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Rite AidFriday, July 20, 2007
Ratatouille Pocket Slider LollipopThere are a lot of marketing tie ins between movies and candy. Some of them work really well and some seem rather strange. I’m going to put these little Ratatouille Rat Racers Pocket Slider Lollipops in that category. Ratatouille is a new movie from Pixar/Disney that stars a rat (named Remy) who wants to be a chef. But, you know, he’s a rat. And in this world he can’t talk to humans. He has a brother named Emile, who is less discriminating about his culinary tastes. These little candy pops are simply a hard candy cylinder housed in a little slider topped with a toy. In this case the toy is a little plastic model of one of the characters with a wide steel wheel on the bottom for racing. As a little toy, the racers are kind of fun. They’re slippery and move easily. The detail on them is pretty good, though I can’t figure out why they’re racing around on cheese or petit fours. But that’s simply my lack of imagination. The two flavors I picked up were Blue Raspberry and Green Apple. They’re both rather tart and have a good chemical, manufactured artifical flavor (kind of like computer animation!). As a candy, I’ve certainly had better hard candy in better flavors. The little toy roller cars are certainly better than a Happy Meal (TM) prize, but limited in their appeal. The retractable lolly is a nice idea, especially for kids who may want to space out their enjoyment of this marginal treat. The same company who makes these also did the similarly branded Peeps Pops. (I reviewed the ring ones and Jeanna at Wisconsin Candy Dish reviewed the slider pops that are pretty much the same as these.) They’re made in China, which at this moment doesn’t make me feel very good ... expect for the fact that I didn’t finish these. I just ate enough of each to get the flavor. Related Candies
POSTED BY Cybele AT 8:42 am Friday, July 13, 2007
Baby Bottle Pacifier TartsThere are some candies that are placed very low on the shelves at drug stores and grocers for a reason, they’re appealing to little people. And until I started shopping the bottom shelf, there was a lot of stuff that never even entered my candy radar. This little baby bottle filled with compressed dextrose tarts is one such candy. It’s made by a small company called Imperial Toy and they haven’t even bothered to name the product. So I’m just going to call them Baby Bottle Pacifier Tarts. Once I took off the clear plastic shrink wrap, there’s no branding on here at all. The little bottle is an actual toy baby bottle, complete with a rubber nipple with a hole in it, so as to make a mess with your little baby doll that actually drinks, or maybe it doesn’t. (Here’s a tip, don’t put actual milk in your doll that actually drinks. It’s fun at first, but then your doll smells like spoiled milk.) The bottle holds 1.5 ounces of candy, so it’s a nice size and of course refillable with candy or kids can use it as a toy bottle for their dolls. The candies come in cherry, orange, lemon, lime and ... um, I think the blue one is pineapple. The little compressed dextrose candies are cute, a great size an the pacifier shape is nicely done. The flavor isn’t very strong, certainly not as strong as SweeTarts. I’d liken these to Smarties, but perhaps a little harder and a little more flavorful (well, and a little more colorful). I think these are called “Oh Baby! Pacifier Candy” and made in Canada by Concord Confections. I’ve seen them in bulk at candy stores and advertised as a favor-filler on sites that specialize in baby shows and the like. Since you can buy them in bulk, I suppose you can make your own little filled favors for parties. Since this was $1.09 at the drug store, it may be a less expensive way to go. (Concord also makes the super-fun Candy Blox.) As a novelty item, this doesn’t really do much for me, but then again I don’t recall actually having a doll when I was a girl (I know I must have had one, but I don’t remember her ... I remember my sister had that doll that grew her long blonde hair when you pushed a button on her tummy). I see this as more of a “favor” item or stocking stuffer. As a candy container, it’s cute but of course once you take it out of its plastic wrap, it doesn’t work very well to keep moisture out because there’s a hole in the nipple.
