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Comment by adventured | Hacker News Reader

> Most candy in the US is total crap, because they've cut out all the parts that make it good to save money.

That's almost entirely a myth. Along with the myth that most of the cheese sold in the US is "American Cheese" or "cheese product." These are fantasy lines of attack on the US for people looking for an excuse to bash.

Here are two more of those myths: the US only sells mediocre, watered down beer (that one has long since been destroyed, it rarely gets used now); and the US doesn't make any good domestic wine that is competitive with eg French wine.

The average Walmart (a mid to lower tier grocery) has a large, normal selection for real chocolate of all varieties (including European). Typically they will have a large half aisle filled with real chocolate candy products to choose from.

The US is the world's largest market for real chocolate.

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> the US only sells mediocre, watered down beer (that one has long since been destroyed, it rarely gets used now)

I think that one isn't used so much because people hear that many American regions now have interesting microbrewery scenes. However, the major national brands are mediocre and watered down compared to many national German or Czech brands (that is the whole reason American regional microbreweries have been able to compete).

> a large, normal selection for real chocolate of all varieties (including European)

That European chocolate in American supermarkets is quite often the lowest-quality stuff from here. For example, Milka. My friends and I spent a lot of time laughing at what American supermarkets think is worth importing. You also see the same thing in India: the worst of European chocolate sold as some exotic, special product, but I would never touch that stuff at home.

You get plenty of Lindt in the US. Can't get much better than that...

>That European chocolate in American supermarkets is quite often the lowest-quality stuff from here.

I guess this is somewhat universal: the only Brazilian cachaças available here in Germany are the worst ones in Brazil, but they have insane prices (e.g. 12€ for one that isn't worth the 2€ it costs in Brazil).

I think it's actually extremely universal -- most of the US brands available in Thailand were the more national/mediocre brands.

Which makes sense when you think who is prepared to export levels of product sufficient to supply a nation, but it's amusing that all we really see is the mediocre versions of other nations imported.

Wal-Mart is pretty crap on produce and meat, but they’re good at shelf stable stuff like chocolate. The one near me has, as you say, half an aisle of chocolate product of all kinds.

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