Candy News: Giant Tootsie Pops (sort of) and Grape Pop Rocks!

Two items of note popped up in my e-mail this week. The first that caught my attention was this: Giant Foot-High Tootsie Pops to debut!
I was like, wow, that's pretty cool! Turns out, though, that it's a 12-inch-tall lollipop-shaped CONTAINER that holds 10 assorted-flavor Tootsie Pops. Nary so exciting.
The other item is that Grape Pop Rocks are coming back in honor of their 35th anniversary! Woohoo! What's scary to me though, is that not only do I remember grape Pop Rocks, but I didn't realize they weren't being made anymore. Apparently there's a gap in my memory there. Seems like just yesterday I was buying a pack of them. I can still feel the painful little snaps on my tongue.

Pop Rocks Cake!

Mrs. Connection sent me this link to a recipe for Heston Blumenthal's Popping-Candy Chocolate Cake. Yes, dear Yumsters, this is a chocolate cake with a layer of Pop Rocks. My goodness. Apparently this was inspired by some Pop Rock-filled truffles the author had while on vacation.

So ... who dares try it?

What's New

I had to go back to the dreaded Christmas Tree Shoppe yesterday to return some Roman shades I bought for Henri's room. They were really nice, blue with a scalloped edge, and pretty decent quality. Too bad they were an inch too short. Turns out the windows in his room are a bizarre size, so now I have to get custom shades, which means $200 per window instead of the fantastic $9.99 bargains I found. Sigh. In any case, while I was there, I decided to check out the candy since the last time I was there I found the Smarties Parties. As I mentioned before, I have a phobia against food bought at non-food stores, but wouldn't you know it-- they had the new Junior Mints Deluxe that were the hit of the Candy Expo. They're packaged in a rectangular box and each mint is individually wrapped like a Cella Chocolate-Covered Cherry. The whiff of mint you get when you first open the box is intoxicating. As for taste, they're good but they aren't exactly like Junior Mints. In the Deluxe version, the chocolate is thicker and snappier, unlike the soft, waxy chocolate of the regular. And it seemed to me that the filling in the Deluxe was slightly more minty, but that may be just because there was more of it. I like these, though. They're big enough that one is satisfying.
While I was there, I also saw two other items of note: Pop Rocks on a ribbon (I'm guessing it's like a fruit roll-up with Pop Rocks in it) and Mike & Ike and Hot Tamales sprays. I almost bought one of these, but I got scared because I thought they might be really old items. Turns out they're brand new. I've seen candy sprays before. In fact, when I went to the Candy Expo a few years ago, I was accosted by some--ahem-- ladies in bikinis hawking their no-calorie candy sprays. Hmmm. I'm sorry, but I just don't get the appeal. That's just a little too Jetsons for me. Oh, and I did score a box of Christmas ribbon candy that I'll be using for my candy paintings.

Blast from the Past

Look at this! I unearthed this gem yesterday while continuing the big pack for our upcoming move. This, my friends, is a page from my scrapbook when I was a kid. It's totally falling apart. Apparently they didn't know about archival quality back then. But preserved here are some candy wrappers from the 70s. (1979-1982 to be exact, at least according to my notes written there on the page.) So what do we have? One package of orange Pop Rocks. I seem to remember buying them at Brook's Drugstore. Oh they were the coolest. Then there's several Big Red wrappers. A vision of things to come? Little did I know that over 20 years later, I'd be flat-out on my parents' couch with a pack of Big Red stuffed up my nose, trying to get rid of morning sickness.
Next, a wrapper from grape-flavored "Chew Laces." I have absolutely no memory of these. I don't remember buying them, eating them or even what they looked like.
Then we have Bottle Caps. I never particularly liked the taste of these. They come in "soda" flavors like orange, grape and rootbeer, but they lacked that certain tangy sourness that one expects from a candy like this.
Last but not least, we have this time capsule gem: a Pecan Chunky wrapper. Yes, once upon a time Chunkys weren't just peanuts and raisins. This one was milk chocolate with little pieces of pecans. Wow, it's been a long time since I've had a Chunky. A very underrated candy bar.
I wish I had saved more wrappers. It would've been fun to see what I actually ate. I've just started saving some of my recent candy wrappings. I'm thinking I might incorporate them into some sort of an art project.