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Just Born

Friday, January 16, 2009

Mike and Ike Italian Ice

In Los Angeles this week it’s been in the eighties. Yes, in January. So the thought of Mike and Ike Italian Ice doesn’t feel a bit out of place in this strange heat spell.

Mike and Ike Italian Ice Flavors

Though Mike and Ike are available in single serve bags, I see them most often in the movie boxes. I think it’s cool, I like the bold designs on them and of course they’re usually a better value than the single serve. But the packaging itself has been bugging me for a while. Inside the rather large box (for something that holds 4.2 ounces) is a plastic bag. I’d be just as happy to pick up a peg bag for the same one dollar as the box. (A package that collapses as you eat it is handy, too.)

To have both the box and the bag is wasteful, though probably ensures freshness and keeps the soft candies from getting crushed.

I’ve had my fair share of Italian Ice over the years, though usually in the little cups from the convenience store freezer. And always lemon. What distinguishes Italian Ice flavors from other fruity flavors? There’s no indication on the box, except that it tells me that it has Your Favorite Italian Ice Flavors. Which isn’t exactly true, since as I mentioned, I really just like lemon and they’ve put four other unnecessary flavors in here.

image

The colors are similar to a set of highlighter pens. A little less vivid, a little less dark than the regular Mike and Ike.

The flavors here are:

Light Red = Cherry: A light woodsy cherry flavor. Because the color isn’t quite as dark, I’m guessing it didn’t need as much food coloring so I don’t get a typical bitter aftertaste. Which makes this a flavor that I don’t have to avoid. (Though it was still the last flavor left after I picked over them anyway.)

Light Blue = Blue Raspberry: this one has flavors on the darker end of the raspberry flavor profile, kind of like jam. But then there was a pop of menthol or mint in there. I don’t know if this was the Italian Ice part of it that was supposed to emulate that cool feeling of sorbet, but really it just make me think I was eating a cough drop.

Light Green = Watermelon: Grossly artificial tasting and a strange aftertaste, especially when paired with the citrus ones. (Bitter & slightly medicinal.) Bad artificial watermelon may replace my dislike of cherry very soon.

Light Orange = Orange: Nice blend of orange essence and orange juice flavors. Could use a little bit more tartness.

Light Yellow = Lemon: Light, tangy but also a little fizzy. Didn’t quite have a minty taste. Becomes rather sweet and flavorless quickly.

As you can guess, my favorite assortment so far was been the Mike and Ike Alex’s Lemonade Stand. But Tangy Twister comes in second and if you look sharp in late February you’ll probably see the Jelly Bean variety for Easter as well (I bought them last year on an after-holiday sale and, well, ate them).

Other reviews of the Italian Ice: Candy Addict and Wisconsin Candy Dish.

These are filled with artificial colors & flavors but are technically vegan.

Related Candies

  1. Dots Elements: Earth, Air, Fire & Water
  2. Organic Zootons
  3. Good and Fruity
  4. Hot Tamales Ice
  5. Mike and Ike Jolly Joes
  6. Mike and Ike Orange ‘n Cream
Name: Mike and Ike Italian Ice
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Just Born
Place Purchased: Walgreen's (Echo Park)
Price: $1.00 (on sale)
Size: 4.2 ounces
Calories per ounce: 104
Categories: Jelly, United States, Just Born

POSTED BY Cybele AT 10:21 am    

Thursday, June 5, 2008

Peeps Chocolate Mousse (Bears & Bunnies)

Chocolate Mousse Marshmallow BearsJust Born is expanding its efforts of Peeps World Domination with a new line of Chocolate Mousse Peeps.

The first version will premiere next Valentine’s Day in the shape of Peeps Chocolate Mousse Marshmallow Bears.

I’m not sure why there hasn’t been a bear shaped Peeps all along, they’re an ideal Valentine’s emblem (and really, why can’t we have Bear Peeps all year round?). However, this package is all about love, with its red wrapper & little hearts.

