Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Gimbal’s Cherry Lovers

Gimbal's Cherry LoversI’m the wrong person to review the new Gimbal’s Cherry Lovers but I’ll do my best.

I’m not generally keen on cherry flavors, but I do love real cherries and I’m generally a fan of Gimbal’s products. This bag of little heart shaped jelly bean type objects boast nine different cherry flavors plus vitamin C and real cherry juice. Gimbal’s makes their candies in the USA in a factory that’s Kosher, peanut free, tree nut free, dairy free, gluten free, gelatin free and soy free. So for allergic folks these are pretty special. (Sorry vegans, though the colors are artificial they do use beeswax and confectioners glaze.)

Gimbal's Cherry Lovers

They’re drop dead gorgeous. A riot of reds, pinks and purples they seem to go beyond the frilly satin hearts of the season. They’re a little rustic because each heart is unique and not quite perfect.

Wild Cherry - plain red - you know, cherry. Tart, sweet, floral and deep woodsy notes. But not quite that good. The medicine flavors are kept pretty faint here.

Cherry Vanilla - white with red speckles - like a cherry marshmallow, mostly a soft flavor with a strong fake vanilla flavor to it. Pretty much pleasant.

Black Cherry - deep red - tastes mostly like red. The cherry flavor is pretty intense as far as these hearts go, more on the woodsy side compared to the Bing Cherry.

Chocolate Cherry - brown - oh, this is quite a tragic flavor, not quite cherry and mostly empty cocoa flavors. It’s like a very bad Cherry Tootsie Pop.

Cherry Cheesecake - pink with red speckles - a tangier version of the Cherry Vanilla, this one had a yogurty twang to it and but still a marshmallowy flavor.

Cherry Daiquiri - deep pink with red speckles - this one was rather fun, kind of a lime and vanilla with a hint of cherry cough syrup. A little bit like aftershave though.

Bing Cherry - lighter red -  Tangy and sweet, a well rounded cherry flavor. A little chemical aftertaste from the food colorings, but about as good as the Jelly Belly I usually avoid.

Cherry Cola - dark red - at first I liked the cherry cola, because it tasted like cola, even had a weird effervescent quality to it (maybe that was just the tangy part playing with my mind) but then the cherry kicked in and ruined it for me. But that’s just me.

Kiwi Cherry - pink with green speckles - this was just terrible. Maybe it’s because I had a recent run in with fresh Durian, but I just couldn’t get that out of my head when it came to this one. The kiwi flavors were more like melon and onions than kiwi, though the cherry seemed about average.

The didn’t do a thing for me. The colors were pretty, the shapes and distinctiveness of the flavors was actually pretty good. But I wouldn’t consider these a breakthrough candy so I found it odd that the National Confectionery Sales Association awarded Cherry Lovers best new Premium/Gourmet product:

In six categories, the winners were: Chocolate, The Hershey Co.‘s Reese’s Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups; Licensed/Limited, New England Confectionery Co.‘s Twilight Series; Non-Chocolate, Ferrara Pan Candy Co.‘s Chewy Lemonhead & Friends; Premium/Gourmet, Gimbal’s Fine Candies’ Cherry Lovers; Snacks, Snyder’s of Hanover, Inc.‘s Peanut Butter Pretzel Sandwiches; and Seasonal, Maxim Manufacturing & Marketing’s Easter Gummies.

Robby at Candy Addict had a better opinion of these. I’ll just consider them very pretty Valentine’s decorations in a bowl.

Related Candies

  1. See’s Cinnamon (Hearts & Lollypops)
  2. Mike and Ike Alex’s Lemonade Stand
  3. Gimbal’s Gourmet Jelly Beans
  4. 3 Musketeers Cherry & Raspberry
  5. Gimbal’s Lavaballs
  6. Pop Rocks Cherry Cola
Name: Cherry Lovers
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Gimbal's Candy
Place Purchased: sample from All Candy Expo
Price: unknown
Size: 11.5 ounces
Calories per ounce: 99
Categories: Chocolate, United States, Gimbal's Candy, Kosher

POSTED BY Cybele AT 12:15 pm Tracker Pixel for Entry    

Comments
  1. I would have to say that I like them a little better then you.  I was munching on them reading your review.  But that said.  I wouldn’t buy them again.

    Comment by Neefer on 2/09/10 at 2:28 pm #
  2. Good review, I just purchased this to review myself.  I liked them a little better than you did but came to some of the same conclusions on the flavors.  I thought the cherry cola was the best of the bunch.  The kiwi was the worst by far.

    Comment by Mark D. (sugarpressure) on 2/10/10 at 6:45 am #
  3. Oh, you just brought up some horrible memories of durian.  Cherry has never been my favorite flavor, but from now on it will be melded with the horrid hot garbage/garlic/foot taste and odor that is durian.

    Comment by Karen on 2/10/10 at 4:42 pm #
  4. I think I commented on these on the post where you teased them a while back. I had been so excited to find them last month (speaking as someone who really loves cherry as a flavor). I was so disappointed. They were disgusting - very chemical tasting and most of the flavors seemed to have no relation to what they claimed to be. I ended up throwing them out.

