For those who didn’t grow up in the Carolinas, I’d like to introduce you to two sweet southern delicacies -

The first you’ve probably seen around, as in the last ten years, this fine, fragile flower of southern femininity blossomed from a small town girl, born and bred in Winston Salem, North Carolina, to a true big city gal.

photo, Scott Ableman

I’m talking, of course, about Miss Krispy Kreme.

You may not, however, have met this fella -

photo, r_bowley

Cheerwine, an obscenely saccharine, cherry flavored soda, from Salisbury, NC.

In a match made in Dixie heaven, the two paired for a limited run and have been gettin’ on like a house afire, selling out around the Carolinas.

photo, John Rottet, News & Observer

Classic glazed KKs, filled with Cheerwine cream and topped with chocolate frosting and sprinkles. Mmmm mmmm.

Well folks, there’s only one week left to sample the product of this sweet, sweet marriage. So get those big wheels a turnin’ and head down to the southland.

I went to high school in the golden age of the vending machine, before children’s health advocates sought to remove the blasted things from the hallowed halls of our nation’s schools. To save lunch money so as to be able to put it toward more elicit enterprises, I often skipped the cafeteria (despite the fact that it offered delicious Chick-fil-a sandwiches) in favor of the super cheap “canteen,” a vast city of Coke machines and Frito-Lay.

Though I usually opted for what was considered the “cool” lunch combo – a pack of Mambas and a Diet Coke, I sometimes “accidentally” pushed the button for Red Zingers, only to be “forced” to eat the day-glo cakes because my maladroit hands had misfired. I felt shame, but still oh so happy to sink my teeth into the artificial moistness of the buoyant flesh of the little suckers.

Now, however, my humiliation in enjoying snack cakes can be outlawed like oh so many vending machines, thanks to bakeries that are doing their own high end versions of childhood favorites.

In Southern California comes Cake Monkey, which offers a wide assortment of prettily packaged treats.

I am particularly fond of the  Cakewiches (especially the peanut butter creme) because I love a good chocolate coating.

In Denver, Watercourse Bakery offers a vegan version of the classic Ho Ho, a beautifully constructed monstrosity of mysterious, but reliably sourced ingredients

photo Liz Kellermeyer, Westword

If only they’d sold these in the canteen, I could have spent those formative years with my head held high instead mired in a bed of cream filled ignominy.

Swedish fish sushi with Rice Krispy Treat rice and some kind of fruit roll up nori. I wonder what you dip it in instead of soy sauce? Coke? Maple syrup? Kool-Aid?

photo by Bloody Marty Mix

While walking in Midtown Manhattan yesterday, I stumbled upon this…

A behemoth M&M, plopped down in the middle of Herald Square to promote the new pretzel M&Ms that are slowly making their presence felt on bodega shelves and check out lines around the country. With what is apparently the most ambitious launch of an M&M product in a decade, parent company Mars is hoping the crunchy little devils will be big. Way bigger than even the bright orange monstrosity parked on 34th and 6th Wednesday morning. Perhaps even bigger than the American Idol concert that I learned was part of the festivities  (you didn’t think the cops would block off traffic just for a float sized candy coated chocolate did you? Okay, I did for a moment. It was after all, very large.)

Sadly, I couldn’t stick around for the show, but it left quite an impression, so on my way home this evening I picked up these…

I am perhaps the target audience for these new candy covered buddies. In fact, it is within the realm of possibility that some observant Mars executive actually developed the idea for the confection while watching me partake in one of my favorite snacks — a couple of Rold Gold pretzel sticks and a couple of plain M&Ms, all popped into the mouth at once, therein creating a perfect harmony of salty and sweet, crunchy and smooth. I will continue to await my royalty check.

I do love pretzels with or without chocolate. In fact, I have a lot in common with the concerned looking M&M whose mug appears on the wrapper of this new edition…

On any given day, a doctor doing an x-ray of my belly would find that, I too, have a pretzel inside me (and probably some M&Ms as well.)

These new pretzel M&Ms are bigger than both plain and peanut, and as such a disappointingly low number come in each bag (which in part explains why the packet’s contents contain only 150 calories.)

Aside from the quantity problem that results from the larger size, the girth of the candies allows them to pack the necessary pretzely-punch. They have just the right balance of sweet, chocolate, and salt.

Looks like a malted milk ball but without the cloying sweetness. A very delicious dessert indeed. I am going to go have another right now. My insides are calling out for that sweet salty pretzel love.

Beware the Ides of February, the  Roman feast of Lupercalia subsumed by Christian doctrine into the festival of St. Valentine.

On this day birds choose their mates, Cupid’s arrows strike the unsuspecting, and men offer gifts to demonstrate that attested bonds of love hold fast.

When calendar-driven holidays loom ahead, especially those holidays with obligatory gift-giving requirements, Mr. Henry faces the catastrophe in five stages:

Denial – What, here again already? Christmas cards haven’t been mailed yet. Let’s forget it.

