While I’m partial to Pocky, I’m trying to open up and try a few of the other dipped cookie sticks from Japan. Last week it was Yan Yan, this week I bring you Lucky Mini Almond Black.

These petite little sticks of chocolate flavored biscuit stucks are covered with a mix of dark chocolate and crushed almonds. Like Pocky, there’s a little bit of uncovered stick so you can grab it and not worry about melting the chocolate as you nibble.

The package holds a brown plastic tray with two sections filled with the sticks. Each stick is about 2.5” long. There are plenty of almonds and it’s got a good mellow crunch to the biscuit without being too sweet.

The ingredients have some oddities, including things like “cheese powder” and “cream powder” but these definitely have no hint of the cheesiness of the Yan Yan.

Overall, as a nuttier version of Pocky, this is pretty good. I actually like the high ratio of chocolate and nuts and the slightly flavored biscuit. It’s no Men’s Pocky, but it’s a great afternoon snack that doesn’t feel too decadent.

While on that fateful trip to Pennsylvania in February I picked up some Mallo Cups. How could I not? They’re made right there in Altoona by the Boyer Candy Co. Soon, I will have tasted all the marshmallow cups there are. Boyer is known for cup candies, they also have the Smoothie Peanut Butter Cup, which has a devoted following.

The Mallo Cup is the East Coast version of the Cup-o-Gold which consists of a milk chocolate cup filled with marshmallow (of differing consistencies) and a little coconut on the top.

The coconut smell is quite apparent when raising the cup to the mouth. The chocolate is sweet and very creamy with the coconut bits providing a chewy texture. The marshmallow center is soft and runny, but not too flowing as to make a mess.

Like the Valomilk, the Mallo Cup suffers from some structural integrity issues - in this case the chocolate base is too thin, so I was not able to remove either cup in my package from the paper without leaving some chocolate behind - basically bottoming out. (If you look closely at the photo, which you can click to enlarge, you’ll see that there is no base at all as I wasn’t able to peel it off for the photo. Maybe refrigeration would help.) The marshmallow itself has a nice flavor and consistency - it’s not at all foamy but not viscous or grainy like some others marshmallows. It doesn’t have any perceptible flavor of its own so I came away with more of a chocolate/coconut vibe.

I liked it quite a bit better than the Cup-O-Gold, I liked the sweetness of the chocolate, nutty scent of the coconut and mellow filling and the proportions seem better balanced (the Cup-O-Gold seemed to be too much chocolate and of course was single cup in a package).

The unique selling proposition of the Boyer Candies, though, is the “Play Money Rebate Offer”. The tray in the Mallo Cup package is actually a coupon advertising their rebate program - save up 500 Points and you can get a $1.00 rebate. Each Mallo Cup tray is worth 5 points. Yes, you get a dollar for every 100 Mallo Cups you buy! The points are also good for other merchandise such as candy tins, sweatshirts, mugs and caps. I have no idea how long they’ve been doing this, but the copyright notice on the package says 1983.

Other opinions: Writers/Artists Snacking at Work gave it a 7.5, Candy Wrapper Museum just doesn’t like marshmallow, Taquitos.net thinks it smells like coconut and finally, read about the long road back for the Mallo Cup production line.

Related Candies

1. Melster Marshmallow Eggs
2. Mallow Blast
3. Boyer Smoothie
4. The Saga of the Valomilk - Review
5. The Mysterious Cup-O-White Gold

Lifesavers are known for being highly-flavored hard candies. If there were a candy model that Jelly Belly might have gone off of, it was probably Lifesavers - here is a hard candy, a little smaller than usual, but super-flavored and in a huge variety. Lifesavers got into the gummi game a while ago and I tried them when they first came out, but didn’t think much of them. I decided to revisit them, especially since they changed the flavors out on the five flavor tray.

The 5 Flavor variety bears little resemblance to the hard candy rolls that have been around since 1934. The flavors in this roll are Cherry (an original flavor), Watermelon, Green Apple, Blackberry and Strawberry. No orange, no lemon, no pineapple. Drat! The candies are much larger than the hard version, they’re soft, if a little greasy on the outside to prevent sticking and are positioned upright on a clear plastic tray inside the wrapper.

