not too sweet

going here | vol 10 | april 2025

May 01, 2025

“April is the cruelest month” - T.S. Eliot

“I’m tired of this shit weather” - D. Chu

We made it. Between longing for sunshine and melting deeper into the oversized potato shaped groove I’ve created in my couch, I found sweetness in daydreaming. Nothing out of body or immersive. These are snack sized escapes enough to tease your loins but not exhausting enough to leave you feeling like you’ve just eaten your weight in steak.

I dreamt of desserts. I dreamt of pastries. I dreamt of butter croissants and pastry cream. Pastry cream inside butter croissants. Pineapple buns. Custard filled pineapple buns. BBQ pork pineapple buns. Perfectly round and soft and tender. And not too sweet.

NTS

Not too sweet (NTS) is the highest order compliment awarded to desserts and baked goods. Unlike its cousin “not bad”, which often carries shady baggage or a reluctance to be candid, NTS is an untempered, unequivocal admission of admiration. It means that it tastes just right. It’s the difference between being able to enjoy something delicious in its entirety vs enduring a decaying sense of delight.

Note how a reactionary “that is sweet” (in terms of desserts) is actually bad while something being sweet without having to say it’s sweet is good. Don’t get it twisted - not too sweet doesn’t mean it isn’t sweet. It is sweet. It’s just not too sweet. Not too sweet is the desired state of being.

Not too sweet is mature and enough. It is balanced. It is in balance. It is sure of itself. It is on the celestial plane of spiritual actualization. Steep cliffs are replaced with consistency in not getting lost in the sauce and having to dig yourself out of whatever mess you created.

Too sweet

Something being too sweet reminds me of a zen lecture of “not confusing food with medicine”. When we’re feeling sick, we need medicine to fix our equilibrium but it cannot (should not) be our consistent source of nourishment and vitality.

Costco rotisserie chicken is too sweet. Any egregious amount of salt brine instantly turns to a krispy kreme level of glaze when a cooked chicken costs less than a raw one. Extra frosting for when it’s never out of stock.

The other spectrum of too sweet is where moderation is not the issue - where something can’t be too good because you don’t want any of it in the first place. When one bite is already plenty forever. Small talk is too sweet. Forced catch-ups between people you were never close with are too sweet. What’s left after we’ve exchanged cordialities? After we’ve unloaded an abridged version of the “milestones” we’ve crossed? I want to talk about normal stuff. I want to know how you’re sleeping, what’s been bugging your stomach, how the streetcar is never on time when you need it to be. Bring that to the table because it’s far more interesting.

Too Good

So where does that leave us? If something is “too good” does it then start becoming less good? Sometimes it takes time to realize you’re in the presence of greatness (see Lanafest). Where too good becomes even more good.

There is no better example than Classic Lays. Classic Lays are the butter croissant equivalent. They are the LeBron James of chips - around forever, win wherever they are, and make everything around them better.