Please keep chocs away

Dec 29 2007 by Andrew Flynn, Huddersfield Daily Examiner

SO, the big day is over and we’ve got a house full of chocolate.

In fact I think it keeps replicating itself overnight so that every morning we seem to have even more of it.

We already had enough to open a chocolatería when our friends came around on Boxing Day, bearing a gift of Thornton’s best.

“Here, have these,’’ they said, generously. “We’ve got a house full of chocolate.’’

We put them next to the Hotel Chocolate selection and champagne truffles, with the tin of Roses and Italian Florentines perched on top.

My mother arrived with some After Eight, for which I was not as grateful as I might have been.

Second-born’s bedroom has taken on the appearance of a confectionery shop. But then everyone knows that she LOVES chocolate. Only The Boy’s bedroom remains a chocolate-free zone, but that’s because he’s reached the age when everyone has started buying him sets of novelty shot glasses and miniature bottles of vodka. He’ll be able to open a bar by the time he goes to university, which might be a profitable sideline to support his student loan.

Chocolate and alcohol, of course, are what Christmas is all about.

They are also responsible for most of the weight gained over the festive season - both being hideously calorific.

But, looking on the bright side, slimming clubs rely on the sales of alcohol and chocolate to create the influx of new members in January.

And so begins the great annual circle of life - eat, drink and be merry at Christmas then pay for it later. One person’s loss definitely becomes another’s gain.

My mother-in-law has been hooked into a permanent dieting cycle since I first met her 20 years ago. Yet every Christmas we buy her a box of carefully hand-crafted chocolates. You know the sort - made from only the finest beans, picked in moonlight and individually licked into shape by skilled chocolatiers (since 1865).

And she buys us one.

I’m becoming quite cynical and Scrooge-like about it all. But please don’t mention humbugs.

“Another box of diabetes swirls and obesity caramels,’’ I say, adding them to the pile.

It’s not that I dislike chocolate. It used to be one of my favourite food groups. But (further to last week’s column) as each year goes by I’m getting increasingly naffed off by the whole Christmas gluttony thing.

And I know I’m not the only one who has evil thoughts when faced with the sort of buffet that I put out for MY guests on Boxing Day. (If only I’d thought to scatter the table with chocolates as well.)

At the very first Christmas do we attended this year I overheard a fellow guest mutter: “You may as well tuck in because by this time next week you’ll be sick of this kind of food.’’

Because it’s not just the chocolate; it’s the salty, snacky, fatty stuff that comes in multi-pack, buy-one-get-one-free selections: Indian starters; smoked salmon roulade, mini Scotch eggs; easy cheesey bites....

By Thursday morning I felt dehydrated, puffed up and lethargic. In fact, it was more than a bit of a struggle to get out of bed for work.

“Why do we do it?’’ I asked the Man-in-Charge that evening,

“I don’t know,’’ he replied. “Let’s go for a walk.’’

And so Christmas for us ended with an hour-long tramp through the darkened, damp streets; breathing in air that had not the faintest whiff of mulled wine or chestnuts roasting on an open fire.

When we got home I had half a canteloupe melon and a clementine for supper, which made me feel a whole lot better.

“I know what we can do with the chocolates,’’ said I, my brain clearly back to normal functioning. “They’ll make great raffle prizes for the school quiz night.’’

Of course that means they have to stay in the house for another five weeks and, who knows, after our diets return to normal I might just feel like a choccy or two!