POSTED BY Cybele AT 6:26 am Thursday, July 5, 2007
Sour Patch KidsSour Patch Kids were developed in 1970s by a candy sales manager named Frank Galatolie who was chasing the sour fad. They were first Martians, to take advantage with the consumer fascination with all things space related. They were later changed to little children and called Sour Patch Kids (to capitalize on the Cabbage Patch Kids fad) and introduced in the US in 1985. A lot of the super sour items from that time period are long gone, so who could have expected that some sour sanded Swedish Fish would be so enduring? Sour Patch Kids are now made by Cadbury Adams in Canada. Sour Patch Kids are a soft jelly candy sanded with a sweet & sour coating. The candies are supposedly in the shape of little frizzy haired kids. They look rather like little feet to me or maybe rabbits with very puffy tails. Sour Patch Kids come in the traditional four flavors they always have: Raspberry (red), Lime (green), Orange (orange) and Lemon (yellow). Yes, these are also the same flavors as the Swedish fish array that Cadbury Adams makes. They’re billed as “Sour then Sweet” and it’s true. Some folks like to suck the sour coating off, which makes them bitingly sour (with an odd salty tang to it as well) but I prefer to chew mine, to combine the sour and sweet and get a little flavor at the same time. Though the flavors aren’t really that strong, as is the same with Swedish Fish, Sour Patch Kids are good whether they’re soft and fresh or hard and tacky. I don’t buy them often, but they’re a good “keep me interested” candy, which is great for movies, traveling or a little munching while at work. I see adults eating them as often as kids, which is nice that there’s a sour candy that generations can share. Note: there’s a little fad going on YouTube where kids collect the sour sand from candies like Sour Patch Kids, Sour Skittles or Pixy Stix and then snort it. Please, don’t do this. It really hurts ... you’re not gonna get high, but you’ll probably make some silly faces and your friends will laugh at you. There’s a reason our tastebuds are on our tongues and not in our sinuses. Sour Patch Kids are meant to be ingested orally ... not nasally. PSA over. Sour Patch Kids contain no gelatin (they’re a jelly candy that uses corn starch as a jelling agent) and use all artificial colorings so they’re suitable for vegetarians. There’s no word in the label about gluten status.
POSTED BY Cybele AT 6:45 am Friday, June 29, 2007
Hot Tamales IceSometimes I wonder why candy availability is so screwy. Take the Elvis Reese’s Cups, you can get them in some stores now even though they’re not supposed to be out until Saturday, July 7 ... but why do some have them now and why not all of them? A few months ago Wisconsin Candy Dish reviewed the new Hot Tamales Ice, and even mentioned that they’d been around since January. Well, I’ve been lookin’, and lookin’. Finally at the strange RiteAid trip this week I found them (along with the Elvis Reese’s Cups and the Dark Chocolate Peanut M&Ms). They were only available in the theater sized box and the ticket on the shelf said $1.29, but it rung up at 99 cents (another reason to think that this RiteAid is screwy). The candies are rather pretty. They’re kind of translucent, light blue with some white speckles. They’re shaped just like Hot Tamales or Mike and Ike, which is a little rod shape that for some reason is a little bigger on one end than the other. The little rods are like jelly beans, if you’ve never had Hot Tamales. These are spearmint flavored ... quite strong spearmint. They’re pleasant and refreshing, and rather unlike jelly beans. They remind me a lot of Spearmint Leaves, which are one of those odd candies that I’ve had cravings for all my life. There’s something about hitting a mint spot (a concentration of the mint flavor) that must release endorphins in my brain or something. Of course I also associate the smell of spearmint with toothpaste, so while they’re tasty to eat, the smell in the car after leaving them there in the sun is rather like a cleaning the bathroom sink of that crust of toothpaste dribbles and beard whiskers when I was in college and shared that one bathroom apartment with four guys for a summer. This might explain why I chose a cinnamon-flavored toothpaste when I bought a new tube. Have I digressed enough? Well, it’s a big box. I could talk about how silly the name is ... why not just call them Cool Tamales, or Ice Tamales or maybe even Mike and Ice? I like the packaging otherwise, the blue box is certainly easy to spot. I don’t know if they’re an ideal movie candy though, not like Hot Tamales. But certainly less messy than those sugar-sanded jelly Spearmint Leaves. One Hot Tamale Ice has 7 calories. There’s no statement on the box about gluten or nuts. Previous Hot Tamales review here. UPDATE 8/1/2007: No wonder I wanted to call them Cool Tamales! There was a product made by Just Born back in the day that was a spearmint jelly rod. They were called Cool Kids (but green instead of blue).
POSTED BY Cybele AT 9:55 am Thursday, June 28, 2007
Altoids Chocolate Dipped Ginger MintsAbout six months ago I got to preview the new Chocolate Covered Altoids. They were tasty, but I never found myself gobbling them up. At the RiteAid the other night I finally found the missing piece to the trio of flavors: Ginger. I don’t know why they were so hard to find, believe me, I looked just about everywhere locally. Now, I’ve heard that the ginger ones are bad. But I like Ginger ... I love Ginger ... do you think I will love Chocolate Dipped Ginger Altoids? They’re woodsy, spicy and strong. The chocolate flavor only stands up to the ginger for a moment, then backs away and gives the normally chalky candy some texture. I’ve had them on my desk for about 24 hours and they’re pretty much gone. I’ve gobbled them up. Sure they’re burning me up, but sometimes I just like that in a candy. They’re a little expensive, too expensive for me to have them more than sometimes. I think I’d like them in Liquorice as well ... but I doubt that’s gonna happen any time soon. As with other Altoids, these contain gelatin and are not suitable for vegetarians. The are also manufactured on equipment that processes milk, wheat & nuts (tree & pea).