The packages I got were for evaluation purposes only, so I don’t have the complete nutritional info & ingredients list. I decided to open the Peeps Chocolate Mousse Marshmallow Bunnies for the purposes of the review.

image

Look familiar?

They’re nice looking, medium brown. They’re sparkly with the light sanding of sugar. (I’ve often wondered what corn starch dusted Peeps would be like.)

They’re extremely soft, softer than regular Peeps are, if you ask me. They smell like chocolate breakfast cereal, like Cocoa Puffs.

image

But the big question, at least in my mind, was are these different from the Cocoa Peeps?

I just so happened to have a package of Peeps Cocoa Marshmallow Bunnies (left) for a direct comparison.

Though they looked similar in my memory, putting them side by side, it’s easy to see that the new Mousse Peeps are darker.

The cross section shows that the Mousse Peeps is cocoa through and through, where the only slightly creamy colored on the inside.

Peeps Chocolate Mousse BunniesThe difference in taste? Well, if you’re expecting some sort of decadent mousse-like product, you’re going to be disappointed. The new Mousse version are kind of like a fluffy, watered down Tootsie roll. Pleasant and less-sweet than the ordinary Peeps, but still, not a chocolate phenomenon.

They’re great with coffee but like the Cocoa version, it’s very hard to get them stale. I’ve had this package open for two weeks and they’re still pretty squishy.

However, these are awesome broiled. The center becomes frothy and runny and the sugar dust becomes a crunchy shell. I put them in the toaster over for 3 minutes. Be sure to have them on foil or parchment or else they run all over the place. You also might need a spoon to eat them. Microwaving also gets the same soupy center, but the outside doesn’t get crispy (so it’s the confectionery equivalent of trying to make pizza in a microwave ... it’s edible but it’s not the same).

In the end, I’m more inclined towards the Chocolate Mousse Peeps than any other Peeps to date, but that’s not necessarily a rave review.

For the record, the available shapes for Peeps are:

  • Valentines: Hearts and now Bears
  • Easter: Eggs, Bunnies, Chicks & new Tulips
  • Halloween: Spooky Cats, Pumpkins & Ghosts (love those, no dyes)
  • Christmas: Trees, Snowmen, Gingerbread Men & Stars + the new JOY letters
  • These should be in stores starting in January, but you can also buy many Peeps items all year round now directly from Just Born.

    Related Candies

    1. Peeps Mash Ups - Savory
    2. Peeps inside a Milk Chocolate Egg
    3. Peeps Chick & Bunny Candy
    4. Marshmallow Pig
    5. Candy Wrapper Purses from Endangered Species
    6. Peeps Mash Ups
    7. Peeps
    Name: Chocolate Mousse Peeps (Bears & Bunnies)
      RATING:
    • 10 SUPERB
    • 9 YUMMY
    • 8 TASTY
    • 7 WORTH IT
    • 6 TEMPTING
    • 5 PLEASANT
    • 4 BENIGN
    • 3 UNAPPEALING
    • 2 APPALLING
    • 1 INEDIBLE
    Brand: Just Born
    Place Purchased: samples from All Candy Expo
    Price: $1.29 retail
    Size: 2.375 ounces
    Calories per ounce: unknown
    Categories: Marshmallow, United States, Just Born, Valentines, Easter

    POSTED BY Cybele AT 8:09 am    

    Wednesday, April 9, 2008

    Mike and Ike Alex’s Lemonade Stand

    Mike and Ike Candy BuffetLast year Mike and Ike let us vote for a new flavor blend and when the winner was clear, they announced the new Mike and Ike Lemonade Blends. But it wasn’t just a new flavor set, this one has a tie in with the foundation called Alex’s Lemonade Stand, which supports research into pediatric cancers.

    There was also a stunning candy buffet, as you can see, that featured all the Mike and Ike flavors and little bags where you could design your own mix. (Mine was mostly pineapple from the Tangy Twister mix and some strawberry-banana from Tropical Twister and a strong dose of the new Lemonade Blends.)

