Some candies need no review, no introduction or marketing campaign. They simply are and hopefully always will be.

Spearmint Leaves are such a simple candy. A firm jelly molded in the shape of a mint leaf and flavored with spearmint oil (or a reasonable facsimile).

I don’t how long they’ve been around (earliest mention on Google’s news archive is 1928). There’s no fantastical tale of their historical debut at any World’s Fair or even a county fair. They’re probably just a novelty shape of a traditional spice gumdrop. I don’t know who invented them or even who makes the best ones. Even passably good ones are good enough for me.

They’re sold without any fancy brand names, simply Spearmint Leaves. You can get them in bulk, in tubs at the office supply stores or in peg bags at the drug stores.

The ingredients are identical to gum drops. They’re sugar, corn syrup and a bit of corn starch for jelling. Then a little artificial flavor & color to complete the illusion of a platform shoe equivalent of a real leaf of mint.

I picked up my package of Walgreen branded Spearmint Leaves from their 99 cent peg bag selection. I usually look for bags that appear dry and the candies move around easily but that the candies also have a little give when squeezed. Too much moisture is an enemy of jelly candies. It makes the granulated sugar coating sticky and allows their qi to leak out.

I picked a good bag. The color is rather light and oddly on the blue side. The shape of the leaf is a bit narrower at the top than the bottom and has a nice point to it on the end with a little stem. So the molding is nice. The granular sugar coating is good - there’s enough to keep them from sticking but not so much as to overpower the flavor.

The texture inside is smooth. It’s not sticky (at least not as sticky as Dots) and not too sweet. The spearmint notes are dead on - aromatic and kind of sparkly. There are small spots where the spearmint flavor really tingles to the forefront.

It’s a fresh feeling, but not like eating a mint. I can eat a whole bag if I don’t control myself. They’re even still good when stale and a bit tacky.

I know they’re not the sexiest, hippest candy but to be around this long without any sort of marketing support is a testament to their excellence.

Other big candy companies that make Spearmint Leaves are Brach’s & Farley’s and probably others, if you have a favorite, please let me know. It’d be nice to find a company that makes all natural ones (which really shouldn’t be that hard to do) - the closest I’ve come are the fruit flavored gourmet Gum Drops from Whole Foods.

This package isn’t marked Kosher and it says that it’s a product of Canada & USA (I can’t quite figure that one out). They are marked Gluten-Free. (And are probably also considered vegan.) They’re also silly-cheap, so it’s a low risk sort of thing.

Related Candies

1. Jelly Belly Sunkist Citrus Mix
2. Spearmint Licorice
3. Loukoumi Artisan Confections
4. Dots Elements: Earth, Air, Fire & Water
5. Barley Mint Mentos
6. Hot Tamales Ice
7. Chuckles

I like York Peppermint Patties, so I was pretty excited to hear about York Pieces (more here). Especially since I disappointed when Hershey’s discontinued the York Bites, I thought this would be a great “morsel” version of the Peppermint Pattie ... great for snacking & sharing.

The new Hershey’s Pieces line takes classic candy bars and makes them into little lentils covered in a candy shell.

The description from the press release was a little vague: Peppermint Flavored Dark Chocolate Candy in a Crunchy Shell, so I wasn’t sure what they would be like until I got my hands on these sales samples direct from Hershey’s. Would they have the classic fondant center? It begs the question, what is the essence of a York Peppermint Pattie?

It turns out, to my disappointment, that they are exactly as described above. Mint flavored dark chocolate with a candy shell. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but where’s the fondant?

The Pieces come in two colors in this assortment: royal blue and white. The grey package with blue accents and the yellow logo was easily identifiable as York Peppermint.

The shell is pleasant & crunchy, the chocolate inside is quite smooth and has a nice peppermint pop to it. The cocoa flavors come out really well, and is very close to the chocolate flavor profile of the York chocolate coating.

While M&Ms have their holiday Mint version, this year round dark chocolate mint lentil will definitely have a unique selling position. I prefer the naturally less sweet dark chocolate of the York Pieces to the very sweet but a touch salty Mint Chocolate M&Ms. (Though they end up with the same rating.)

All that said, I am confused by the Yorklessness of these little Pieces.

I got to thinking about whether or not it’d be possible to make a fondant centered lentil and then I remembered that the York Mints (and Dutch Mints or Holland Mints) were just that.

So I picked up some York Mints just to compare them. (Luckily I found them at the 99 Cent Only Store ... which means that they’re only three months from their expiry and who knows what conditions they were stored under.)

The shell on the York Mints is thinner than the York Pieces. But the York Mints, with their not-quite-soft-and-crumbly fondant are quite minty ... enough to be called breath mints. The York Pieces, on the other hand, do not freshen the breath to the point where I’d think it was perceptible by others.

The point though is that a lentil version is possible, at least in my eyes, but for some reason (perhaps the fact that they sell 1.35 ounces for more than $2.00) they decided to go with a much easier to produce product: the York Pieces.

That said, I think I prefer the York Pieces anyway. They’re certainly different from most other minty lentils, which are usually mockolate or milk chocolate.

