Pepper Chocolate

Chocolate com Pimenta is a comfort object, and it knows it. Set in the 1920s, it follows Aninha, humiliated in the small town of Ventura after her father’s murder, who leaves and comes back owning the chocolate factory the whole town depends on. Mariana Ximenes plays the transformation with bright, stubborn conviction, and Murilo Benício matches her as the story’s romantic pole.

The period setting does quiet work, all factory steam and town gossip, and a woman returning with money and power is satisfying in the way fables are. The supporting cast leans broad and the humor is corny on purpose; your tolerance for twinkling eyes will decide a lot.

At 209 chapters it runs a little long for its plot, and the middle treads water while the misunderstandings reset themselves once too often. But it is sweet, handsome and easy to live inside.

The full run streams on Globoplay, and dubbed versions traveled across Latin America and Eastern Europe for good reason. Our score: 6/10. Tonight this is for viewers who want something warm and undemanding, dessert instead of dinner.