The Cherry is just as you’d expect it, great woodsy cherry flavor with a good tart bite. I’m not fond of cherry flavored stuff, but I actually find Lifesavers rather acceptable, probably because the flavor doesn’t seem as artificial as many others. The Green Apple, the lighter of the two green flavors, is rather mild, not too sour but good overall flavor. Watermelon is a darker green and bears little resemblance to real watermelon flavor but has a nice tart bite to it without that overwhelming fragrance that many watermelon candies have. Strawberry was a bit disappointing. It was sweet and had only the slightest hint of a berry flavor to it. I’d tell you about the Blackberry, but this roll had none. I think they’re dark purple. I’ll hazard that it’s the same blackberry flavor in the Wild Berries below.

The Wild Berry mix held more promising flavor for my tastes: Cherry Berry, Strawberry, Red Raspberry, Black Raspberry, Blackberry and White Grape.

The colors are a little bland, but I guess when you’re making a dozen different flavors you’re going to run out of primary and secondary colors. The White Grape was my favorite. Soft and delicate, it’s just a bit tart and has none of that artificial grape note that I only seem to like in Tootsie Pops and SweeTarts.  The Cherry Berry was remarkably similar to the Cherry in the 5 Flavor, but I’m not complaining. The Blackberry is the only one that seemed opaque, a lustrous dark purple it was tart and fragrant but hardly had a flavor different from the other berries. The Strawberry was the same as above. The rather lavender looking one was, I think, Black Raspberry. It was sweet and tart like the others and much more perfumed, as raspberries tend to be. The lightest red one was probably Red Raspberry and was similar to the Black Raspberry one, but perhaps a little tarter.

The good thing about this mix is that the flavors all blend together well, you can eat them one after another without the flavors fighting or combine them if you’re so inclined.

I like to eat gummies when my throat is bothering me, and I’m just getting over a cold (so if my tasting is a little off, it’s some sort of leftover malaise). They’re soothing and not too sour, so I don’t have to worry about burning my tongue like I often do on my overdoses of SweeTarts. I bought these in a Christmas Storybook on an after-holiday clearance for 98 cents ... so I certainly got my money’s worth for five packages of these.

While these flavors all have merit, I’d really like to have my favorite Lifesavers flavors - Lemon, Orange, Tangerine, Banana, Pina Colada and Pineapple. Actually, I’d be game if they wanted to try a Butter Rum gummi, too!

I’m not an energy drink person and I’m not one to start popping caffeine pills either. So what am I to do when I need a little pick-me-up?

A friend of ours who travels in Italy every year suggested Pocket Coffee! Basically it’s chocolate-covered Italian coffee. Because the sweet coffee center is concentrated, it only takes three chocolates to equal a single shot of espresso. Our friends like to get them for traveling as it’s more portable that hot coffee but has the same side effect. I’ve heard that it’s very popular with students, truck drivers and folks on night shifts.

Ferrero is a well-known Italian chocolate brand even here in the United States, with the elegant little Rochers and Nutella as their best-known products. In fact, I’ve never seen Pocket Coffee anywhere in the US before, but not for lack of trying. They’re not even made in the summer, so as a seasonal item it’s likely that getting one out of season means that it’s no longer fresh. But a no-so-fresh Pocket Coffee is just a different experience.

The candy is composed of a syrupy espresso center, then a light sugar crystal shell and then the chocolate. As the candies age the sugar shell will actually grow, taking sugar from the espresso syrup center to create a bigger shell. The ones I tried were a little old (purchased last fall) so they had the extra crystallized shell.

The coffee center is very sweet but smooth with a slightly acidic bite to it. The crystals provide a kind of funky crunch to it, but melt easily if you’re inclined that way. The chocolate is not too sweet and gives a good creamy boost to the whole mix. On the whole the candy is very sweet, a little too sweet for my tastes, but then again, it’s coffee candy. I’m not saying that I won’t eat it again ... though they are messy. If you’re driving, you’re obligated to pop the whole thing in your mouth but if you’re not, feel free to experiment with biting off a corner and sucking out the coffee first.

Finding them in the states may mean ordering online. They’re still being stocked at Capriflavors.com.

JoeD at Slashfood beat me to the punch on this review last week and David Lebovitz has a haiku you might enjoy.

If only Cadbury Creme Eggs had a coffee version!

