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January 2007

Monday, January 15, 2007

Short & Sweet: Japanese Goodies

I have too much candy and at one review a day I’m never going to get to it all.

And if I review more than one a day, well, I’m just not going to have enough time for anything else.

So here it is, a “Short & Sweet” review of a buncha stuff Japanese stuff:

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High Concentration Milk Candy (made by UHA) -are little hard candies, kind of like a hard toffee. They taste distinctly of milk and are very sweet. They’re also rather satisfying without being too sticky. I’m sure there’s some high calcium content in there but the wrapper was all in Japanese.

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Cubyrop (made by Bourbon) - oh they’re such cute candies! Little fruit flavored hard candies in Strawberry, Pineapple, Orange, Peach, Lemon, Muscat and Grape. Some flavors were very tasty, but I didn’t care much for the peach, which was a rather difficult flavor to distinguish from the orange. Lots of vitamin C.

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They came in little wrappers that held two little candy cubes. They were completely random, so you’d never know when you were going to get a muscat and grape together.

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Look Nut ala Mode (made by Fujiya) is a strange little tray of chocolates in a box with a wide, envelope-like flap. Great for sharing, they’re pretty and of descent quality even for less than $2.00.

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It took me quite a while to realize that there were four different nut flavors ... not that each chocolate contained all flavors. I have no idea, beyond the rather green pistachio one which was which. I enjoyed all of them except for the macadamia, which seemed more coconutty.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 6:49 am     CandyReviewBourbonUHAChocolateHard Candy & LollipopsNutsToffee6-TemptingJapan

Saturday, January 13, 2007

Candy Around the Net

imageHere are a few links for the long holiday weekend:

Missed Manners did more than just a gingerbread house for the holidays. He and his family recreated the seige on Helm Deep from Lord of the Rings book Two Towers in gummis, licorice and even catapults made from Tootsie Pops.

Pretty inventive stuff. If I had to do a diorama for a book report, I’d definitely tackle it in candy like they did!

Second - if you haven’t read it yet, there was an interesting expose by Scott at DallasFood.org about a super-expensive chocolate called Noka. If you read through all of it, including the comments in the forums you’ll find out that Noka later engaged one of the defenders of Noka in the comments. It’s a very odd story. I have nothing against expensive chocolate. I highly doubt that any chocolate is worth that much, but as has been pointed out in the newest press release since this whole thing broke, you get a really nice collectible box! (I’ve never tried Noka but now I’m curious to try Bonnat.)

Powell’s Sweet Shoppe has opened in Boise, Idaho. I mention this because people have been visiting Candy Blog looking for info about this. I did email Powell’s corporate headquarters for more info, but my request went unanswered. Luckily KTVB did a story on it and gave me the scoop.  The new store (only the second outside of California) is off Parkcenter in Bown Crossing.

I’ll use this as my opportunity to rant about the Powell’s website, which has NEVER listed the locations of the other stores besides the one in Windsor.

UPDATE 1/16/07 - I found the Boise location:

Powell’s Sweet Shoppe
3064 S. Bown Way
Boise, ID

(208) 424-6099

Hours:
Mon-Sat 10AM to 9PM
Sun 10AM to 8PM

Finally, if you’re planning a wedding, there’s a great article about the new trend in Candy Bars for a make your own wedding favor area at the reception. What’s really great about it is that people get to pick. It’s great when a wedding recognizes that the people who attend are individuals and might not like the little chocolate truffles and might prefer some jordan almonds. And let’s face it, a huge table of candy can be drop dead gorgeous. You can adapt this idea for all sorts of occasions like birthday parties, corporate thingies, baby showers, engagements, retirements and anniversaries.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 7:31 am     CandyFun StuffNews

Friday, January 12, 2007

New Years Resolution Poll Results

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Wow, these are really interesting results. Not to mention the fact that this was a poorly constructed poll, because it assumed that you either made resolutions about candy or you made no resolutions at all.

I’m actually glad to hear that so many folks are going to try to eat better candy. I mean really, life’s too short for bad candy! I’m hoping that those who said that they were going to eat less candy meant that the candy they were going to eat was going to be better as well.

POSTED BY Cybele AT 2:43 pm     CandyPolls

Blow Pop Minis

imageI’m a big lollipop fan. (No, not that I like big lollipops.) My favorite cheapo lollipop is the Orange Tootsie Pop (though I enjoyed the Limited Edition Tropical flavors last year, too). Blow Pops aren’t quite as good, mostly because the gum isn’t candy and they don’t come in orange.

While wasting time at the Pittsburgh Airport, I found these Blow Pop Minis. They herald, “It’s a Blow Pop with NO Stick!” Hallelujah! Now adults can eat their Blow Pops without being branded Rejuveniles.

