Mr. Candy Update: Definitely Evil

The Sugar Baby's been talking about Mr. Candy again-- twice this week! The first time, we were sitting at a table where someone had carved their initials. "Uh oh," the Sugar Baby said. "I think Mr. Candy did that. I think he's in a time out."
The second time was today as we were walking through a parking lot. There was a slice of bread on the ground. "Look!" said the Sugar Baby. "I think that's Mr. Candy's! And there's his car!" Apparently Mr. Candy drives a green Toyota Camry. It's all coming together.

Wonka Fruit Marvels and Fruit Jellies: a professional review from unprofessional testers

This weekend I had a reunion with all my taste tester buddies. They're a wild bunch. I suppose I could blame our trained palates as a reason that we all like to get sauced enjoy fine foods and beverages, as well as each others' company. As luck would have it, I received a box of samples from Wonka earlier in the day, so I thought, hey, why not have the Buds (as we were called) do the taste testing? I put out a notepad for comments since I knew I'd be lucky if I even remembered being there.
I put out three products: Wonka Exceptionals Fruit Marvels in Clementine Orange and Pomegranate flavors, and Wonka Exceptionals Fruit Jellies in Grapefruit.
Here's what the notes say:

• Pomegranate-- yummy!
• Surprise! The Marvel is soft inside.
• Orange: has a soft center. Pleasant surprise! Great!
• Reminiscent of early winter citrus with a hint of cooked orange, candy orange and fresh orange. (Okay, I made that last one up. But it certainly would've come up had the wine not started flowing.)

Here is Taste Tester Ginger with a Pomegranate Marvel in her hand. She took it out of her mouth because she suddenly remembered she gave up candy for Lent. Taste Tester Dawnie told her she could finish it if she said ten Novenas.

So here's the deal: the Marvels are "Hard candies with soft centers, delicately sugar dusted." I have to say, these are a unique candy. I can't think of anything to compare them to, except they're kind of like those little strawberry candies that are hard on the outside and soft on the inside. They're very tasty.
The Fruit Jellies are "Fantastically flavorful soft jellies dusted with sugar." In other words, top-shelf gumdrops in a cube shape.
I really like these products and here's why.
1) I like the packaging. This is how I always envisioned Wonka candies should look like, rather than the goofy Oompas packaging with the cartoon Willy Wonka. These definitely feel like something you could actually get at the Willy Wonka Factory Store, if he had one.
2) The flavors. They could've done plain old orange, but instead they did Clementine. I was thrilled to see they had grapefruit jellies, an under-utilized candy flavor. And of course, there's the sophistication factor of pomegranate and Goji berry. With flavors like these, Wonka/Nestle is obviously trying to appeal to candy lovers of a certain age.
3) They're made with natural ingredients. Yes, there's sugar and corn syrup and modified corn starch in these, so the whole "natural" label is kind of shifty. This ain't health food, folks. But the good news is, there's no artificial colors, which can be a big deal to some parents. The candies are colored with carmine and cochineal. It's probably best not to tell the kiddies that these colors come from ground-up beetles. (So if you're vegan, take note of that. No jellies or Marvels for you.)

Lucky Day

A friend of mine (well, kind of; we've never met) posted this on Facebook:

"At age 40, finding $5 in the laundry shouldn't be a big deal. But I swear my first thought was 'I could totally buy a candy bar with this.' "

Yep. That would be my thought too.

Chocolate Covered Peeps

I went to Walgreen's last week in a driving rain storm to buy some pain patches for my back because, you know, I'm old. The only saving grace of this trip was that I knew I'd get to check out the Easter candy.
I think Easter offers the most variety of any of the candy holidays: Halloween, Christmas and Valentine's. I love seeing all the different bunny- and egg-shaped candies and of course, marshmallow is majorly predominant. I loves me some good marshmallow. So I was thrilled to buy a dark chocolate covered Peep. (They also come in milk chocolate.)
It sure is a pretty thing, all shiny and dark. I wasn't sure what to expect on the inside, but it turned out to be bright yellow (like a Peep) only without the sparkly sugar coating. Unfortunately, I thought these had just a slightly medicinal taste to them and the chocolate was pretty grainy. The fact that the majority of the Peep has sat on my desk uneaten for about five days says something. It says, if you want a Peep, buy a box of Peeps. If you want chocolate-covered marshmallow, go for the Russell Stover.
In other Peep news, I went to the mall today and now that the Sugar Baby is old enough to notice such things, I realized that there are candy machines and claw game machines everywhere. He found one particularly enticing: a machine full of big, clear bouncy balls with Peeps in the center. They were pretty cool, I must admit. I was almost tempted to give him the 50 cents to try it. But then I thought better of it. No need to start that bad habit yet.