    I went to a press reveal at All Candy Expo last September where Alexandra Scott’s father told the story of his little girl who started a lemonade stand to raise money for cancer research, all while she was battling the cancer that would ultimately take her life at the age of eight. (There wasn’t a dry eye in the house, it’s an amazing story of a selfless kid.)

    Just Born will be making a minimum donation of $100,000 a year for three years. (And this mix will return each spring/summer as well.)

    Mike and Ike Alex Lemonade Stand

    Finally the candies are hitting stores and I can post my review!

    I was pleased with the quality of the Mike and Ike Tangy Twister, but didn’t care much for the set of flavors. Since citrus is one of my favorite flavor sets, I had a much better feeling about the new Lemonade Mix.

    The new assortment has the following flavors: Lemonade, Raspberry Lemonade, Strawberry Lemonade, Lime Lemonade, and Tangerine Lemonade flavors. The odd part is that these flavors aren’t mentioned on the package, or even on the website, unless you dig deep into the Just Born press release archive. But there are little images of five different fruits on the package, so I guess folks need to make the jump themselves.

    Mike and Ike Lemonade StandThe colors look like highlighter pens.

    Yellow - Lemonade - a good zesty and really sour lemon. After chewing, as with most Mike and Ike, the flavor fades and it’s just pleasant and bland jelly candy.

    Green - Lime Lemonade - not as tart as the lemonade, but has a good rounded lime flavor.

    Orange - Tangerine Lemonade -  I was hoping this one would be really tart but it didn’t quite rise to that. It’s definitely tangerine and not orange though.

    Light Pink - Strawberry Lemonade - I enjoy real strawberry lemonade and this has a nice mix of the fragrant berry and the tangy lemon-ness.

    Purplish Pink - Raspberry Lemonade - not as tart as the strawberry, this has a more floral berry essence to it.

    They’re all tasty and all have that lemony zazz to them. It’s easy to eat them together or separate your colors. I liked all the flavors ... I wish they were just a little more flavorful, but that would be wishing away one of the essential parts of Mike and Ike, which is the mellow jelly center. (Which is made with pear juice.)

    Mariko at Candy Addict also had a preview of these and found them so good she’ll be happy to hear that they’re on shelves so she can get more now. For more fun Mike and Ike adoration, check out Jason Liebig’s photo set of his collection of boxes.

    The package says that these are Gluten Free. The colors are all artificial, so I guess these are also Vegan.

    Related Candies

    1. Hot Tamales Ice
    2. Mike and Ike Jolly Joes
    3. Mike and Ike Tangy Twister
    4. Hot Tamales and Hotter Tamales
    5. Mike and Ike Orange ‘n Cream
    Name: Mike and Ike Lemonade Blends
      RATING:
    • 10 SUPERB
    • 9 YUMMY
    • 8 TASTY
    • 7 WORTH IT
    • 6 TEMPTING
    • 5 PLEASANT
    • 4 BENIGN
    • 3 UNAPPEALING
    • 2 APPALLING
    • 1 INEDIBLE
    Brand: Just Born
    Place Purchased: samples from Just Born
    Price: $.65 retail
    Size: 2.12 ounces
    Calories per ounce: 99
    Categories: Jelly, United States, Just Born, Kosher, Limited Edition

    POSTED BY Cybele AT 7:36 am    

    Tuesday, March 18, 2008

    Hot Tamales Spice Jelly Beans

    imageThis is one of the most incongruous bits of packaging I’ve seen in a while. Hot Tamales branded jelly beans, in spice flavors ... okay, so far so good. But the colors are all, I don’t know, racy.

    Spice jelly beans are far from racy. They’re eaten by little nostalgic old ladies and middle-aged European guys as palate cleansers. These are packaged like they’re supposed to appeal to the NASCAR crowd (not that they wouldn’t enjoy them ... Mike and Ike even have an association with NASCAR).

    But still, spice jelly beans are hard to find these days, and it’s even harder to find them made in the USA. (Yes, I get emails from people looking for American made spice jelly beans.)

