Nonpareils were likely made in the mid-to-late 1800s when chocolate manufacturing and affordable, albeit upscale, candy found a place in households everywhere. The name “nonpareil” in somewhat confusing: it is a noun, the name of a newspaper in the early 1900s as well as the name of an esteemed ship in the 1700s. Regardless, nonpareils were part of the “kiss” family of chocolates – small, easy-to-eat and sweet as a kiss. To complicate the matter, the little sugar bits that give the nonpareil chocolate are also called “nonpareils.” These chocolate bits originated hundreds of years before under numerous guises. Nineteenth century confectioners got past the confusion by calling these candies “chocolate wafers” or “chocolate drops’ adding, unapologetically, that they were “chocolate wafers with nonpareils. As for the flavor – milk or dark chocolate. Most likely dark chocolate, an earlier chocolate, came first with milk chocolate close by.