Overwhelmed by chocolate
Back in 2010, The Independent published an article that considered a claim by Nick Clegg that it took 15 years for the EU to define chocolate. Now the court arguments are about the shape of chocolate bars. Claim: "The European Union ... is a club that took 15 years to define chocolate in a chocolate directive." (Nick Clegg) Fact: An EU directive introduced in 1973 defined what could be in products labelled "chocolate". However, the definition didn't include the chocolate produced by British manufacturers until 27 years later. The delay was due to the amount of cocoa butter and milk in chocolate in different countries. Britain and Ireland produce chocolate with higher milk content than on the continent, and use other vegetable fats as substitutes for cocoa butter. There was a failed attempt to include these products in the definition in 1984, but it wasn't until 2000 that other European nations accepted that this could be also be called chocolate. It is c...