    Just Born is known for it’s jelly bean type products, which are their Mike and Ike and Hot Tamales as well as their lesser known line of Teenee Beanee, a gourmet jelly bean.

    What strikes me as especially odd about these (on top of everything else) is that Just Born also has a line of spice jelly beans that Sera at Candy Addict just reviewed yesterday!

    image

    They’re lovely looking beans, a little bigger than the Jelly Belly everyone is so used to these days, but not as large as the Brach’s Jelly Beans.

    The variety has five flavors (the only ones left out of the “traditional” spice mix are licorice and lemon): Wintergreen, Peppermint, Clove, Spearmint and of course Cinnamon.

    The color mix is a little odd too, the assignment of colors defies ordinary candy traditions, but I suppose none of that is written in stone either. At least they have a key on the back.

  • Wintergreen = Pink: It’s a pretty pink, a little darker and easy to confuse with the red sometimes. The wintergreen is soft and mellow, almost like a teaberry instead of a Lifesavers Wint-O-Green.
  •  

  • Cinnamon = Red: pretty much what you’d expect, a spicy and zesty cinnamon with a very light burn to it.
  •  

  • Peppermint = White: it reminds me of those Brach’s Ice Blue mints, just a mild peppermint, which is pretty rare these days with all those curiously strong things around. Refreshing.
  •  

  • Clove = Yellow: as a candy purist, the universal color for clove is purple or lavender. Yellow is downright counterintuitive. All that aside, I thought it was nice. It has a good blend of the aromatic elements of clove along with the slight bitter volatile side. I’m not a big fan of clove, but this didn’t bother me when I ate it by accident. (Because they’re yellow!)
  •  

  • Spearmint = Green: the lightly translucent green had only a touch of spearmint, not quite as spicy as a good Spearmint Leaf, but still, a nice mellow bean that’s easy to keep eating.
  • Really, all that’s missing here is Licorice. But the Licorice beans were sold separately ... literally, in their own bag. There’s also a separate bag of Hot Tamales Cinnamon Jelly Beans, but that’s just silly! Hot Tamales are cinnamon jelly beans!

    The beans are traditional pectin thickened, many just use corn starch these days. But they’re not Kosher for Passover (but plain old Kosher). They’re also gluten free. I don’t know if these will be sold year round of if they are just a seasonal offering.

    Thanks to Rebecca on Flickr who helped me find these!

    Related Candies

    1. Hot Tamales Black Licorice Jelly Beans
    2. Gimbal’s Lavaballs
    3. Hot Tamales Ice
    4. Lifesavers Jellybeans
    5. Cadbury Dairy Milk Whispers
    6. Starburst and Jelly Belly Jelly Beans
    7. Hot Tamales and Hotter Tamales
    8. Jelly Belly - Full Line
    Name: Hot Tamales Spice Flavored Jelly Beans
      RATING:
    • 10 SUPERB
    • 9 YUMMY
    • 8 TASTY
    • 7 WORTH IT
    • 6 TEMPTING
    • 5 PLEASANT
    • 4 BENIGN
    • 3 UNAPPEALING
    • 2 APPALLING
    • 1 INEDIBLE
    Brand: Just Born
    Place Purchased: Albertson's (Los Feliz)
    Price: $1.50 (on sale)
    Size: 14 ounces
    Calories per ounce: 99
    Categories: Jelly, Mint, Cinnamon, United States, Just Born, Kosher, Easter

    POSTED BY Cybele AT 7:22 am    

    Wednesday, March 5, 2008

    Peeps inside a Milk Chocolate Egg

    Peeps Milk Chocolate EggThis is another one of those cool idea novelty Easter candies that just doesn’t have a name. Marshmallow Peeps inside a Milk Chocolate Egg just does not roll off a whiny child’s tongue in a desirable way. There is a little ribbon on the top of the box that says “Just Hatched”, so I think if they’d gone for something like Peeps Chocolate Egg Hatchlings or something, it might be a smidge more compelling.