POSTED BY Cybele AT 10:18 am Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Dark Chocolate Peanut M&MsA couple of week’s ago I saw a mention on the All Candy Expo website that M&Ms was introducing Dark Chocolate Peanut M&Ms on July 1st. I couldn’t find anything else about it though ... expect the commercial that’s running for Dark Chocolate M&Ms ... have you seen it? It’s themed on the Addam’s Family. The curious part is that only Uncle Fester and Pugglsey are regular shaped, the rest of the family is Peanut. The M&Ms website makes no mention of the peanut version as of this date. I can kind of shrug it off, except for the fact that I actually found them on sale at RiteAid last night. Well, of course I bought them! Dark Chocolate Peanut M&Ms were introduced a couple of years ago as a themed promotion for Star Wars and called Darth Mix. I never got to try them (just the plain ones, which were also introduced as a regular version). First, Peanut M&Ms are not my favorite. They’re kind of in the middle of the pack, I enjoy them but I find that they’re a bit uneven in quality, I really don’t like the Russian Roulette of getting a bad peanut. A regular Peanut M&M single-serve package contains 1.74 ounces. The Dark Chocolate version contains 1.5 ounces. Do you think that’s exactly the milk content difference? Hardly, there’s plenty of milk in here ... lactose and milkfat are both ingredients, so this isn’t really dark chocolate. They’re dark, that’s for sure. They crunch the same but the combination of peanut and dark chocolate is quite, well, dark. It’s a bit bitter, it’s a bit smoky, in fact, the whole thing reminded me of peanuts and molasses more of peanuts and chocolate. The colors are nice and there’s no indication that these are dark on the shell (the plain dark ones have the occasional “dark” stamp on them). Overall, they were just a little too “dark” for me. It’s not that they weren’t sweet, they were just too bitter. Read up on all the other M&M coverage.
POSTED BY Cybele AT 6:39 am Thursday, May 31, 2007
Starburst Sours (New)Just when I think I’m done, I get pulled back in again! I thought I’d reviewed all the Starburst on the market today when I saw that the Starburst Sour have new flavors. It’s not like I was that thrilled with the original set of flavors in the Starburst Sour array, so the new ones might be better. As luck would have it I picked up the new flavors, then saw the original flavors at the 99 Cent Only Store. Before you go thinking that this will be a redux of the LifeSavers, both of these products are fresh. Original Starburst Sour were manufactured in June of 2006 with an expiration of 8/2007. New Starburst Sour were manufactured in December 2006. (Curious how I know this, check out What Does that Mars Code Mean?) Here’s the flavor breakout: Sour Tangerine (was Orange) - I really had to work hard on this one. The wrappers were the exact same shade of orange and the candies were the exact same shade of orange. I had to admit that the new Sour Tangerine was different from the orange. It had a “high note” of orange and tartness that just wasn’t in the original. I can’t say I prefer one over the other, but I’m glad there’s something citrus in there. Sour Green Apple (was Cherry) - I was pretty surprised that this wasn’t in the original mix. It’s definitely a synthetic sour apple taste, but it’s quite intense and of course sour. It has some nice real apple juice notes to balance it out, especially as the chew goes on. Sour Strawberry (was Grape) - While I enjoy a sassy tart and crispy apple and even a juicy tangerine, I have a hard time with sour strawberries, as they’re so much better when they’re sweet and ripe. It smelled like strawberry - a cross between summer flowers and cotton candy. The chew though, was a little less pleasant. It was sour but it didn’t match up with the flavor, it was like a blind date that was going horribly, uncomfortably wrong. It made me break out in a sweat twice, not because it was too sour, perhaps because of the red food coloring. I didn’t eat the third one in the mix. Sour Blue Raspberry (same) - still an insane blue, still an unnatural flavor for food. Tart and a little on the lime side, a little bitter/dry aftertaste that I kind of liked it this time around. Overall, I prefer the much more rounded flavors of the classic Starburst. I can see these being a nice change of pace and if I were doing more bike riding or running where I wanted a little something to get rid of dry mouth, this might be the stuff because they’re so portable and of course a good variety in every pack. Some of our wheat sensitive friends will be happy to hear that the new packaging now says that New Flavors Starburst Sour are Gluten Free (please make sure that your package says that if you’re gluten intolerant since the old flavor set does not say that!). Related Candies
