The Chocolate Milk Pecking Order.

First, let me rank the specialty items, in descending order.

1) A New York Luncheonette Egg Cream.
Pure Heaven.
2) Any smoothie you can make in your blender, customized to taste.
3) Dairy Queen's chocolate shake. A superior store-bought product.
4) In-N-Out Burger's extremely cheap and extremely good chocolate shake.
5) Bottom of the barrell: McDonald's chocolate shake with whatever the hell they put in there.

Those were the prelims.
Now, for the main event.

The rankings of chocolate milk, in descending order.

1) Chocolate milk made with Fox's U-Bet chocolate syrup.
Fox's U-Bet is primarily a New York thing.
The best chocolate syrup on the market.
Most, if not all Egg Creams are made with Fox's U-Bet chocolate syrup.
Out here in Michigan, and in California, Fox's U-Bet can be found in the Kosher section of most supermarkets.
And it costs a pretty penny.
But it's worth it.

2) Yoo Hoo Chocolate syrup. Again, big in New York.
Not to be confused with Yoo Hoo chocolate drink, which is decidedly watered down.
I'm not even sure if the syrup still exists, but if it does, and it has retained it's quality, it's just about as good as Fox's U-Bet.

3) Hershey's Chocolate syrup.
Decidedly a comedown from the first two mentioned, but nevertheless acceptable.

4) Any gallon jug of chocolate milk you can get in any supermarket.
Usually quite tasty, but cannot be found in a non fat version, for you weight watchers.

5) Bosco. A triumph of childhood marketing. But a vastly inferior product.

6) Cocoa Marsh. Three steps below Bosco. Heavily advertised when I was a kid. Don't believe they make it any more.
Claude Kirschner of "Super Circus" used to hawk the hell out of Cocoa Marsh.

7) Nestle's Quik. Didn't taste bad, but always tasted powdery.
Who needs anything that tastes powdery?

8) Ovaltine. Didn't quite taste like chocolate. Could only be drunk when hot.

9) Flav-R-Straws. The bottom of the barrel. You pour a glass of milk, stick one of these straws which contains something resembling chocolate in it, shake it up and down, you do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself around, the "chocoate" substance is released into the milk, and provides a less than satisfying experience.

I suppose that the reason for this exercise is to expose the unenlightened to the glories of Fox's U-Bet.
Check it out and you will immediately upgrade your chocolate milk experience.

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My book, "Show Runner" and it's sequel,"Show Runner Two", can be found at the Amazon Kindle Store, You can search by typing in my name, Cindy Williams, Laverne & Shirley, The Odd Couple, or Happy Days.
You might want to check them out.
You don't need a Kindle machine to download them.
Just get the free app from Kindle, and they can be downloaded to an IPhone, IPad, or Blackberry.

The paperback, "Mark Rothman's Essays" is still available for people without Kindle. I have many readings and signings remaining, and the thing about Kindle is you can't sign one.

The website "On Screen & Beyond" has two hours of an interview I did on it's podcast in their archives.
Just Google On Screen & Beyond to find them if you're interested.

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