    Names aside, it’s pretty easy to figure out what this is. It’s a solo yellow Peep inside a milk chocolate egg.

    The egg is wrapped in gold foil with a life-sized Peep in yellow. The egg has a little flat spot on the bottom of the larger end so it sits up rather easily, even without the clear plastic packaging.

    Peeps inside a Milk Chocolate Egg

    What I find rather fun about the Peep inside is that it’s an only child. Peeps in the larger broods always have at least one little joint where they’re in the row with their siblings. This one has no conjoining scars.

    The Peep is a little softer than I’m used to, perhaps the moist and nutritive atmosphere of a milk chocolate egg keeps it factory fresh. Still, it’s a Peep.

    The chocolate shell is thick and firm. It’s not great chocolate and includes real vanilla but PGPR. The chocolate is passable, not as good as the Russell Stover Bunny, and certainly not the See’s Hollow Eggs with Novelty or Lindt. The chocolate and Peeps combination is kind of fun, Peeps need a little something with them, if you ask me, but I’d like a stronger milk flavor to my chocolate in this case or something darker to offset the sugar crust.

    The foil is pretty thick and makes it easy to save at least half of the shell for later (the package says there’s two portions ... I’m not sure if they mean that you eat half of the Peep for each portion or not.

    It was a bit pricey at $2.99 for mediocre chocolate ($1.00 an ounce). I think you’re better off getting the classic Lindt Gold Bunny (and you get to choose milk, dark or white these days usually for about $1.00 an ounce) for about the same price and then just get a whole tray of Peeps.

    However, as a learning experience, if you have kids and want to talk to them about where birds come from, this is actually a pretty accurate little candy ... you know, there’s a tiny baby bird inside a chocolate shell. It’s absolutely better than giving live animals to a kid for Easter. (Don’t forget the Make Mine Chocolate campaign.)

    Related Candies

    1. Peeps Mash Ups - Savory
    2. Wonka Golden Egg
    3. Peeps Monster Mash Ups
    4. Peeps Mash Ups
    5. Peeps Spooky Cats & Cocoa Bunnies
    6. Peeps
    Name: Marshmallow Peeps inside a Milk Chocolate Egg
      RATING:
    • 10 SUPERB
    • 9 YUMMY
    • 8 TASTY
    • 7 WORTH IT
    • 6 TEMPTING
    • 5 PLEASANT
    • 4 BENIGN
    • 3 UNAPPEALING
    • 2 APPALLING
    • 1 INEDIBLE
    Brand: Peeps (Just Born)
    Place Purchased: Target (Glendale Galleria)
    Price: $2.99
    Size: 3 ounces
    Calories per ounce: 140
    Categories: Chocolate, Marshmallow, United States, Just Born, Peeps, Easter, Novelty

    POSTED BY Cybele AT 8:27 am    

    Wednesday, February 20, 2008

    Peeps Chick & Bunny Candy

    Chick & Bunny CandyI stumbled across these little Chick and Bunny Candy at the Dollar Tree in January and have been hanging onto them every since.

    Now it’s Easter season and time to trot out these cute little baby farm creatures. The package calls them Artificially Flavored Marshmallow candies, which doesn’t really explain them that well. Inside there are 10 little pouches that hold 9 or 10 candies in each.

    The candies come in two shapes: Chick & Bunny (could you have guessed?). They also come in four colors: yellow, lavender, fuschia and turquoise.

    DSC03054r

    They’re really cute. The colors are vibrant and actually go through and through, the insides are soft pastel versions of the exterior colors.

    Each is about the size of a Flintstone’s Chewable Vitamin, but happily tastes nothing like it. They’re not a compressed dextrose candy (like SweeTarts), these are made of sugar and corn syrup (like marshmallows, actually).

    They’re very crunchy and have a light marshmallow flavor. Marshmallow flavor? Well, it’s kind of like the lightest fake vanilla and light sugar. Kind of like a tasteless Altoid.