POSTED BY Cybele AT 6:09 am Wednesday, May 2, 2007
Skittles (Fruits, Wild Berry, Tropical, Smoothies & Sour)Skittles are insanely tasty little morsels. Rather like little bits of Starburst covered in a candy shell. Skittles were first introduced in 1974 in the UK and parts of Europe. They spread to the States as an import for a while and then in 1981 Mars began making them in the States. Obsessive folks (perhaps I’m one of them and speaking from experience) like to divide up the colors and eat them. I usually eat mine in pairs of same flavors, but when it comes down to the end of the pack, there are certain acceptable combos (all the citruses can be paired and grape and strawberry can go together ... strawberry and lemon are also acceptable but never ever put orange and grape together). Original Fruit Skittles While the Skittles website asserts that the flavor distribution is random, I’ve always felt that there were fewer green and purple ones in most bags. But as you can see from the photo, it’s just the green ones that seemed slighted in this mix (and I’m not going to complain). I took copious photos of all of the bags as well, so if you’re curious they’re here. You might want to partake of some of my favorite Skittles commercials: Man with Beard, Skittles Leak, this one is from the previous campaign (one that I think captures a bit of the wonder of candy and magic better) and the original with great costumes ... oh, wait, those aren’t costumes, that’s what we used to wear back in the day. Wild Berry Skittles These have been around for a long time, but I never really noticed them. I never saw a reason to get anything other than the regular Skittles. All of the flavors were great. Sure I ate the grape ones last, if at all (always share!), but they were one of those candies you can eat in a dark movie theater without having to spit out mistakes. Wild Berry Skittles come in a super purple pack, so there’s no mistaking them at the store (not like the M&M Pirate Pearls and M&M Almond). The colors look vaguely familiar, but without the vibrant orange and yellow. Instead they have a mousy pink in the mix which just makes them feel bland.
Not enough of these flavors are actually berries and berries as a mix aren’t that interesting to me. Rating: 6 out of 10 Tropical Skittles As I was looking through a bunch of old commercials for Skittles online I realized that this was another flavor mix that I completely ignored. However, part of that may be that the flavors were different back then. The original mix of Tropical Skittles included two different flavors: Passion Punch (Blue), Mango Peach (Orange), Strawberry Watermelon (Pink), the new flavors are noted with an *.
I loved the look of these spread out on the table but again the proportion of “tasty” ones was too small to warrant buying the whole bag. (How long before Skittles goes the way of M&Ms and you can special order flavor mixes?) Rating: 6 out of 10 Smoothie Mix Skittles I’m not sure if a consumer wrote to Skittles and said, “I love your chewy little morsels, but could you make them with less flavor? I just can’t take it.” And of course being capitalists wishing to capitalize on all corners of the untapped Skittles market, they did. Smoothies in real life are great. They’re like shakes only made with lots and lots of fruit. At least when I make them that’s how they taste. Some folks put yogurt or ice cream or sherbet in there, so I guess that’s where the watering-down of the flavor comes from.
These are just too bland. Maybe if I’d just come out of a coma these would be good for easing me back into the world ... or might put me back into a vegetative state. Rating: 5 out of 10 UPDATE: Smoothies are discontinued. Sour Skittles While all the other bags were virtually identical in format (same size and weight and materials) this bag is different. It’s a little shorter than the others and made with a much thicker plastic (that’s annoyingly hard to open). I’m guessing it’s because these are rather different Skittles. Instead of all the sour being locked up under that candy shell, here it’s on the outside of the shell in a sparkly sanded coating.
The chew towards the end on all of these seemed grainier than usual. I don’t mind that as a feature though. I don’t like how messy these are. I like to line up my Skittles on my desk in little lines of each color as I dump small amounts out. These leave a dusting of sour on the desk. A word of caution as well, don’t ever get the sour powder in your eyes. It’s also very easy to just suck the sour off the outside, though it tastes the same on all of them, it also seems to lead to more tongue damage. UPDATE: The flavors changed, here’s a re-review. Rating: 7 out of 10 Other products: Notes: Related Candies
POSTED BY Cybele AT 8:04 am |
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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