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Monday, February 6, 2006

Pearson’s Nut Roll

Pearson’s Nut Roll is one of those bars I look at and think that it’s not for my generation. It was first introduced in 1933, and during the depression a bar like this could not only be a treat, but supply much needed calories and protein at a rather affordable price.

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Pearson’s Nut Roll is kinda like a Payday bar. It’s a soft nougat center, then a small layer of sticky caramel and a generous coating of salted peanuts (Virginia peanuts according to their website). My bar was a little wonky, with the caramel part showing through and the peanuts all gathered around the edges instead of on top. It didn’t seem to affect the flavor at all.

The center is much sweeter, as far as I can tell, than a Payday bar, but the nuts are salty and balance it well. For a candy bar there’s a lot of protein in there too, 8 grams for the regular 1.8 ounce sized bar. A lot of those “nutrition” bars don’t have that much protein in them. Of course you have to like peanuts to eat this bar. Which I do.

It’s a solid middle performer as candy bars go. It’s something I would pick up if I were looking for a “meal replacement candy bar” that has a good balance of taste, texture and of course a hit of protein which gives lasting energy. Without any chocolate, it’s a good hot weather performer as well.

Name: Pearson's Salted Nut Roll
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Pearson's
Place Purchased: Cost Plus World Market
Price: $.69
Size: 1.8 ounces
Calories per ounce: 133
Categories: Peanuts, Caramel, United States

POSTED BY Cybele AT 9:03 am    

Friday, February 3, 2006

Hershey’s Raspberries ‘n’ Creme

I never thought I’d eat so much white chocolate in my life until I started CandyBlog.net. It’s not that I don’t like white chocolate, but it’s usually so sweet it makes my throat hurt. (I’ve heard this may be because we have some taste buds in our throats.)

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While it would be easy for me to just copy and paste the review for Strawberries ‘n’ Creme in here, I have to say that they’re really not the same bar at all.

The bar was very aromatic, with a strong scent of raspberries, fake vanilla and milk. It’s not unpleasant at all and reminded me of yogurt. (I like yogurt.)

Now, I’ve had my share of raspberries in my life. When I was a kid we had a huge raspberry patch and we pretty much ate berries all summer long. When we had our fill we would make them into jam or sauces. I’ve had a lot of berries in my life. For a long time I didn’t even care for raspberries. I find the seeds really annoying and the flavor was a little too floral for me and there wasn’t enough of a textured chew. But of course now that I don’t have an unending supply, and the stuff that I do get is insanely expensive, I like them a lot and eat them at every opportunity. I’m a huge fan of the raspberry and dark chocolate combination and when I make chocolate truffles, I make more of raspberry than any other flavor.

The bar is tart, with a little tangy taste that you might be used to in all Hershey’s milk chocolate. The raspberry taste is pronounced but a little overshadowed by the strong sweetness of the bar. There’s also a very weird aftertaste to the bar that’s hard for me to pin down. I think it’s a dairy aftertaste, that sort of coated feeling you get on your tongue after whole milk.

The bar reminded me of Easter, the smell of the white chocolate and the berry overtones that are a mix of violet and rose floral notes. While I might actually buy the Strawberry bar again (a guilty pleasure, don’t expect me to admit it), I can’t see myself picking this one up unless it’s on sale. But these are limited edition bars and are no longer on the Hershey’s website, so don’t count on them being around too much longer.

Name: Raspberries 'n' Creme (Limited Edition)
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Hershey's
Place Purchased: 7-11 (Hollywood)
Price: $.85
Size: 1.4 ounces
Calories per ounce: 143
Categories: White Chocolate, United States, Hershey's, Limited Edition

POSTED BY Cybele AT 9:25 am    

Thursday, February 2, 2006

Zagnut

Do you ever wish that Chick-o-Sticks came in larger bars? Ever wish that Butterfingers didn’t come with that fake chocolate? Ever want a little coconut on your 5th Avenue?

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Zagnut has been around for ages and was once proudly made by the Clark company in Pittsburgh alongside the more famous grandfather, the Clark Bar. For some reason when the Clark company was broken up the Clark bar went to NECCO and the Zagnut bar went to Hershey’s. I have no explanation for this. My guess is that Clark was struggling to stay afloat and of course couldn’t sell off their namesake bar as a way to raise capital.