Candy Addict also previewed these last week and found them to be nice.

These won’t be hitting shelves until December 2009. (I didn’t have nutrition info on them either and there was no Kosher status on the package but it did mention that it was processed on equipment that handles peanuts, tree nuts, egg & wheat ... plus they contain milk & soy.)

Related Candies

1. Hershey’s Almond Joy Pieces
2. Marich Easter Select Mix
3. Manhattan Chocolates Dipped Mint Cremes
4. M&Ms Premiums
5. Mint Crisp M&Ms (Indiana Jones)
6. Smooth n Melty
7. 3 Musketeers Mint with Dark Chocolate

The first time I tried a Sunspire product, I thought it was terrible. I was also rather irritated that they thought that their candy coated chocolate lentils were better just because they were all-natural, when they actually had more “sugar” in them than M&Ms. (Not that I subscribe to the belief that sugar is unhealthy in moderation.)

I was at Henry’s Market over the weekend and all the Sunspire candy bars were on sale, so I grabbed a bunch ... because if there’s one thing that makes me reconsider my opinion, it’s a reduced price. (Oddly enough free samples have less influence.) This Sunspire Peppermint Pattie was $1.25 (they’re usually $1.69).

On the front it says that it’s premium dark chocolate - all natural / nothing artificial.

The little mylar wrapper holds a 1.4 ounce pattie.

It’s a rustic looking pattie, a little thicker than a York Peppermint Pattie but also smaller in diameter. Still, they’re the exact same weight as a York. (No, that’s not a trick of the light, the center is actually a light amber color.)

The ingredients are impressive, if only for the adjectives involved in simple ingredients:

Center: evaporated cane juice, water, white rice syrup, butter, egg albumen, natural peppermint oil. Dark Chocolate Coating: evaporated cane juice, unsulfured molasses, unsweetened chocolate, cocoa butter, soy lecithin (nonGMO), pure natural vanilla.

So while the ingredients are pretty wholesome, they’re not vegan and not processed in a facility that’s gluten free (nor peanut/nut free).

But for me it’s all about the taste. I was a bit worried that the dark chocolate would be too sweet, what with two sweeteners listed before the cocoa solids.

The chocolate shell is pretty thick, it has a nice toasted cocoa aroma with a hint of the minty sweetness within. It’s nicely tempered and has a good break but happily the little bits adhere to the fondant center.

The chocolate is much like chocolate chips as far as texture. Not extremely smooth, but with good flavor ... just a smidge on the dry and chalky side of things.

The fondant center is smooth, with a slight but consistent grain to it but overall it has a cool dissolve on the tongue. It’s a cross between the texture of the York Peppermint Pattie and Junior Mints. The peppermint isn’t that strong and there’s a pretty noticeable whiff of molasses in the whole thing. It makes it all seem rather “hearty.” There’s also a lot more chocolate to this than a York has (so there’s also more fat and more calories).

My opinion of Sunspire is a-changin’ ... this is a really good product. Yes, more expensive but also made in the USA. (But if I had my druthers for non-York mints, I’d probably go for the Ritter Sport Peppermint bar ... except it’s seasonal.)

Related Candies

1. Ritter Sport Peppermint
2. Christmas Mint Round Up
3. Junior Mints Deluxe
4. Best Intentions: Sun Drops
5. York Pinkermint Patties

They say we eat with our eyes first. If there’s one candy that capitalizes on our attraction to bright and shiny things, it has to be lollipops.

I love lollipops in the sense that I love looking at them, I like buying them and I enjoying having them. But I’d have to guess that I only eat about half of the lollipops I ever have.

Part of it is that lollipops are simply hard candy. And I’m pretty sure that most people don’t actually like hard candy ... in the sense that they’d be willing to pay three times as much for it simply because it includes an inedible holder with it. But this is part of the amazing enigma of lollipops.

If I were a sculptor, I would probably wish to make things of spun, twisted & boiled sugar.

If I were to have my wedding all over again today, I’d probably just carry a bunch of lollipops instead of a bouquet of flowers. (Or maybe some of those wondrous flowers made from sugar.)

At the moment though I just take photos of lollipops when I get a hold of them.

Today, however, I’m also eating them.

I have a set of Hammond’s Candies All Natural Lollipops.

They’re made without artificial flavors or colors and are hand crafted. They come in a variety of flavors, I have six that I’m going to profile

These are the middle-sized pops - they’re one ounce each and about two to two and a half inches across. (Honestly, I think some of these were more than generously oversized.)

The pops feature thick wooden sticks and are wrapped simply in little cellophane bags with a sticker on the back that lists the flavor, ingredients & nutritional info. The front is all about the look of these hand-crafted medallions.

Strawberry - magenta/red background with orange & cream stripes. (cross section above of broken pop)

The ropes of candy are built in layers, at the center is a slightly aerated hard candy center. The outer layers are smooth and for the most part “clear” boiled sugar candy. The slight aeration of the core means that it’s very easy to crunch & chew it up and has no noticeable voids. It also means the the candy has a slightly lighter feel to it than I think I would have guessed just looking at it.