    Comment by celly on 2/10/10 at 7:11 pm #
  5. I loved Cherry Lovers!  Bought them at BJ’s…my family devoured the entire jar.  We all thought that we could taste the real cherry juice…Looked beautiful in a dish this Valentines season, while they lasted.  My daughter’s friend is getting married in June and is going to use them as wedding favors.

    Comment by Quinn on 2/12/10 at 10:29 am #
  6. I should’ve listened to you… but I am such a cherry devotee that I couldn’t resist picking up a bag of these yesterday.

    You were so right. The cherry flavors—at best—were chemical-tasting and not very good. The kiwi cherry? I threw the bag out after gagging on that one. Your description of “onions” is dead-on. How in the world did that candy get released? It reminded me of a bad experience with Bertie Bott’s beans. Candy shouldn’t be a gamble.

    Ugh. I give these a 1. I’ll never buy them again. They had so much potential, too! They look so cute and innocent!

    Comment by Hannah on 2/14/10 at 1:32 am #
  7. Saw these on Martha Stewart Valentines Show.  Bought them at Walgreens.  Delicious!

    The manager said the product was one of his top sellers this valentines day. 

    Maybe the other jelly bean companies don’t want people to try them and have posted “off” comments here…

    Isabella

    Comment by Isabella on 2/18/10 at 9:36 am #
  8. Cybele's avatar

    Isabella - I respect that people can have different opinions about candies, which is why the comments section is here.

    Please note that I screen comments pretty well to detect sock-puppets. What I have noticed is that there is another comment in this thread using the same email address as yours. (Can the readers guess which one?)

    I have to update my review with this - I actually picked all the Daiquiri ones out and ate them - it turned out I liked the lime and cherry combo quite a bit. (The rest went in the trash.)

    I hope they do a different version with other flavors. (Yeah yeah, I’d advocate for citrus.)

    Comment by Cybele on 2/18/10 at 9:44 am #
  9. I brought these on clearance at work and actually returned them.  Not even wroth my 74 cents! The first three or so were actually okay, until I tasted the chocolate one and the cola one and it was all downhill from there!  Every piece I tried from the bag had a worse taste than the next and two other co workers agreed.  We contemplated leaving them out purposely as payback to a certain worker who likes to eat everyone’s food when unattended, but decided even she didn’t deserve tastes of these.

    Comment by Heavenly Herrera on 2/23/10 at 2:26 pm #
  10. I seriously ADORE these. I have never written a review about anything before…let alone candy. But I just HAD to write one about these. I love them. The only one I wasn’t fond of, oddly enough, is the Cherry Cola. I found 10lbs of them and I’m seriously thinking about buying it. If only candy wasn’t so bad for you…hmmm…

    Comment by Emily on 2/23/11 at 12:49 pm #
  11. Since I am an absolute cherry lover like the brand of candy I was thrilled to find them in the store.  (I only found them once but will plan to buy online a much larger quantity).  For one thing, why does a reviewer who doesn’t like cherry flavor bother to review them?  Kind of like me trying to review a Jack Nicholson movie in a positive light.  To me all of the flavors are good and I admit slightly different.  The fact that it takes 12 pieces to reach 150 calories make this candy fairly low in calories.  But face it, eating candy should be done in moderation.  I don’t understand the snotty comments about cough medicine—the bad taste in medicine is not due to cherry flavor but to the stuff that the cherry flavor is helping hide.  People who want true cherry taste must eat fresh cherries but they are in season such a short time.  Anyway, to sum up I LOVE Cherry Lovers and will be buying more.  As an aside I am going to the cherry festival in Traverse City, Michigan in July and I am sure it will be a cherry good thing.

    Comment by Roger Phillips on 1/28/12 at 7:02 am #
  12. Cybele's avatar

    “For one thing, why does a reviewer who doesn’t like cherry flavor bother to review them?”

    Because it’s my job. I’ve stated my prejudices, faithfully documented the product and opened up the comments section to all views.

    Have you never seen a website that does reviews? I try to cover everything. Seriously - hundreds of reviews a year. Did you not bother to look around before you left a comment?

    That said: Gimbal’s has since started making a Honey Lovers and Sour Lovers mix. Both are fantastic, with the Sour Lovers (I’ve bought more than 10 pounds so far) being one of the best new products I’ve seen in a long time.

    I believe many stores are stocking these specifically for Valentine’s. I saw them at Ralph’s, which is part of Kroger. 

    All that said ... I love fresh cherries. I buy a lot of them when they’re in season.

    Comment by Cybele on 1/28/12 at 10:13 am #
  13. Delighted to find that these are being sold at Target now as store-brand “Gourmet Cherry Hearts”!  I’ve never seen the Gimbal’s brand for sale here in the Midwest (actually, I’d never heard of them before following your blog), so I figured I’d never get a chance to try these.  So glad I could—cherry is one of my favourite flavours, and these were right up my alley.  Aside from the cherry chocolate one, anyway; that one is super gross.

    I think a few other Gimbal’s products have also been licensed under the same brand.  Since I adored these, I’ll have to go back and try some more.

    Comment by ar on 6/02/13 at 4:19 pm #
  14. I was happy to find them today in the Target packaging with the Valentine candy.  I like them.

    Comment by Sara on 1/26/14 at 4:26 pm #
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