Today’s prompt: Name five things inside your refrigerator right now and how you feel about them.

Although I am a single adult male, there are actually more than five things in my refrigerator, I’m happy to say. In keeping with today’s prompt, here is a list of five of those things, and how I feel about them.

Hershey’s Milk Chocolate with Almonds
Hershey’s chocolate makes for an interesting study (one that would be too involved to go into here). As chocolate, it really isn’t very good. In fact, among people who are really into chocolate, Hershey’s barely qualifies as chocolate at all. (For genuine, high-quality chocolate, you’d need to have at least 70% cocoa solids.)

But that’s not really the point. What makes Hershey’s chocolate the continued presence it is stems from two things:

First, it’s so flexible. Just think of all the products that Hershey sells: Hershey bars, Hershey’s Kisses, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups (the no. 1 Halloween candy, according to a news report I recently saw), Mr. Goodbar, Kit Kat bars, Krackel bars, 5th Avenue bars, Almond Joy and Mounds bars, Hershey’s chocolate syrup, and so on.

Second, and perhaps more important, a Hershey bar is always the same. Sure, the logo may change ever so slightly, but the Hershey bar you purchase today will taste the same as the Hershey bar you bought when you were ten. That’s right. Never underestimate the power of nostalgia, particularly when childhood is involved.

Plus, they go really well with peanut butter.

Wallaby Raspberry Yogurt
Creamy “Australian” yogurt. I’m not sure that there’s really any difference between Australian yogurt and American yogurt, quite frankly. The main reasons I buy this yogurt are that it doesn’t contain corn syrup or corn starch, and it is pre-mixed. Yes! None of this “fruit at the bottom” crap. That stuff never mixes properly, no matter how long you stir.

I used to buy both strawberry and raspberry flavors, but eventually decided that I preferred the raspberry.

Diet Snapple Peach Tea
I’m not a fan of the artificial sweetener, but I don’t generally buy sugary stuff, and I’m opting for tea over coffee because of coffee’s acidity (which does not always mix well with my digestive system). Of Snapple’s teas, peach is my favorite

Impossible Project PX 70 Color Protection film
Polaroid closed its last film factory several years ago—but the fine folks at The Impossible Project acquired Polaroid’s last film manufacturing plant in the Netherlands and started working on producing new films for Polaroid SX-70, 600 (a/k/a One Step), and Spectra/Image cameras in 2008. The first products of that effort appeared in 2010.

I had already disposed of Polaroid Spectra System camera by then—but that same year, I was given two SX-70 cameras and a Spectra System camera by people close to me who had decided to get rid of them. It wouldn’t be until March 2013 that I would finally buy some of the new Impossible films—but I’ve used little else since. Though I still like my digital camera, it gets used only occasionally these days.

Darigold Chocolate Milk
I don’t drink milk, but I love chocolate milk. Darigold chocolate milk is the only readily available brand I know of that uses neither corn syrup nor corn starch. I actually prefer their Old-Fashioned chocolate milk, but I found out it contains corn syrup—something you wouldn’t necessarily know, depending on which size you buy, as their labelling is inconsistent.

For those keeping track, my refrigerator also contains some of the ingredients for my next batch of chicken soup (chicken breasts, chicken & apple sausage, a leek, sliced crimini mushrooms, three small yellow onions), bacon (uncured), Canada Dry seltzer, Talking Rain sparkling water, Diet 7-Up, Fresca, a few different salad dressings, sugar snap peas, romaine lettuce, Trader Joe’s canned tuna (in olive oil), and a can of cat food (for my cats, of course). If we move up to my freezer, add several bags of frozen okra, two frozen beef roasts, two frozen pork roasts, more frozen sausage, Trader Joe’s gyoza (pork), and a container of Haagen-Dazs Mango sorbet.

There you have it!

(12 November 2013)