    Not really something I want to eat as a candy, but they are really cute and the bags are really tiny, so it’s an appropriate size indulgence. (Heck, each bag has only 36 calories.) They’re probably better as decorations ... on cupcakes ... scatter them around on the table or maybe in a mix of other candies. I suppose you could also use them for a Peeps Mash Up. They certainly maintain the Peeps appeal as being one primarily of appearance.

    Tulip PeepsJust Born raised a bit of a controversy last year when they introduced their Spooky Friends individually wrapped Halloween marshmallows. Instead of being manufactured in Bethlehem, PA, they were made in China. Though the company says that this is the first time they has outsourced their production, it’s not the first time that they’ve licensed their name. Flix introduced the Peeps Lollipop Rings & Slider Pops last year, which are also made in China, just as these are.

    Just Born also added new Tulip shaped Peeps to their line this spring.

    Related Candies

    1. Peeps Monster Mash Ups
    2. Peeps Mash Ups
    3. Peeps Lollipop Rings
    4. Peeps
    Name: Peeps Chick & Bunny Candy
      RATING:
    • 10 SUPERB
    • 9 YUMMY
    • 8 TASTY
    • 7 WORTH IT
    • 6 TEMPTING
    • 5 PLEASANT
    • 4 BENIGN
    • 3 UNAPPEALING
    • 2 APPALLING
    • 1 INEDIBLE
    Brand: Flix Candy (licensed from Just Born)
    Place Purchased: Dollar Tree (Harbor City)
    Price: $1.00
    Size: 3.5 ounces
    Calories per ounce: 103
    Categories: Chalk, China, FLIX Candy, Just Born, Peeps, Easter

    POSTED BY Cybele AT 1:19 pm    

    Thursday, November 15, 2007

    Peppermint Peep Stars

    Peppermint Peep Stars PackagePeeps have become a large brand unto themselves. A huge line of products that includes the familiar marshmallow and has even branched out into lollipops.

    Marshmallow purists probably don’t think much of flavored marshmallows, in fact I don’t usually care much for them beyond the kiss of honey or toasted sugar notes.

    But Peeps Peppermint Marshmallow Stars have changed that. They’re light, peppermint flavored marshmallows, just in time for Christmas.

    Peppermint Peep Stars

    The stars are very puffy and fluffy. The outer sugar coating seems to be well adhered, I’m guessing the flat surfaces have a lot to do with this. The whole marshmallow is peppermint flavored, rather strongly and the pink peppermint sparkle-flakes are also strong peppermint.

    If I had any complaints at all about these it’s that they didn’t get stale very easily. I opened a package last week and left it open, but the marshmallow is still rather soft and only slightly tacky. It gives it a nice chew, but I was hoping for something a little drier.

    I actually ate a whole tray of these.

    And then read the ingredients to see that they contain Sucralose and AceK. Sigh ... artificial sweeteners. (It said less than .5% of the candy was composed of these, but when sucralose is 600 times sweeter than sugar, they don’t need to put much in and it did shave 20 calories off the total for a serving compared to a regular Peep.) I felt really betrayed, though I can only blame myself for not reading the ingredients completely before eating them. (I did have a stomach ache for the rest of the morning, but that could have been caused by, well, eating a tray of marshmallows for breakfast or the ibuprofen I’ve been popping lately.) I thought they were really tasty and I would actually buy these and eat these again if they didn’t have those artificial sweeteners. I just have to ask ... why?

    I can’t figure out how to rate them now. I was all set to give them an 8 out of 10. For now I’m going to give them a 6 out of 10.

    Here’s X-Entertainment’s review and Candy Addict’s.