Anger – Why must hackneyed traditions dominate our existence? Who came up with these poppycock red hearts and flowers motif?

Bargaining – Isn’t a gift given out of pure affection more valuable than a gift designed by a greeting card company? What about those pretty desert plates we bought last year? Don’t those still count?

Depression – No matter what the gift, it will fail to please the inamorata. Perhaps it’s best to buy from Bloomingdale’s. At least there you can take it back for an exchange. But Bloomingdale’s is such a shlep from the West Side, and such a crush of unwashed humanity, and doesn’t have a single thing she really needs or wants.

Acceptance – OK. Valentine’s Day is an easy one, after all. One can buy flowers, chocolates, or a nice veal chop. (No, scratch the chop. Make that underpants. Better yet, a chiffon cheesecake! It’s delicate, it’s delicious, and its name is a little risqué.)

John Updike writes in his final book Endpoint:

                                              Perhaps
we meet our heaven at the start and not
the end of life.

If Updike is remembered only for a single line, this should be the one.

Although Mr. Henry’s rejoinder may not achieve the eloquence of Updike’s iambic pentameter, here goes:

At breakfast you may eat the sweet
you left untouched the night before
and greet the day’s beginning with
the satisfaction knowing that
tomorrow you’ll have more.

The sweet in question this week is Mr. Henry’s favorite dessert from a platter of figs: prunes stewed in red wine with sugar and cinnamon. On yogurt it transports you to a heavenly realm.

The season is early for pit fruit – peaches, plums, nectarines. White peaches in the market aren’t bad but cannot approach the sublime aromas they exude in August.

Citrus in June has faded a bit from the high quality of springtime Indian River fruit, but pineapple remains a dependable choice. Its palate-cleansing acids encourage good digestion leaving the stomach full and the mouth clean.

Breakfast is the one moment of the day when something sweet is genuinely appropriate. Coffee’s bracing bitterness seeks balance in a delicate, sophisticated sweet. Instead of an icky, oily gut bomb like a doughnut or a Danish, reach for plum tart, apple pie, banana bread.

Even the morning mayhem brought to you by The New York Times cannot defeat the genuine thrill of such a breakfast. It’s a transcendent experience – life’s promise in each mouthful. Plus, you have the whole day ahead of you to walk off the calories.

Mr. Henry is brand loyal. For decades he has kept the same barber, tailor, dentist, doctor, mechanic, and partner in marriage. For decades he has used the same personal products – the same soap, the same shampoo (the 2-in-1 kind, nothing fussy), and nearly the same toothpaste (now opting for one with more peroxide). He would still be buying Noxzema shave cream had they not removed most of the menthol and “improved” it into a goopy, flowery mess.

Change for its own sake pains Mr. Henry. (It is impractical, after all, to be an iconoclast unless you find some new, genuinely improved icon as replacement.) Though a religious and political firebrand, in personal habits Mr. Henry more closely resembles a hound curled up by the fireplace.

Notwithstanding these noble instincts, when first he tasted Choctál, in an instant he knew he would stray.

Heading for the ice cream locker at Zabar’s, he literally stumbled over the Choctál lady blocking the aisle. Peeved, he tried to sweep right past her. Doesn’t Mr. Henry KNOW that chocolate ice cream always disappoints? After years of disappointment, he no longer grouses about the lingering aftertaste of Hershey’s syrup lurking in every common brand. Now to satisfy his chocolate ice cream needs he simply shaves Scharffen Berger bitter onto Häagen-Dasz vanilla. Can there be a finer, simpler postscript to a meal than this?

Yes, there can.

With one reluctant spoonful of chocolate from Ghana, he was a goner. Overwhelmed by feelings of guilt and shame – guilt at having strayed from his allegiances, shame at what little self-control he foresaw he would marshal – he bought three pints at a serious $7.00 each. Because it is an ice cream made with gelato technique, that is, with less air, the intensity of Choctál satisfies after only a single scoop. The price, therefore, is not outrageous.

The taste is absolute heaven.

There are four flavors of chocolate, each from a single region. The darkest is Dominican, a spiraling, swooning ascent into chocolate valhalla.

The most enticing to the Henry household was Ghana, which, though still a dark chocolate, concludes with a bright, joyful, almost fruity finish. The Madagascar vanilla is unequalled in delicacy of aroma.

When he recovers from rapture, Mr. Henry will face the inevitable melancholy. First, he will worry about his waistline. Second, he will brood. Will this mid-life dalliance lead to more perilous infidelities? His remorse will surely be dark and bitter.

In Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End, the unctuous Lord Beckett offers Captain Jack Sparrow a small glass of honey-colored liquid that must surely have been Madeira, the preferred drink of 18th-century British and Americans alike. (It was Thomas Jefferson’s favorite drink.)

Least expensive of the fortified wines, Madeira bears the singular virtue of being utterly still like whiskey or eau de vie. Uniquely aged in heat rather than cool, the sweet wine oxidizes slightly and thus after opening retains its flavor even in hot climates.

