I'm not sure really what flair to use or indeed if any is necessary, so please forgive me if I got it wrong.

So, ive been looking through older posts about Butyric Acid in american chocolate and people seem to think that it is either an ingredient or an additive to the chocolate, so I wanted to try and quickly dispel some myths surrounding the idea.

1. Butyric Acid wont be a listed ingredient. It is a side product of milk that goes through lipolysis, which Herdhey's specifically uses as a consistency and branding tactic. It will not be listed in the ingredients because it is a product of natural processes all of which, if listed, would make the ingredient list larger than the bar of candy/chocolate.

2. It is impossible to tell if your chocolate has butyric acid in it simply from taste, smell, and feel. While some may be more sensitive, being perceptibly led astray for whatever reason is certainly very easy and so a lot of assertions with this basis are, regardless of accuracy, speculation.

3. Butyric Acid isnt added to chocolate to preserve it in most if not all cases. It doesn't really need to be. Again, the source of it comes from milk fermentation and the purpose is for taste. There are other additives which are listed, such as lecithin, that help do the heavy lifting in preservation.

4. Butyric Acid isnt merely present in vomit. Usually common knowledge now due to the articles that single out Hershey's (usually vis a vis Cadbury), the presence of butyric acid in other foods specifically such as parmesan is a common and ubiquitous product due to the processes of creating it. Just as well, there are other volatile aromas created from hydrochloric acid, bile, and more from the stomach contents that create the signature upchuck scent.

5. Butyric Acid isnt the reason that Hershey's and other brands have been challenged legally on whether or not they can claim and/or label their products as chocolate. This is because they use a wholly artificial stand-in for cocoa butter which makes what is called "compound chocolate." This causes, obviously, a lack of cocoa/cacao/chocolate so that the candy bar is more of an imposter than a stand-in when labeled improperly, but is also very cheap and allows them to stretch their supply of actual chocolate much further and wider leading to much quicker and higher stacks of money.

6. Unless you are allergic and/or harbor genuine anger towards it, you do not hate Butyric Acid. Even if you dislike parmesan, as long as you like any on a long list of other foods that contain it, you merely dislike its presence in your candy/chocolate. If you tend to also dislike parmesan, then perhaps you dislike parmesan and not necessarily Butyric Acid as you may have convinced yourself. There is no need to stand against a naturally occurring ingredient aside from affectation at its purest.

7. Butyric Acid, as you should now know, is not artificial, nor is it (allergies notwithstanding) dangerous or harmful to you in any way (assuming its part of your food and not in a vial as concentrate of course). It is a perfectly acceptable part of the circle of life within our foodstuffs and it is merely that: a part of life. You are allowed to have whatever opinion about it you like, but it is in everyone's best interest that such an opinion on something as fundamental as food be based on factual information.