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May 2012Wednesday, May 9, 2012
Candy Tease: Sweets & Snacks Expo 2012 - Part 2Though I couldn’t make it to Sweets & Snacks Expo this year, I’ve gotten word of loads of new candy hitting the shelves soon. Here are some highlights. Name: Lindor Vanilla Truffles Name: Hello Kitty Chocolate Brownie Treats Name: Red Velvet Nutffles Name: Sweethearts Marshmallows Name: Scary Gummy All images courtesy of the respective manufacturers. Related Candies
POSTED BY Cybele AT 9:33 am Candy • New Product Announcement • Tuesday, May 8, 2012
Candy Tease: Sweets & Snacks Expo 2012 - Part 1The Sweets and Snacks Expo, sponsored by the National Confectioners Association starts today in Chicago. It’s a huge trade show for candy manufacturers to show their product lines to candy buyers. Hundreds of new candy products are introduced each year, here are a few: Name: Brand: Ritter Sport Name: Au Natural Name: Ginger-Lemon Gummi Name: Gimbal’s Sour Beans Name: Bonomo Taffy: Blue Raspberry & Cherry Related Candies
POSTED BY Cybele AT 9:14 am Candy • New Product Announcement • Gimbal's Candy • Haribo • Ritter Sport • Warrell Corp • Highlight • Featured News • Monday, May 7, 2012
Snickers 3X ChocolateWhen there’s a new version of Snickers I’m usually right on top of sourcing one for review. I knew that Mars was bringing out the Snickers 3X Chocolate late last year. The bar has chocolate nougat, chocolate caramel and a chocolate coating, plus peanuts. It sounded like the Triple Chocolate Twix they brought out a couple of times. These came out in February, but I couldn’t find them anywhere in Los Angeles. Luckily I did spot them at a gas station in Media, Pennsylvania and picked one up. They only come in the 2 To Go size, which is like a King Size bar, except there are two small bars in the package. The wrappers says that you can eat one now, twist the wrapper and save the other for later. Yeah, as if a lot of people do that. (Mars is phasing out their king size bars over concerns about portioning and will only sell bars with 250 or fewer calories. I would prefer to call these Triple Chocolate Snickers, but no one at Mars consulted me on this item. The 3X was vague, I thought maybe it was three times the size or maybe had three little bars in the package. Each bar is 210 calories and almost 1.6 ounces. So they’re actually a good size and satisfying portion. I find the regular Snickers bar just one bite too big for me. About 200 calories is a pleasing portion for most of us. The bars are beautiful, even after a few thousand miles of travel. They have the lovely swirls of chocolate on top and a thick coat over the layers inside. The bar is constructed as you might anticipate, a base of chocolate nougat with a peanut studded caramel on top of that then a coating of milk chocolate. The bar smells like a Snickers, like sweet milk and peanuts. The bite is similar to the traditional Snickers with perhaps a little less caramel pull. It’s all quite sweet and not quite as chocolatey as I’d hoped. The nougat doesn’t really taste like chocolate, just sweet and fluff like a 3 Musketeers. The chocolate caramel is a bit richer in profile than the standard caramel, but lacks a salty punch. The peanuts are just as good as they should be, crunchy and fresh. Really, I prefer the salty and nuttier standard Snickers. But if I tried this bar first, I might be more inclined to make it a favorite. It just felt a little too sweet overall without as much of a flavor punch. I have no idea if Mars is set to roll this out in Fun Size and regular size bars, my guess is they’re waiting for reaction from consumers on the King Size (but if the King Size goes away, I would guess this bar would, too). Mars has not moved to sustainable and ethically sourced cacao in the United States (their first product will be Maltesers in the UK). This bar contains peanuts, soy, eggs and dairy. There’s no note about the gluten status. Related Candies
Friday, May 4, 2012
Skittles Crazy Sours (Europe)Skittles were introduced in 1974 in the UK then in 1979 in the United States. While the flavors in the classic Fruits package vary whether you purchase the US or European variety, the flavors have remained the same. It wasn’t until 1989 that Skittles started to create extra flavor versions of their packages. The Skittles Sours were introduced in the United States in 2000 as a regular Skittle with a grainy sour coating. That same year the European version of Skittles Crazy Sours came out. They’re a bit different in that they don’t look different, but have a different set of flavors from the Fruits set but no tangy coating. The colors are a little muted but easily identified as Skittles with the classic printed S on them. They did smell a little more than the standard Fruit Skittles. It was a light, fruity smell, kind of like Froot Loops or Freesias. Since they don’t really look like the American Sour Skittles, I compared them to the American Fruits Skittles (on the left). Green is the Sour Apple flavor, not lime. It’s the most artificial tasting of the bunch, with a more apple cider vinegar tartness than a Jolly Rancher, by far my least favorite of the bunch. Yellow is Pineapple! What a delight. Why don’t they have any pineapple Skittles in the United States? I loved these. A mix of floral and canned pineapple. Orange is Sour Mandarin according to Wikipedia. It actually doesn’t say what the flavors are on the package. It is tangy, but not terribly intense. The orange original Fruits Skittle orange is equally mild in the flavor profile, but of course lacks that tartness.The flavor actually varied a bit from piece to piece, some were notably more sour than others. Pink is rather magenta and a Sour Raspberry flavor. The notes are really good, there’s the tartness, the floral berry notes and then a deeper boiled sugar flavor like jam. Purple was hard to place at first, it’s Sour Cherry. The color is a true, bright purple, instead of the eggplant purple of the domestic grape version. It’s rather good, probably the most sour of all of Skittles in this package and with a really convincing sour cherry juice flavor. It has notes of currant and raspberry and pomegranate There really is no comparison between the American Sour Skittles and the European Crazy Sours Skittles. I can’t say that I prefer them, but the zing was noticeable enough to say that they’re different, but perhaps my mouth has been spoiled by truly sour things so I didn’t find these rose to the level of crazy. I have to say that I prefer the European version to the American sours, but only because they’re not messy. I don’t know the allergen status of these. Skittles stopped using gelatin a few years ago, though they’re not marked as Kosher. Related Candies
Wednesday, May 2, 2012
Eat with your Eyes: Hershey’s Luscious Pearls of ChocolateThis isn’t actually a review. It’s just a photo documentation of a version of Hershey’s chocolate that’s available in China. They’re narrow tins that open like drawers. Inside are little spheres of chocolate. They call them Pearls. They’re not so different than the Godiva Pearls that are sold in the United States in much smaller tins. The chocolate actually seemed to be of higher quality than the ordinary Hershey’s bars, but that could just be the premium packaging. It’s a great way to portion just a little bit of chocolate and the tins are nicely reusable. They’re thick enough that I could put a few thumb drives in them, or a card reader for my camera and some extra flash memory. Or I suppose I could refill them with other edibles and stash it in my bag. Another view of the Hershey’s Extra Creamy Pearls. Hershey’s Extra Creamy Milk Chocolate Pearls close up. They’re each about the size of a fresh garden pea. There was also a version of Hershey’s Special Dark Pearls, which I didn’t find as creamy as the milk chocolate version. I picked these up as samples at the ISM Cologne show last year. POSTED BY Cybele AT 7:23 am Candy • ISM Cologne • Highlight • Photography • |
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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