The bar was first introduced in 1930. (The Clark bar came out in 1917.) In a weird way, we have the military to thank for many of our favorite candy bars. Confectioners were usually enlisted to create ration bars for servicemen as quick and easy-to-carry calories. Servicemen would often get a taste for the bars (most of which were made with nuts and chocolate for a balance of protein, fats and carbs) and introduce them to their families back home.

The Zagnut bar, like the Chick-o-Stick is a great summer alternative to the 5th Avenue, because it has no chocolate coating to melt. It’s a large, flattened log of honeycombed peanut butter and molasses crisp. The flavorful and smooth center has a nice sparkle of salt in it and the toasty coconut on the outside goes surprisingly well with the molasses and peanut flavors. There’s some sort of a peanut/white chocolate coating on the bar, just enough to get the coconut to stick. If anything, this bar seemed more like a 5th Avenue than a Clark. (That’s a compliment.)

It’s a solid, midrange performer when it comes to candy bars, a good backup when maybe you don’t want an Almond Joy or maybe want a little more crunch than a 3 Musketeers. I know some folks aren’t keen on them, but now that Hershey’s has them in their stable, I’m actually seeing them more often. Now all they have to do is replace the hydrogenated oils in there.

Other Reading: Taquitos.net review and here’s what the wrapper used to look like.

Name: Zagnut
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Hershey's
Place Purchased: 99 Cent Only Store
Price: $.33
Size: 1.75 ounces
Calories per ounce: 131
Categories: Peanut, Coconut, United States, Hershey's, Kosher

POSTED BY Cybele AT 2:00 pm    

Wednesday, February 1, 2006

Silver Bear Toffee

Toffee is a strange thing. It’s like caramel gone too long on the burner, but it becomes its own special delight. In the United States, toffee is generally hard caramel: a mixture of sugar and butter. It’s boiled slowly to “hard ball” stage and then cooled, usually as flat pieces. What’s so wonderful about it is the way it cracks. It’s completely irregular. It flakes, it crumbles and it fractures. It’s buttery and sweet and often has a nice salty twang to it that cuts through the stickiness. (In the UK they also have soft toffees, which confuses the heck out of me, until I start eating them and then I get distracted. Mmm, toffee.)

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I got these full-sized samples directly from Brian at Silver Bear Toffee in Colorado. The first indication of their decadence is that the label says “refrigerate,” now that’s fresh toffee!

The ingredients are pretty compelling too: chocolate, almonds, butter, sugar and corn syrup. Each package was a little white box with planks of broken up toffee. The toffee was then covered in chocolate on top and sprinkled with more almonds. The dark chocolate one was my favorite as the smoky and smooth chocolate matched the sweet and salty toffee perfectly. The toffee was so buttery though that sometimes my chocolate fell off the slab. No matter. Toffee is casual; toffee is jeans and a tee.

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While I may have said I preferred the dark chocolate one, the milk chocolate one disappeared first (it could have been that toffee snitching elves were visiting my kitchen). The toffee crumbles wonderfully on the teeth and becomes a smooth and buttery experience on the tongue. There are lots of nuts in both versions but not in huge pieces, which I prefer (otherwise it’d be nut brittle).

When I eat commercial toffee bar, like a Heath bar, my usual custom is to eat the chocolate off first and then eat the toffee slab by itself. I have no desire to do that with this stuff, I want to eat the whole thing: the chocolate, toffee and nuts all at once.

The webstore isn’t open yet (I was hoping it would be in time for Valentine’s) but you can still order by phone:

Silver Bear Toffee
303-886-3892
.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

Toffee is $15 a pound and

$8.50

$8.00 by the half pound. Mine came boxed well with a cold-pack to keep it from melting (not really an issue in the winter).

Name: Silver Bear Toffee (Milk & Dark)
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Silver Bear Toffee
Place Purchased: manufacturer's (full size!) samples
Price: $8.00
Size: 8 ounces
Calories per ounce: 130
Categories: Chocolate, Toffee, Nuts, United States

POSTED BY Cybele AT 12:01 pm    

Tuesday, January 31, 2006

Darth M&Ms

In my continuing effort to bring you timely reviews of new products (that’s a joke), I finally found some Darth M&Ms at the 99 Cent Only Store. I picked up collector’s pack 18 of 72. In fact, they were all 18 of 72 at the 99 Cent Only Store. I’m not certain if these are still available, the website is still up.