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While they say they’re Blow Pops without sticks, they’re also without mass. They’re wee little candies, about the size of a smooshed garbanzo bean. And they’re mostly candy. They come in four flavors: Watermelon, Blue Razz, Cherry and Sour Apple. (No, no grape, which is a classic Blow Pop flavor.)

imageI talk a lot about proportions when it comes to candy. Sometimes something can be coated in too much chocolate or not have enough of a particular element. Let me just say that the blow part of the Blow Pop Minis is sadly lacking.

First, the gum is hard and tacky. Some of the time it wouldn’t even chew, just sit in the crevasses of my molars until I picked it out or ate something to dislodge it. Second, if I got the gum to chew, it was a wee amount. We’re talking the size of a BB. It would probably take six candies to make the amount of gum in one Chicklet.

These are stupid. Why not make one large enough to hold a responsible amount of gum? These little candies are probably a third of the size of a Root Beer Barrel. And you’re wondering, why not just sell them has plain old unfilled hard candies? Well, then they’d just be Charms.

The gum ends up being tough and flavorless ... rather like chewing a stamp or a piece of paper.

The candy part isn’t bad but, of course, none of the flavors are favorites of mine.

This is just a bad idea.

Name: Blow Pop Minis
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Tootise
Place Purchased: Eckert (Pittsburgh Airport)
Price: $.69
Size: 2 ounces
Calories per ounce: 100
Categories: Hard Candy, , Gum, SourUnited States, Tootsie, Gum

POSTED BY Cybele AT 7:11 am    

Thursday, January 11, 2007

Maud Borup Potato Chips

I’ve often said that you can cover garbage in chocolate and sell it as a delicacy. And we do, you can find chocolate-covered candied orange peels and even dead bugs. (I’m rather fond of the former, not so much with the latter.)

imageOf course potato chips are hardly garbage, they’re wonderful, wonderful things. I don’t eat them much any longer but I do admit that I miss them. But since my life is all about candy now, something had to go.

When I saw these in the 75% off post-holiday clearance section at Target I figured this was my opportunity to have some chips!

Let me start by saying it’s more chocolate than chip. Each chip is quite heavy but still bears the unmistakable shape and ripple of a potato chip. They even smell a bit of potato chips.

The coating on them smells sweet but not very chocolatey, it smells more like coconut and caramelized sugars. Some of the chips are stuck together, but hey, that happens in bags of chips anyway. There is an unmistakable crunch at the center and a nice hit of salt and an immediate potato chip flavor there.

But something is off about the chocolate. It felt greasy. It didn’t so much as melt as just slide around in my mouth. At first I didn’t know if it was because the chips imparted that but after looking at the ingredients I realized that it’s not chocolate.

Maud Borup’s recipe for milk chocolate goes something like this

Sugar, vegetable oils (palm kernel and partially hydrogenated palm), skim milk, cocoa powder, whole milk, vanilla, natural and artificial flavors, sorbitan tristearate [an emulsifier and skin conditioner], soya lecithin & salt

So, I guess that’s why they’re called “Milk Chocolate Dipped” in quotes. When in reality it’s just the milk chocolate part that should be in quotes. I’m quite sure the dipped part is accurate. But real milk chocolate, at least in the United States must contain chocolate liquor (the slurry made from grinding up cacao until it’s a smooth paste that is often separated into cocoa powder and cocoa butter). Just putting in the cocoa powder does not make it chocolate. It makes it chocolatish or chocolate-flavored. The fat in chocolate should be cocoa butter ... not palm kernel and partially hydrogenated palm oils. (For the record, the partially hydrogenated amount must have been small since the trans fat content was marked as zero on the label, but who knows if the small print is accurate if they’ve already duped me with the milk chocolate claim.)

Anyway, I really wanted to like these because I am a huge fan of chocolate dipping, including savory items like pretzels. But the greasy texture of the not-chocolate coating and the weird buzzing feeling that the chips left in my mouth (I don’t know what that was ... maybe there were some traces of walnuts in there) just makes me wanna chuck these out the window. I’m really glad they were only two bucks and I didn’t pay the original $8 for them because then I would need to sweep up some glass.

(I’ve had other candies from the overlord company that owns Maud Borup and found them quite tasty, so I’m not going to write the company off completely, though I may email the company about my displeasure.)

Name: Potato Chips "Milk Chocolate Dipped"
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Maud Borup (Route 29 Napa)
Place Purchased: Target (Carson)
Price: $1.98 (on sale - regularly $7.99)
Size: 10 ounces
Calories per ounce: 149
Categories: Cookie, United States

POSTED BY Cybele AT 6:53 am    

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Meticulously photographed and documented reviews of candy from around the world. And the occasional other sweet adventures. Open your mouth, expand your mind.

 

 

 

 

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