prison-made lingerie. Continue reading