Unhelpful

Here at the office, we get some strange food products from time to time. One of the companies a few doors down gives them to us. Usually what they give us is pretty good - foofoo cereal with whole grains and dried cranberries and golden raisins, A1 Steak Sauce (which is great for when we order takeout from a place that serves fries), candy, and so on.

Usually.

Sometimes, however, we get things that defy description. Rice cake snacks that think they’re Chee-tos but taste more like cardboard, those nasty peanut butter and cheese crackers, and chewy calcium supplements.

When I was a child, I would go to Grandma’s house. It got boring pretty quick, so frequently I would ask her if she had any candy. She did, all right, but it was grandma candy. Anise drops, pulled sugar candy, and perfumy-tasting pink thingies. Oddly enough, I bet I’d really like the anise drops now, but the rest was pretty horrific.

I’m sure Viactiv would have felt right at home on Grandma’s candy shelf. It combines a chocolate flavor with a chalky texture. I suppose the best word to describe the flavor would be … chalklet. I tried one with someone else who was feeling especially daring. We exchanged distasteful looks and spat them out. They weren’t immediately repulsive, they just tasted … wrong.

I wonder if Grandma still buys those anise candies…