A few weeks ago I was fortunate enough to participate in the tasteEverything Independent Food Awards, I was thrilled to see the other awards given. But the first one that I made an effort to get a hold of was the Sahagun Salted Caramels. Since I’m not going to get to Portland anytime soon, my husband mentioned it to friends there and they went right out and bot

bought me some (and some for themselves)!

I’m not quite sure what they all are, but I had to start with the caramels, which I knew were the tall ones with the nuts on top because the one in the back was actually broken in shipping. These are fantastic! The chocolate is smooth and mellow and the caramel filling is unlike most other caramels I’ve ever had. It was dark and complex, with quite a bit of salt in it and a gooey but not flowing texture. I hesitate to say that it was jelly-like or custard-like, but it definitely wasn’t quite caramel. The crunch of the hazelnut on top brings all the textures together.

The real find is that amorphous blob there on the right. I had no idea what it was going to be. It was a dark chocolate shell with a white chocolate coconut center. It’s hard to describe. Instead of the drab sweet center of a Mounds bar, this is a delicate and mild buttery base filled with soft and chewy coconut. I have never experienced coconut like this before.

The coffee truffle (not pictured) was shaped like a big button and dusted with cocoa and very smooth and soft a very strong coffee flavor. It wasn’t sweet at all, just like a cup of coffee without sugar would be. It was quite a refreshing change from many of the “too sweet” Easter candies I’ve been gorging on.

The other sphere there on the left, that’s dusted with a luster powder, is a plain chocolate truffle. Like the coffee one, it wasn’t sugary at all, except this one has a chocolate shell, which adds a touch of sweetness. The center is buttery and dense and quite satisfying.

The little medallions of chocolate we also dusted with that luster powder. I find it a little unappealing, like someone spilled their eyeshadow on my candy. But it doesn’t taste like anything that I can tell. (I know these edible lusters are quite trendy now, but it you haven’t already guess, I’m not really the trendy sort.) The coins were simply dark chocolate and it gave me an opportunity to experience the chocolate used in all of these creations on its own. It’s mellow and only slightly sweet with a dry, bitter bite towards the end, as plain eating chocolate is quite nice, but it really shines when used in combination with the other ingredients here.

The last item I didn’t even take a photo of, it was a what I thought was a nut bark. Oh, I should have known that it wasn’t going to be run of the mill. I have no idea what it’s called, but it’s dark chocolate with spicy corn nuts. The salty, extra crunchy and slight burn of the corn nuts went really well with the chocolate. It hardly felt like a sweet at all, but was entirely satisfying and possibly addictive. Of course it’s probably a good thing

From everything I’ve heard the best part about Sahagun is visiting the shop, so if you’re in Portland, OR, make a point of it. They’re at 10 N.W. 16th Ave. You can read more in this interview at Portland Food and Drink.

On one of my recent visits to Mitsuwa, the local Japanese grocery chain, I found this. Even the woman at the checkout thought it was cool.

Basically it’s a blister pack of M&M-style candies. The disc is the size of a regular CD with a larger hole in the middle. The candy coated treats aren’t quite real chocolate, there’s a large amount of vegetable oil in there in addition to the cocoa butter, so I knew before I even got them home that they wouldn’t really rival M&Ms or the fantastic seasonal Hershey’s Candy Coated Eggs.

Still, the sherbet colored candies and super-sealed individuality was compelling. My low expectations were completely met. The candies are well made, the shells are smooth and consistent but freakishly slippery. The taste is sweet and crunchy with a mild chocolatey taste, but of course the texture of the actual chocolate is rather lost.

I suppose blister packs for little candies is extra-hygienic, but I found that just as many of the candies wound up bouncing around and onto the floor as I tried to pop them out through the foil. It’s a fun novelty item, but in my mind if you’re going to go through the trouble of wrapping them up like this, at least do it with something of value.

Note: There are 26 candies in the disc.

A few weeks ago I posted about the darn tasty Milky Way Crispy Rolls from Germany. And of course they’re not available here, but luckily reader TheMatt pointed me to these:

I didn’t see them in milk chocolate, though I doubt that’s the version I would have picked up anyway. They were hidden away in the grocery candy aisle all the way down near the mixed nuts. The package hails that each stick has less than 100 calories (90 each, actually) but the small print underneath that says “not a low calorie food.” Yeah, each stick is also less than two thirds of an ounce. I find an ounce or an ounce and a quarter makes a good portion for me when I’m looking for a little sweet. So I’d be eating two of these. Still, at 180 calories that’d be a nice respite and still not the full 300 I budget for a day’s sweets.