Riddled with flu on his return from Italy, Mr. Henry repaired to his favorite apothecary, Nancy’s Wines for Food. Though his head was full of cotton, his reasoning was not occluded. Mr. Henry decided that the purchase of a subtly aromatic libation would be money wasted. Consequently he threw himself on the mercy of a young apprentice with shaven pate and satyric smile who recommended an $11 bottle of Rainwater that Mr. Henry dutifully drank every evening for a week.

The cure was thorough and complete. Rainwater is the cough syrup of the gods.

With newly-acquired curiosity for the mysteries of Madeira, Mr. Henry detected traces of it in a mascarpone cream dessert served by Cipriani at the McKim, Mead & White designed 55 Wall Street, one of Manhattan’s greatest rooms, former site of National City Bank, the Merchant’s Exchange, and the New York Stock Exchange.

The dessert is one that itself must be very resistant to decay because the cream is principally composed of stiffly beaten egg whites with some mascarpone and a splash of Madeira. Sandwiched between pastry layers and sprinkled with shaved coconut, it was light and toothsome. (Best of all, it can be prepared without cooking!)

‘

Emboldened by freely wandering the antique byways of Rome, Little Henry’s friend Stinky launched an accusation that Mr. Henry will not permit to stand uncontested in this or any other forum:

“Mr. Henry talks a lot about cooking but never does any!”

Ha! Only weeks ago Mr. Henry prepared a tiramisu at home that even the skeptical Stinky admitted was a bona fide, authentic, and glorious tiramisu.

It wasn’t exactly cooking, mind you, because no heat was applied. But it greatly impressed the crowd. Here for his gentle reading public so long ignored because he has been re-arranging his life, his office, and his books, Mr. Henry offers up a recipe of sorts, or rather recipe guidelines, for la vera tiramisu di Signor Henry.

Don’t worry. The thing is failproof. You can fudge any proportion and it turns out just fine.

Mr. Henry’s Tiramisu

6 eggs
1 cup confectioner’s sugar
splash of scotch
1 large tub mascarpone (500g)
5 ounces bittersweet chocolate
1 ounce unsweetened chocolate
1 package ladyfinger cookies (200g)

First brew some coffee quadruple strength (In deference to the children Mr. H. chose decaffeinated.) and let it cool to room temperature or colder. Grate some good chocolate like Scharffenberger, mixing half a bar of bittersweet with a modicum of unsweetened to intensify the flavor. Have close at hand, as well, a bottle of single malt scotch whiskey. (Mr. Henry believes this to be sound advice for any recipe.) For this recipe, Mr. Henry chose The Macallan.

Separate six eggs. Whip the whites until stiff. Cream the yokes together with a cup (or more) of confectioners’ sugar, beating until the color becomes pale. You raw-egg worry-worts at home, please relax. The sugar preserves the egg. In the fridge the concoction will stay perfectly fresh far longer than it will survive repeated servings to you and yours.

Finally to the creamed yokes whip in a splash of scotch, dark rum, or any other spirit appropriate for a coffee, chocolate, and mascarpone confection. This last touch brings a perfume to the dish that separates it from a quotidian custard.

With big gestures and a big rubber spatula, lightly fold in the mascarpone and then the egg whites. Ecco! Mascarpone custard cream. Now you build.

Slice the ladyfingers in half lengthwise if you like. (This is a decision more of style than of taste.) Spread half of them loosely in a deep dish pan. Using a pastry brush soak them – yes, soak them – with coffee. [A Mr. Henry Dictum: Italian desserts must be either soggy or hard as brick.] Cover with a layer of mascarpone custard cream. Then cover the cream thoroughly with half the grated chocolate. Repeat the procedure to create a second story. Chill until set, at least three hours.

Mr. Henry is reminded of an equally false accusation hurled his way by his diminutive and opinionated life-long consort, Mrs. Henry, namely, that whenever he gets an idea for a new dish he feels compelled to purchase a new kitchen utensil. This is falseness itself! Mr. Henry always makes do with whatever is at hand. (A recent purchase of a Le Creuset oval enameled gratin pan was NOT an indulgence. Someday soon she will thank him for it, and mean it sincerely.)

As an example of his resourcefulness, on the morning after returning late from JFK he prepared a fine breakfast of marmalade and crackers borrowed from several of Italy’s nicer hotel breakfast baskets and conveyed trans-Atlantic in Aunt Bev’s backpack. Although there are grocery stores within walking distance of his apartment, Mr. Henry prefers not to conduct his marketing at 3:30 a.m., an hour when he receives stares from street strays and riff-raffy youth.

He prefers the adoring glances he believes he got in Florence from American college students envious of his casual insouciance and his fluency in Italian. He did not actually witness these glances, mind you, being too polite to stare slack-jawed at breathtakingly beautiful young women. Mr. Henry, you see, has faith in the unseen.