Eat Your Vegetables! (I mean, Russian Chocolate)

My mother's neighbor went to Russia recently and returned bearing gifts. I have no idea what these two packages say, but I tried to hide them on the counter trying to keep them away from the Sugar Baby. Alas, he is part monkey and can scale any height if he suspects there is candy. When he saw these bars, he went bonkers.
"I want one of those!" he said.
"No you don't. Those are vegetable bars," I told him.
He gave me "the look." The smirky head-tilt that means, "I know you're lying to me again."
I couldn't contain myself. He had totally snagged me in my fib. Fine. I told him he could have half of one.
He went for the round chocolate/hazelnut one first. It had a crispy sort of wafer bottom, almost like a Kit Kat. In fact, the whole thing tasted kind of like a Kit Kat.
In the meantime, I tried to hide the other one, but tonight he asked for a vegetable bar for dessert. How could I say no? We split the other one, which said on the back (in the tiniest print I've ever seen and in about 12 different languages) that it was a caramel creme. It was a mousse-like filling, very sweet. He loved it.
If only it really was a vegetable bar.

M&Ms at the Science Fair

Apparently Mr. Goodbar isn't the only one that finds math + M&M's= FUN! Check out this mom who's selling her kid's science fair project for $20 here. Hmm. Call me uptight, but wouldn't that be considered cheating?

Do You Know This Gum?

A reader writes:

I'm wondering if you recall a gum that came in a little rectangular box, that was citrus flavored tabs of gum (like Chiclet tabs). As I recall, they were white (maybe light yellow?) in color. It seems like the name of the gum was something like ABC (not already been chewed!) gum.

This doesn't ring a bell to me. Anyone out there familiar with it?

Let's Talk Fruits and Nuts

There was a time when I wouldn't touch a candy bar (or anything else for that matter) with raisins in it, but in my old age, I've come to believe that the raisin/nut/chocolate combination is quite possibly the most perfect blend of ingredients a candy bar can have.
It started with Cadbury Fruit & Nut bar. I don't remember when I first had one, but it changed my thinking on the whole raisin situation. (This was back when Cadbury chocolate actually tasted good. These days, I find it to be too grainy to enjoy.) And of course there are Chunkys, which I haven't had in forever, but I'm thinking I need to re-try soon. So when I saw that Toblerone came out with a raisin nut bar, I was ecstatic.
Like the other Toblerone bars, this one is composed of little triangular pieces that are easy to break off. I'm guessing the theory is that you would eat one triangle at a time. I, however, have yet to experience an occasion when I could eat just one. I love the rich creaminess of the classic Toblerone, and this bar continues that tradition. The chocolate is smooth and flecked with bits of honey almond nougat and raisins. I dare you to eat just one piece.

Bubble Chocolate: Yay or Nay?

I hate to give any candy a bad review-- I really do-- particularly if a) it was given to me as a sample and b) it's from a small company. But I've got a job to do and that job is to be honest with my opinions. (Which, of course, are just my opinions. Take 'em or leave 'em.)
I was excited at the prospect of Bubble Chocolate. After all, I like Aero bars and I was a fan of the now extinct Nestle Choco'Lite. I expected these bars (in both milk and dark) to taste pretty much like the other "bubble" chocolates out there.
Unfortunately, they didn't. The bars came with instructions on how to best savor them: "Pop it into your mouth, let it melt for 5 to 10 seconds. As you begin to feel the bubbles soften, begin to chew gently. The mouth-feel will develop from slightly dry to moist and creamy." Well, yes, that's true. The problem is, the flavor. It doesn't taste like chocolate. If anything, it tastes like some sort of cheap coconut product, which is odd because the ingredients are all-natural and there's nary a coconut product to be found. I thought it might just be me, so I gave Mr. Goodbar a piece to try (without telling him my opinion). "Oooh, not good," he said.
My advice? Change the chocolate and hire some taste testers, because there is a market for Bubble Chocolate. Just not this kind.

Chocolate Covered Peeps! And Peeps Italian Ice!

I almost forgot to mention-- I saw Chocolate Covered Peeps the other day! Holy moly, I can't wait to try them. (I wasn't able to coordinate wrangling the Sugar Baby with purchasing the Peeps, so it had to wait.)

Also, Just Born has teamed up with Rita's (the frozen custard/Italian ice place) to create some Peeps products! Here are some dates to stick on your calendar:

March 20^th - Rita’s will celebrate the First Day of Spring by giving away a free, regular size Italian Ice to each guest in the available flavor of their choice.

March 27^th – The first 500 guests to visit a Rita’s location will receive a FREE PEEPS^® Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Chick while supplies last.

Candy Tidbits: A Little of This, A Little of That

(First, sorry for the craziness with the font size. I'm having issues...)