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I was a little confused at how these are considered dark chocolate, as they have milk in them, but that’s probably part of the evil Sith plan. The colors are actually pretty nice. Navy Blue, Maroon, Gray, Black and Lavender. All great colors for a snazzy sweater or scarf.

As long as I’ve brought up the subject of color, this is probably a good time to talk about consumption techniques. There are those people who like to eat M&Ms by color. Eating your candies by color of course makes sense with Skittles where they’re different flavors. But M&Ms are not. Still, when I dump a bunch out on my desk for snacking, I divide them up by color. Plain M&Ms are consumed in lots of three, all the same color and when I get to the end, there are particular pairings of colors that are acceptable. I have no idea why I do this, but I’m guessing it’s a way of taking full advantage of the colors as a feature.

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Anyway, these are darker-than-milk chocolate M&Ms. Their colors are bright and shells crunchy but the centers are strangely grainy. Not grainy in the sense of the sugar is not completely dissolved, they’re grainy like someone left some ground up oyster shells in them. They’re slightly less sweet than the regular plain M&Ms and do have a bit more complex, chocolatey flavor. But they somehow lack the punch of a regular M&M. I wouldn’t mind them trying this chocolate on the Almond M&Ms, but I don’t really think they work in this format. Maybe the Peanut ones are better (Writers & Artists Snacking at Work liked them). There’s little benefit here either for Vegans or those with nut allergies as it’s not a suitable candy for either. I also resent dark chocolate being represented as evil. I mean, as candy goes, it’s more pure.

For the record, the colors are: Dooku Blue, Grievous Silver, Emperor Red, Vader Black & Maul Purple.

More timely reviews around the blogosphere - Toys are Good Food & Joshilyn Jackson.

Related Candies

  1. Mint Crisp M&Ms (Indiana Jones)
  2. Skittles Chocolate Mix
  3. M&Ms Razzberry - Limited Edition
  4. Cherry Almondine M&Ms
  5. M&Ms Line
  6. M&M Pirate Pearls
Name: Darth M&Ms
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Mars
Place Purchased: 99 Cent Only
Price: $.50
Size: 3.14 ounces
Calories per ounce: 146
Categories: Chocolate, United States, Mars, Limited Edition

POSTED BY Cybele AT 10:29 am    

Monday, January 30, 2006

KitKat Tsubu Ichigo and Hershey’s Strawberries ‘n’ Creme

Here I go again with the KitKats. But this time I thought I’d give you a domestic comparison. It’s not exactly a head-to-head post, just two reviews in one.

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There are whole groups of folks devoted to the various iterations of KitKats and I have to admit I’ve fallen under the spell, too. I picked up the KitKat Strawberry a few weeks ago. It’s a very pretty bar, the Japanese version of KitKats are sold in a box that holds two individually wrapped minibars of two fingers each. They’re also quite a bit pricier. I don’t know how much they sell for in Japan, but $1.89 for a rather ordinary candy bar is kind of extreme.

Everything about this bar screams strawberry. The pink wrapper, the smell and the appearance of the bar. It smells like strawberry waffles or ice cream. The crisp is really good and has its own wheaty flavor. The cream between the cookie layers is also strawberry and the strawberry coating is very smooth. There is no cocoa butter in this concoction though.

I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but American confectioners recently came to an agreement that you couldn’t call something White Chocolate unless it has cocoa butter in it. This is good news. While cocoa butter is a fat and contains oodles of calories, it’s considered to be neutral when it comes to our body’s cholesterol level. Cocoa butter is made primarily of three different fatty acids: Stearic Acid, Oleic Acid and Palmitic Acid. While these are saturated fats, they have a neutral effect on serum cholesterol levels. I’m not saying eat chocolate to keep your cholesterol down, but plant derived, natural fats may not be as bad for you as animal fats (like dairy and lard).

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I’m not usually a big fan of White Chocolate. I like misty mints, but generally white chocolate is just too sweet and bland for me. This bar has an overwhelmingly berry smell along with plenty of sweet notes and a touch of fake vanilla. I like it. I was really surprised, because I’ve been ignoring this bar for months, but I actually liked it. Once I started writing this and tasting it as I went along, I ate the whole thing.