Anyway, I digress from the real topic, which is these little crispy sticks. What we have here is a little tube of crispy, bland cookie - think ice cream cone - filled with a firm chocolate cream. The whole thing smells very sweet and a little like cereal. The chocolate isn’t spectacular. It’s sweet but smooth. The real fun is the flaky tube of cookie which is mostly texture and provides a nice crisp and of course acts as a container for the chocolate cream. The center cream is nice, it’s sweet and smooth and a little buttery.

On the whole, this isn’t the same as the Milky Way Crispy Rolls, but they’re certainly nice. If I were to have any chocolate cookie snack I wanted without regard to trans fats, it’d be the Lu Chocolatiers, but these are far superior in their portability. They’re pretty expensive as non-gourmet candy goes, so keep your eye out for sales if you fall in love with them.

A long time ago, when I was a little kid, my sister and I would be given two dimes each and were allowed to walk down to the corner store with other children in the neighborhood. (This was back when candy bars were only 20 cents

15 cents each.) But even at the tender age of four or five I realized that there were better values out there in the candy world than the standard candy bar. One of those things was penny & nickel candy. These were either junior versions of regular sized candies or special small morsels, like lollipops, Bit-o-Honey, Jawbreakers, Mary Janes and Tootsie Rolls.

I was especially fond of a candy called Sugar Mama. It was part of the Sugar family which was headed by the excellent Sugar Daddy and included the wee Sugar Babies. The Sugar Mama was a chocolate covered Sugar Daddy. I often got Sugar Mamas because they were the best of both worlds - the intense caramel flavor plus the chocolatey coating that made it feel more like a candy bar. Sugar Mamas, like Sugar Daddys, were pretty big and because they were softer than a regular hard candy lollipop, they were more interactive. This starts with an impression of the roof of my mouth, then slowly shaving off the chocolate with my teeth and then twirling and pulling the naked, softened caramel into shapes. It was a pretty good way to spend a nickel.

Of course they don’t make Sugar Mamas anymore and Nabisco sold the Sugar family to Tootsie back in the mid-nineties. Sugar Babies, though, continue to be produced and are actually easier to find than Sugar Daddies (there were also Sugar Daddy Nuggets at one time which were divine in their own right). They’re fine little caramel bits unlike anything else on the market because they’re panned - I’m guessing with a layer of sugar or caramel or something to make a smooth shell that turns grainy when you chew it.

I haven’t had a Sugar Daddy in years, and I guess part of it is a fear of losing dental work. I’ve never actually hurt my teeth that way (though I once lost a filling eating scrambled eggs), but it’s a huge fear and I figure better safe than sorry.

My favorite way to eat regular Sugar Babies is to soften them up by putting the package into my pocket or just holding a few of them in the palm of my hand for a while. This is especially important when I get the really stale ones.

Now, on to the product at hand ... it seems that Tootsie is getting into the limited edition racket and has introduced Chocolate Covered Sugar Babies. Now some of you might think that this is the same thing as Milk Duds. First, chocolate coating aside, a Milk Dud doesn’t quite have that caramelized sugar taste to them (they’re more milky) and they don’t quite have the same graininess towards the end of the chew. The thing that surprised me most about these was that they’re actually fully formed Sugar Babies under the chocolate ... I thought maybe the Sugar Baby wouldn’t have the candy shell on it on the inside. This makes the little candy a bit hard and the option of warming them first is kind of gone because of the mess that ensues by holding a piece of chocolate in the palm of your hand for a few minutes.

The chocolate coating is pretty good, much better, in my opinion than a Milk Dud and they’re certainly pretty looking when I dumped them out of the box. There’s a slight cinnamon hint to the whole candy and they combine well once it all warms up. However, I still prefer the plain old Sugar Babies. It was a good effort and I’m glad they tried it, but I don’t need them to add this to the line permanently but if I were going to the movies, this would be a good option (I bet they taste great with popcorn).

Thanks to Joanna at SugarSavvy for pointing out their existence!