    Related Candies

    1. Peeps Monster Mash Ups
    2. Peeps Spooky Friends
    3. Peeps Mash Ups
    4. Peeps Lollipop Rings
    5. Frankford Marshmallow Hearts
    6. Peeps
    Name: Peeps Peppermint Marshmallow Stars
      RATING:
    • 10 SUPERB
    • 9 YUMMY
    • 8 TASTY
    • 7 WORTH IT
    • 6 TEMPTING
    • 5 PLEASANT
    • 4 BENIGN
    • 3 UNAPPEALING
    • 2 APPALLING
    • 1 INEDIBLE
    Brand: Just Born
    Place Purchased: samples from Just Born
    Price: 99 cents
    Size: 3.375 ounces
    Calories per ounce: 97
    Categories: Marshmallow, Mint, United States, Just Born, Peeps, Christmas

    POSTED BY Cybele AT 5:46 am    

    Wednesday, October 17, 2007

    Peeps Spooky Friends

    Peeps Spooky FriendsJust Born has been adding lots of new products lately. Usually it’s just a different color or shape on the regular Peeps line, but the Spooky Friends add a new element to the Peeps marshmallow line.

    What’s so different about them is that they’re individually wrapped. Oooh .... you know what that means? They’re not conjoined. There’s no little sticky spot where they’re separated from their row of quadruplicate siblings.

    It also opens up the possibility for some diversity in a single package. This bag of 54 individually wrapped Peeps has three different shapes: Googly-Eyed Green Mummy, Purple-Eyed Jack ‘o Lantern & Shrugging Ghost. (There are other mixes that have skeletons, bats and spiders.)

    image

    While I love the idea of being able to give out fun little sugar puffs to kids for Halloween, I feel like they may think it’s a practical joke when they try to get the little packets open. Let’s hope their parents let them have scissors, because that’s what I resorted to.

    I thought these would be the same as regular Peeps, and I happened to have some regular Easter Peeps around for comparison. Here’s what I found:

  • Spooky Friends taste like vanilla, regular Peeps taste like lightly toasted sugar.
  •  

  • Spooky Friends are not as fluffy and some are tacky & stiff. (Mostly the Ghost.)
  •  

  • Spooky Friends insides are colored, the Pumpkin is slightly peach and the Mummy is lightly green. (The Ghost is still white.)
  •  

  • Spooky Friends are smaller than regular Peeps. (This means that each has fewer calories though, at only 28 each instead of 32 for a conjoined Peep.)
  • The main thing that detracted from any recommendation for Spooky Friends is that they’re not as puffy and therefore do not work with Peeps Mash Ups as well. I rather liked the light vanilla flavor, but I missed the springly-lofty texture. They also didn’t seem to get stale as easily, but I’ve only had them for a week ... poking holes in each package in order to let them get dried out isn’t really that practical either. They have their selling points but they’re still not going to get a better rating than the original.

    At about 9 cents a marshmallow, they’re cheaper per item than the Frankford Marshmallow Pals, but they’re more expensive per ounce. Since they’re both made in China, I can’t see why you wouldn’t go for the more detailed Frankford Marshmallow Pals ... unless you don’t like coconut flavor.

    The package notes that Peeps are Gluten Free.

    UPDATE 10/31/2008: It does not appear that Just Born continued this product. I have not seen it for 2008.

    Related Candies

    1. GudFud Stuffed Marshmallows
    2. Peeps Mash Ups
    3. Peeps Lollipop Rings
    4. Peeps Spooky Cats & Cocoa Bunnies
    Name: Peeps Spooky Friends
      RATING:
    • 10 SUPERB
    • 9 YUMMY
    • 8 TASTY
    • 7 WORTH IT
    • 6 TEMPTING
    • 5 PLEASANT
    • 4 BENIGN
    • 3 UNAPPEALING
    • 2 APPALLING
    • 1 INEDIBLE
    Brand: Just Born
    Place Purchased: KMart (Park LaBrea)
    Price: $4.99 (on sale)
    Size: 14.25 ounces
    Calories per ounce: 104
    Categories: Marshmallow, China, Just Born, Peeps, Halloween

    POSTED BY Cybele AT 6:27 am    

    Page 5 of 7 pages ‹ First  < 3 4 5 6 7 > 

    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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