The berry particles were actually there and give the white chocolate a definitely pink cast with little red bits. They weren’t as big as the berry bits in the KitKat though. They provided a little tart respite from the otherwise sweet and slightly tangy chocolate. It also reminded me of strawberry yogurt or maybe strawberry ice cream. But most Hershey’s chocolate reminds me of yogurt. The strawberry bits also include seeds. So you get fiber with your bar! (They don’t mention any fiber on the nutrition info but they do say that it has 10% of my daily calcium!)

On the whole the bars had a very definite berry taste that eased the usual sickly sweetness of white chocolate that I’ve never enjoyed. I also have a Hershey’s Raspberries ‘n’ Creme bar that I’ll review in a few days. Canada also has a Milkshake (Malt) version of KitKat I need to get a hold of.

Other reviews: Candy Is Awesome - Hersey’s Cookies ‘n’ Creme had some disgusting children and Candy Addict has positive feelings - Strawberry & White Maple. I haven’t even scratched the surface with my reviews here of KitKats, check out Wikipedia.

Name: Kit Cut Tsubu Ichigo & Strawberries 'n' Creme
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Nestle & Hershey's
Place Purchased: Mitsuwa (Mar Vista) & 7-11 (Hollywood)
Price: $1.89 & $.85
Size: 1.51 ounces & 1.4 ounces
Calories per ounce: 159 & 143
Categories: White Chocolate, Cookie, Japan, United States, Nestle, Hershey's, KitKat, Limited Edition

POSTED BY Cybele AT 10:34 am    

Friday, January 27, 2006

Razzles

Razzles are an oddity. They seem to be the jack-of-all trades of the candy world. Billed, “First it’s Candy ... Then It’s Gum!” I have to admit it doesn’t do either particularly well.

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The package for these Razzles is particularly attractive, and that’s often enough to get me to buy something. That’s the wonder of candy, even if you’re disappointed, you’re rarely out more than a dollar.

The package, of course, makes the Razzles look better than they actually are. They’re not the sassy looking, colorful pieces on the package. Theyr’e rather grainy looking and kind of crumbly. Chewing them gives a burst of sweetness followed by some tart. I chose three orange ones for my first Razzles in probably 20 years. They were disappointingly bland, but did turn into gum more faithfully than I remember when I was a kid. The gum has a nice lingering essence, but little sugar to jazz it up. This is not bubble gum either, in case you were going to make some attempts.

Orange: bland and lacking in any zesty punch. Lemon: Solid, good mix of essence and tart. Grape: not as chemical as some others, had an odd sort of ginseng/root flavor to it. Blueberry: pretty good, kind of grapey and kind of like raspberry. Raspberry: nice and flowery tasting with some good tart bite to it and a little hint of cotton candy but it doesn’t wear well, the flavor is gone before the sugar is.

The color when it becomes gum is far more vibrant - the lemon became a lusturous saffron yellow and the dirty looking grape became, um, inky and the blueberry was positively turquoise.

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These had a pretty powerful smell of chemicals. And they are SOUR. This package had more defects in it - three of the candies were noticeably darker than the others and just didn’t seem “right” so I didn’t eat them.

Lime: puckeringly sour with a good hint of lime essence. The sour stays with the gum well after the rest of the flavor is gone. Blue Raspberry pretty much like the regular raspberry but intensely sour with a rather salty taste to it as well (I know there’s no sodium in there). Orange: straight up sour with some nice fruity flavors. Lemon: I figured this one was going to be really sour after those lime ones and I wasn’t disappointed. Much better than the regular Razzle, if you could just buy these, I think they’d do very well. I didn’t get any Cherry ones in this batch for some reason, so I can’t comment on that flavor.

I don’t think Razzles have won me over. They’re a nice novelty and the gum part isn’t bad, but the candy part is pretty awful. It’s not smooth and the flavors are uneven. The appearance is also kind of off-putting. I wonder if they’ve ever considered candy coating them like a Spree or Chicklet.

