Happy belated heart’s day, readers. We don’t mean to be grouchy, but we are just not big Valentine’s Day people over here at Hot Plates. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be, though, and it doesn’t mean we don’t appreciate you lots (maybe we even heart you). Newspapers did their usual V-Day-centric food editions, so we have a lot to share with you today — much of it sugary and intoxicating.

We love that, as The New York Times reports, “Dark May Be King, but Milk Chocolate Makes a Move.” Those guys are pretty good on trends, so we tend to believe what they write on subjects such as these, but they do love to be contrarian. Just when dark chocolate is what everyone’s saying they love and adore, the Times gives a little ink to the super-sweet stuff. Who can say it better than this first paragraph? “Until recently, midnight-black, bittersweet bars with punishing percentages of cacao were, like coffee and wine, on a quest for brooding intensity. Milk chocolate was left behind, dismissed as child’s play, an indulgence in sweetness and nostalgia.” Hot Plates has, by one person at least, been made to feel silly for loving a Cadbury Dairy Milk bar more than some austere, organic, billion-percent cacao, but we care not. Give us high-end stuff or the drugstore Crunch bar — milk chocolate reigns for us, and we’re not alone.

The Dallas Morning News produced a sweet little guide for people doing the last-minute Valentine’s thing. Lingerie sugar cookies, a chocolate topiary, and classic chocolate-dipped strawberries are on the list.

Our local paper, The Washington Post, has a new column called The Gastronomer. It will come out once a month and be about “the science of everyday cooking.” An increasingly popular writing subject, from what we can see around the ol’ information superhighway. This one is devoted to teaching readers what deliciousness can happen when mixing water and chocolate (sounds bad; why dilute goodness?). We know you’re curious now.

Here is a think-piece kind of love-themed food article, which is actually pretty dark since it is mostly about relationships that “run aground” when people determine they can’t “meat” in the middle — ha! — since one is vegetarian and one loves to eat animals: The N.Y. Times talks to people on both sides of the meat-eating continuum about the importance of being on the same page about this lifestyle preference. Writer Kate Murphy talks about “the perilous shoals of money, sex and religion” and adds food to the mix of things that can break people up (or keep them together). Murphy says we live “in an age when many people define themselves by what they will eat and what they won’t.” Kind of scary, if you ask Hot Plates.

Creative points to the Boston Globe for its ode to restaurant Ten Tables, written in love-letter fashion. Writer Devra First gushes, but not about what it takes to get in the door there: “I’m not saying you’re perfect. There are things I would change about you if I could. For one, your reservations system is crazy-making. I call and get voice-mail … You don’t call me back, so, guiltily, I call again.” Light reading is always good, especially after a meaty food-science column.

OK, before moving briskly (is somebody thirsty today?) to the wine subject, we’ll give you delicatessen fans out there a couple of good things to stick between your bread.

The Washington Post, for some reason, decides to shower our favorite local deli with praise! Yes, Parkway Deli, which we have been visiting since before we actually lived in Washington, gets a nice write-up by Walter Nicholls even though the place has been open since ‘63. They’ll take it, we’re sure. Tomorrow we will go there to fetch some lovely liver, which Nicholls specifically mentions as a worth-the-trip menu item.

Perhaps the Post knew the Times was going to write up the new, relocated, famously wonderful Second Avenue Deli in this week’s paper, and wanted to hold up a little flag to show that Washington isn’t totally deli-ignorant as a city (it pretty much is, sadly, save for a few spots). Frank Bruni goes to the deli and lunches with “Ed Koch, the former mayor; Nora Ephron, the writer and movie director; and Laura Shapiro, the author of several books about culinary history.” The article is breezy and fun, especially for those who “get” the whole “deli thing,” if you know what we mean. The new place is a lot smaller and is no longer down in the East Village, and its hot dogs are almost as good (but not the same — oy) as the old ones, but it sounds like all would go back again.

Well, we said “sugary and intoxicating,” but we’ll save the boozy stuff until tomorrow, making it officially a Wine Friday. Here is one last item that combines drinks and dessert.

We love any excuse to go to The Irish Inn at Glen Echo here in Washington, and we secretly go there not just for the good drinks, but for its Guinness ice cream. It is amazing. And so when we saw The Boston Globe included in its pages this week a recipe for Porter ice cream, we got excited. It doesn’t sound romantic at first, but it is rich and creamy and cold with the potential to give a subtle, mellow buzz.