The Sugar Baby got a little Russell Stover heart from his grandma for Valentine's Day. Inside was a chocolate fudge, caramel and a coconut cup. This led me to think: why doesn't Russell Stover make a box of just coconut cups? Everyone always goes for those first. So then I went to the Russell Stover website and voila!
They also had other cool things, like boxes that you can personalize with a photo and bags of candy-covered chocolate pieces in custom colors. Who knew?

We have a missive from the field. Alexandra has found a new fave candy bar. Here's what she had to say:


"Walgreens has them for 3/$1 - so I thought, why not? OMG! They are about the size of Twix bars, the chocolate is pretty - it's almost as if there's a design in it on the bottom of the bars. The inside of the bars is like merengue or freeze dried texture. It's not a messy candy bar. It's described as "Whipped-up truffle on a crisp layer enrobed in real milk chocolate. Each bar is 85 calories and every time, I say just have one, but they're like potato chips - you can't eat just one! But you really should, because halfway through the second one, it gets to be a little sicky sweet. I'm thinking of freezing one to see what happens... (I have a liitle supply of these).

More news on the Mr. Candy front: The Sugar Baby and I were driving along and he just randomly said, "There was a gummy fish on the ground. It was in the dirt." It took me a few minutes to realize that he was talking about the Swedish Fish he saw at his school a gajillion weeks ago. So I said, "Oh yeah! The Swedish Fish that Mr. Candy put there." But then he corrected me. "No," he said. "I don't think it was Mr. Candy. It was Miss Gail." So the mystery continues. Is Mr. Candy somehow related to his teacher Miss Gail? Are they partners in crime? Or is Mr. Candy Miss Gail's alter ego? Stay tuned. I'm sure there will be more adventures. I'm not sure when I had my first chocolate-covered pretzel, but I'm pretty sure it was a life-changing experience. When done properly, with the perfect ratio of chocolate to pretzel, there's nothing better. Except maybe adding some peanut butter to it. That's what Snyder's of Hanover figured out. They make a whole line of chocolate-covered pretzels and peanut butter-filled pretzel sandwiches. I had no idea! When they offered to send me some samples, I said, "Heck yeah!" They use Hershey's chocolate and these babies are sweet... sweet enough so that one or two fulfills a chocolate craving.I took the Sugar Baby to the Yale Peabody Museum last week to see the dinosaurs. I think the concept is still a little lost on him, although his friend (who shares the same name as the Sugar Baby) loves dinos as much as *someone* loves candy and mushrooms. We stopped in the gift shop afterwards and I found these:
KSCHOKOLAT Dark Chocolate Mintettes. I thought these were going to be flat mint squares, so I was quite surprised to see they were little balls. (I would've known that had I read the package which says, "Mini nuggets of natural mint fondant encased in rich dark chocolate.") Here's the thing with these: they're really tasty, but at $2.95 for 1.23 ounces, you have to really savor them. These are the type of candies that should come in a big bag so you can eat them by the fistful.

Aren't these beautiful? I sat and stared at these Oliver Kita chocolates for a long time before trying them. They taste as good as they look.

Let the Easter Fun Begin!

Isn't it amazing how quickly all the Valentine's candy was cleared away and replaced by Easter candy? There was barely any time for the shelves to be empty before they were loaded up with jelly beans and chocolate bunnies.
My first official Easter purchase was a bag of Sour Patch Bunnies. It was a difficult choice between those or Swedish Fish Eggs.
If you didn't tell me these were bunnies, I'm not sure what I'd think they were. They sort of resemble a bottle of Aunt Jemima pancake syrup. I hadn't had any Sour Patch candies in a long time, so I'd forgotten how much I like them. These are one of the few sour candies that start off and stay sour. The flavors are bright, fresh and citrusy-- a nice juxtaposition to the usual super sweet Easter basket offerings.

Valentine's Day is the New Halloween

It's official. I've had more than a few moms say to me, "What's with all the Valentine's candy?"
It used to be that, on Valentine's Day, you'd go to school and the teacher would collect everyone's cards and have the class pet pass them out. Some kids got a huge pile of cards, while other kids, sadly, got fewer. (These were the days before class lists and social equality.) You'd take your pile of little cards home, stuff them in a drawer and call it a day.
But that was so yesterday. Today's kids have taken Valentine's Day to new heights. Anything that can be glued, taped or stuffed into a cello bag is fair game. We're talking pencils, stickers, snack bags of chips, lollipops, chocolates, tickets to Broadway.
The Sugar Baby's haul included four pencils, three cards that did some crazy 3-D stuff, a bag of Goldfish, a tattoo, sunglasses that made him look disturbingly like Elton John and-- the Holy Grail-- a rootbeer-flavored Dum Dum from a little girl he's never even said boo to but now considers his one true love.
My sister-in-law said the post-Valentine's crash in their house was so bad that they've given up sugar for Lent. (I'm sure this is an unwilling sacrifice on the part of my nephews.)
In the house of Yum, I finally had to tell the Sugar Baby that we were going to play the "Quiet Game." He said, "You play the Quiet Game, I'll play the Talking Game."
Thank goodness it's all over with. And now there's just 39 days 'til the Easter Bunny comes.