UPDATE: for even more confusing “candy/gum” see CandyAddict’s recent review of Japanese Wata Gum

Name: Razzles and Sour Razzles
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Concord Confections owned by Tootsie Roll Industries
Place Purchased: Candy Town (San Pedro)
Price: $1.25
Size: 1.4 ounces
Calories per ounce: 94
Categories: Gum, Canada, Kosher

POSTED BY Cybele AT 2:51 pm    

E. Guittard Single Origin Tasting Kit

I got this fantastic single origin tasting kit from E. Guittard. The photos are deceptive, these are tiny little bars, each is 10 grams (a little over a third of an ounce) and measured a mere 2.5” x 1.25”. There were four different varieties that came in a box of 16 wee bars. What was most stunning about these bars is the packaging. The little labels are lively and elegant with their gold leaf and description of the flavor of the particular varietal. Inside, the foil wrappers were beautiful too, with a delicate pattern featuring an impressive bas relief style scene of heaven knows what with three figures probably worshipping the cocoa bean or something. (The comprehensive press kit and tasting kit brochure made no mention of the scene.)

image

Each of the bars looks slightly different as well (except for the Sur del Lago and Quevedo) from different molds. All bars were 65% cacao, which is a good midrange for dark chocolate, allowing for lots of room for cocoa butter to give a nice fatty background to support the complex flavors.

imageAmbanja - notes from package: You’re in for a rich chocolate experience! Made primarily from rare Criollo beans from the fertile Sambriano Valley in Madagascar, Ambanja mingles sour essences with deep rich, chocolate flavor.

Dark with a slight amber/red tint, this bar was buttery and smooth. There were overwhelming raisin and cherry notes in this bar. It definitely has an acidic tone to it, but not in an unpleasant, bitter or acrid way. It’s really very nice.

imageSur del Lago - notes from package: Complex chocolate flavors underlie subtle hints of red berry fruit. Cacao beans used to make this chocolate were harvested from trees of Criollo and Trinitario heritage in Venezuela’s Sur del Lago region.

This one started out rather woodsy and sour. It reminded me of the zesty smell of piles of fresh sawdust from a fruit tree. Then the other notes started coming out, including the light berries and maybe some grape. It’s pretty mellow and pleasant, but the high sour note is a little odd.

imageChucuri - notes from package: Long, deep, slow chocolate flavors are accented by pleasant hints of spice. The Trinitario cacao beans used to make this chocolate were grown in the San Vicente de Chucuri Valley of Santader in Colombia.

Deep flavors dominate this little bar. It starts out woodsy with some balsam notes of juniper or rosemary. Then it’s got some very strong cherry notes that linger for the rest of the melt on the tongue. It’s got a high little topnote of lavender or maybe it’s bergamot. It gives this bar the best balance of the four.

imageQuevedo notes from package: Quevedo’s extremely dark color forshadows its powerful but flowery chocolate taste. The intensity of this rarefied Forestero varietal produces rich green forest, tea and slight nut flavors with a lingering banana and pound cake finish.

Smooth but with a notable bitter dryness at first. Rich and woodsy with an exceptionally buttery texture that makes it feel almost fluffy and buoyant on the tongue. I’m getting the tea notes, but I’m totally missing the pound cake the wrapper promises.

If you’re looking for single origin chocolate that doesn’t skimp on the cocoa butter and is so dry that it leaves you gasping for water, this might be the stuff. At only 65% cocoa solids, there’s an excellent mix of flavor and texture that’s not too sweet. All of the bars are exceptionally smooth without a hint of grain. Here’s a tip: this would make an excellent Valentine’s Day gift for someone. It’s sensual, educational and you can share it.

You might think you’ve never had Guittard chocolate, when you probably have. Guittard is one of the top chocolate makers in the country, but most of the business is making chocolate for other companies. Guittard makes the excellent chocolate that you find on See’s candies. It’s hard to know who they supply chocolate to, but they’re a huge operation and that chocolate is going somewhere tasty. I don’t see Guittard in the stores very often, except for their baking chips. They’re definitely worth going out of your way for. Most of the varietals from other brands that I’m seeing lately are higher cocoa percentages, so you’re missing out on the cocoa butter, which I think is an equal part of the chocolate experience.

They’re a little pricey directly from E. Guittard’s store, you can also find them at Chocosphere (throw some Dolfin and Dagoba in your cart while you’re there).

Other Reviews: SeventyPercent.com gives Chucuri top marks and here are their reviews of Ambanja, Quevedo and Sur del Lago.

Name: Single Origin Tasting Kit
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: E. Guittard
Place Purchased: sample from E. Guittard
Price: $15.95
Size: 5.64 ounces
Calories per ounce: 142
Categories: Chocolate, United States, Kosher

POSTED BY Cybele AT 9:51 am    

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