An Ode to Terry's Chocolate Orange Season
The women in my family put too much effort into creating Holiday magic for me to not even put up a Christmas tree now
If the UK did one thing (and one thing only) right, it was combining chocolate and orange. Fine, you got me. They also invented Love Island. But we’re not here to talk about that. This time, at least.
I’m here to discuss Christmas. As we all know, Christmas begins on November 1st, with a brief interlude for Thanksgiving, followed by more Christmas. And the holiday season means something even more profound, even more paramount: the return of the Terry’s Chocolate Orange to grocery stores.
My grandma has always loved a Terry’s Chocolate Orange. Among the Holiday magic she and my mom built from scratch, that was some of her magic. A coveted candy, impossible to find any other time of year1. I didn’t get the appeal– actually, like her green olive habit and penchant for (blech) liver, I thought it was pretty gross. Chocolate and orange isn’t a popular flavor combo in the US. I had more important things to worry about than some candy that wasn’t even a Reese’s peanut butter tree: I helped put out the Christmas village filled with houses my grandpa hand-painted, I assisted with baking Spritz cookies and something my mom called “frosting bars,”2 and let someone else hang the lights, wrap the presents and create an elaborate scavenger hunt from “Santa.” When you’re a kid, you get all the magic with none of the work.
As an adult, the holidays prove to be significantly less magical. ‘Tis the season for cracked knuckles and chapped lips and vitamin D supplements and scraping the windshield in the morning. The whimsy of childhood feels so far away. I catch the magic fleetingly, like a shadow out of the corner of my eye, like something slippery that I can’t get a grip on. The first sprinkling of snow, a really magical winter sunrise, twinkling lights in an unexpected place3.
Full-on holiday joy and wizardry is overpowered by Black Friday sales and stress about money, coupled with this anxiety-inducing worry that the only way I can possibly show my love to the people I love is with the gift4. The situation is so dire that, not only do my husband and I exchange gifts a month or more in advance, we didn’t even put up a tree last year. Call it correlation or call it causation or call it BS, I don’t care. A little holiday spirit won’t cure seasonal depression or make the long, cold months suddenly joyful and bright, but the lack of celebration sure might make shit worse. No wonder I’m sad! I’m depriving myself of enchantment.
As you grow up, your taste buds change. I happily consume things I used to turn my nose up at: any type of olive, funky blue cheese, green bean casserole5. Last Christmas, I had my first Terry’s Chocolate Orange, gifted to me by a coworker along with a cute little bag they crocheted. And it was life changing. Like, I spent the entire Christmas season devouring them. The day after Christmas, I went to the grocery store and bought as many as I could when they were half off. How on earth had I been depriving myself of the enjoyment of citrus-shaped candy for the past 28 years?
And when you’re grown up, your perspective changes. Christmas was never inherently magic. My mom and my grandma put in work to make Christmas magic for me. And now I’m the adult. My friends and I went to a pumpkin patch this October and I made the joke, “five adults at the pumpkin patch with no children.” But why shouldn’t we go to the pumpkin patch? Why shouldn’t we build ourselves some goddamn seasonal magic and new holiday traditions? Why should kids get all the fun?
There’s a study that circulates often that claims people who start decorating for the holidays earlier are happier6. Maybe the people who put up their tree in mid-October are just clutching the magic with both hands, ensuring it can’t flee the scene. Personally, I’m determined to hold on tight to the magic this Christmas. I’m going to put up the lights and pull out the heirloom ornaments that range from my great grandma’s lead-laced fragile glass bulbs to the sled I made out of popsicle sticks in Kindergarten. I’m going to hang tinsel like my life depends on it. I’m going to send Christmas cards. I’m going to bake cookies and listen to carols and make my own magic. No one else can do it for me anymore, but I still deserve magic.
We all do.
What does this have to do with a Terry’s Chocolate Orange? I don’t know. Nothing, maybe. I’m not an expert at connecting the dots. I went to Walmart on Saturday and there they were, gracing the shelves, like the first hit of Christmas straight to my bloodstream. A compact dose of holiday magic, and I grasped it before it could skitter away into the darkness. I’m going to keep grasping for the magic all season long, and see where it gets me.
A Microdose of Holiday Magic Starter Pack:
If, like me, you asked: Why are Terry’s Chocolate Oranges such a thing?The Rise of Orange Chocolate, District Magazine
If seasonal reading gets you in the mood: Allow me to recommend The Christmas Orphan’s Club by Becca Freeman (not horny, but heartfelt), or A Merry Little Meet Cute by Julie Murphy and Sierra Simone (incredibly horny, and also, somehow, heartfelt).
These cookies are way easier than they look, really fun to assemble and look at, and were a hit with my coworkers last year.
This was pre-Amazon, of course, and you can find them now…accompanied by a hefty, off-season price tag.
Tragically, the recipe was lost years ago and I still mourn it. I tried to reverse engineer them for a Christmas party three years ago with comically disastrous results.
It’s still early– only the first full week of November– but all the frat houses have their Christmas lights up. So cute for them.
And, don’t you know it, the gift is a piece of technology that won’t mean as much as something corny and handmade, if only you had the time.
I still can’t stomach mushrooms, but it’s not for lack of trying.
I’m linking the actual research from the Journal of Environmental Psychology, which is, of course, paywalled, instead of one of many copy and paste half-news articles, but it’s from 1989? People’s general psyche might be a little different than it was 34 years ago…go figure. I wouldn’t consider that current, relevant literature on the subject but we’ll allow it for the sake of the argument.