I Call It "Almond Joy Cake"

(Not a pretty picture. It looked a lot better before it was hacked up.)

Maybe I should be doing a cake-of-the-week post. With all this snow we've been getting and some sort of social activity planned every weekend, I seem to be doing a heckuvalotta baking. This past weekend, it was a cake that Almond Joy lovers would, well, love: ground almond meal, coconut and bittersweet chocolate topped with chocolate ganache. Tonight, Mr. "I-Don't-Like-Cake" Goodbar was getting a bit hysterical, really, when he couldn't find the leftovers in the fridge. In fact, I think he was darn near accusing me of cake theft. (Turned out it was under the pancakes.)
This recipe is from "125 Best Chocolate Recipes" by Julie Hasson. I give her props; I've tried many of her recipes and they're almost always flawless.

Almond Chocolate Coconut Torte
Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease bottom and sides of 9-inch springform pan, then line bottom with parchment paper.

7 oz. semisweet chocolate, chopped (I used Ghiradelli chips)
1 cup unsalted butter
2/3 cup packed light brown sugar
4 eggs
1/2 cup almond meal
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup sweetened flaked coconut
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp almond extract

Chocolate Glaze
5 oz semisweet chocolate, chopped
1/2 cup whipping (35%) cream

In a large microwave safe bowl, combine chocolate and butter. Microwave, uncovered on medium (50%) for 1-2 minutes, stirring every 30 seconds until soft and almost melted. Stir until melted and smooth. (Let Sugarbaby lick the spoon.) With a clean spoon, stir in brown sugar until smooth. Let cool slightly. Add eggs, one at a time, whisking after each addition. Stir in vanilla and almond extract.

In a small bowl, mix together almond meal, flour, coconut and salt. Add to chocolate mixture, stirring until smooth.

Spread batter in prepared pan, smoothing top. Bake in preheated oven for 25 minutes. (I used a smaller pan, so cooking time was about 10 minutes more.) Top of cake will be puffed (do not overbake). Let cool completely in pan on rack.

Chocolate Glaze: In a microwave safe bowl, combine chocolate and cream. Microwave uncovered on medium (50%) for 1 minute, stirring every 30 seconds, or until cream is hot and chocolate is starting to melt. Stir well until chocolate is melted and mixture is thick and smooth. If chocolate is not completely melted, return to microwave for another 10 to 20 seconds or until chocolate is soft and melted. Stir well. If glaze is very thin, let stand for a few minutes to thicken slightly.

Invert cake onto a platter and remove parchment paper. Pour glaze over top and spread with spatula, letting glaze drip down sides. Refrigerate until glaze is firm.

Pillow-Soft Boozey Goodness

Waaaaay back when in 2008, I sampled some boozey-enhanced candies called Crown Nuggets Borrachitos. They came in two flavors: Cafe and-- I say whispering-- ((tequila)). They looked like this:
I just couldn't get myself to try the tequila ones back then and, to be perfectly honest, I still can't. As they say, once bitten, twice shy: one bad night with some cheap tequila will remain forever etched in my brain. I was able to try the Cafe ones, though, and I likened them to happy hour in a candy.
Fast forward to 2010, when I was asked if I'd like to try their new flavor Whiskey. I hesitated at first. Whiskey isn't my drink of choice, either, but at least I can say the word without gagging.
The first big change was obvious. The packaging is a hundred, thousand, million times better. The photo on the package shows some darn yummy looking candies and identifies them as "Creme & Liquor Filled Caramels." I noted before that they almost look like little pastries or cruellers. What I totally forgot about was the texture. It completely surprises me every time. Rather than a dense chew or a crumbly, almost doughy texture, these have a gelatinous feel to them, almost more marshmallowy than caramel. (The website refers to them as "pillow soft.") The alcohol-- up to 4%-- gives them a very definite kick. The whiskey ones taste just like the highballs* my parents used to make on Saturday nights. If whiskey is your poison, then these candies are your treats.
Mr. Goodbar loves these. I've watched as the package has slowly disappeared throughout the week. If you're the type who devours rum balls at Christmas, these are most certainly for you. They aren't really my thing, but I can say they're unique. If, however, they come out with a champagne-flavored version, watch out. Then it will be happy hour for me all the time. You can order these at www.crowncandies.com.

*It wasn't until just this very moment, when I looked up the definition of highball, that I realized that a highball is actually a generic name for a family of mixed drinks. According to everyone's favorite sketchy source Wikipedia, highballs are "composed of an alcoholic base spirit and a larger proportion of a non-alcoholic mixer." So technically, a gin and tonic or rum and Coke are also considered highballs. Huh. Who knew?