The flavor is light and bright - a touch of tartness but mostly a floral berry flavor like cotton candy.

Pomegranate - satiny cream background with pink/red stripes.

This had a very light floral flavor at first, all sweetness on the outside. The core, though, has a bit of a yogurty tang to it and a mellow cherry flavor with a stronger pop of sourness towards the end. It’s not a very intense flavor - just a light and rather nondescript berry note. It’s more like a fruit punch and is an overall positive.

Cherry - alternating large stripes of bright pink and medium red with a small strip of cream between.

This was a big test for me, because for the most part I don’t like cherry flavored candies because I don’t like the aftertaste of the most commonly used red food coloring, Red 40.

The outside was sweet and has a little toasted sugar flavor to it. The interior has a nice, zesty sour pop to it along with the cherry flavor. It’s not the dark, black cherry flavor - more like a cherry pie note. I’d call it positive and definitely has no weird poisonous aftertaste. Call it a win for cherry haters.

Peppermint - deep red with a series of amber stripes inside cream bands.

The coloring on this one wasn’t what I would have picked out of the bunch as the mint flavored one.

The mint flavor is clean and crisp - fresh and cooling with a long-lasting aftertaste. The texture of the candy is a little odd at first. The outside is smooth and with few voids, but can be kind of sharp if you break or crunch it.

Pear - satiny light green with cream stripes (with inset green stripes)

Most of the pops at this point I was eating by breaking them first, eating the pieces and then whatever was left on the stick. For the Pear, which was just slightly smaller than the others, I ate it whole.

The outer layer was mild & sweet and had a light orchard fruit scent. In this case the center is the same ... kind of like an apple kissed toasted marshmallow. For the most part I love fresh pears but have never cared for pear flavored candies ... but this isn’t very “pear-flavored” so I give it a thumbs up.

Lemon - yellow bands with cream mini stripes

The outside is zesty but just a kiss of sweetness to it. The center is only slightly tangy. The whole thing reminds me of the flavor combination of a lemon bar. It’s not going to burn holes in my tongue, so I’ll definitely eat the whole thing.

The size of these pops was just a smidge too large for placing in the mouth whole. The texture and smoothness of the outside & inside meant that they were both interesting and pleasant from start to finish. In most cases the outside & inside also offered different flavor variations, which was a good feature to offer when selling at a premium price. They also come in a huge variety of sizes, from this one ounce version to a 4 ounce (saucer) to a full pound (dinner plate).

When not in “review mode” I found that these were definitely an all day sucker for me. The price is a bit steep - at about $2.50 to $3.00 per pop (depending on where you buy them). I’ve seen these at department stores around Christmas (in cinnamon!), at Cost Plus World Market (they also have Root Beer, but I don’t think it’s all natural) plus upscale candy shops and of course on the internet at CandyWarehouse.com, NaturalCandyStore.com and direct from Hammond’s.

Hard candy has its place, it’s durable and can be packed with flavor or just sweet comfort. Mostly it’s an amazing concoction because it can be beautiful.

To finish this off, have a look at how they make some of their hand-crafted creations:

Related Candies

1. Melville Candy Company Tea Spoons
2. Hammond’s Pantry Candies
3. Disneyland Candy Novelties
4. Peeps Lollipop Rings
5. Miette Patisserie

I don’t know much about fudge. What I do know is that when I accepted an offer of fudge samples from Rosa’s Fudge last month I became the proud recipient of more fudge than I have ever possessed before.

The box pictured is over 6 inches long, 4 and a half inches wide and almost three inches deep. Inside were 24 1.25 ounce squares. Yes, the box weighed about two pounds (counting the weight of the box itself).

This was an ideal time for me to get over my fudge ambivalence. It’s not that I don’t like fudge, it’s that I don’t know fudge.

For the most part I find fudge tasty, but difficult. After all, it usually requires implements to eat ... cutting it with a knife, storing it awkwardly, it dries out easily. Candy should be low fuss.

Rosa’s Fudge, based in Springfield, Massachusetts makes 22 flavors. They sent me 16 of them to try (no walnut or cherry for me!). It took me two weeks to get through them. 

Their fudge is sold in these little cubes, one serving, each stays fresh and they’re easy to eat, store & share.

They’re made with mostly wholesome ingredients: milk, butter, sugar but also a dash of hydrogenated palm kernel oil (can’t be much based on how far down on the list it comes) plus chocolate or nuts as dictated by the flavor then some potassium sorbate to keep it all fresh.

Chocolate - the bite is soft and the chocolate flavor is immediate (chocolate is the second ingredient in this flavor). It’s rich and has both the cocoa flavors and some nice fatty “melt” going on with the slight sugary grain. It was appealing and went especially well with salty/crunchy snacks like pretzels or plain almonds. *

Peanut Butter - this is a classic flavor and I find that fudge made from peanut butter to be one of the ideal ways to use peanuts in confection (along with peanut butter cups & peanut brittle). It smells dark and a little bitter. The stuff is fatty, but not greasy ... though it did make the little waxed paperboard bottom label a clear translucent. It has a softer and crumblier bite than the chocolate. The nut flavors were wonderful with a mellow not-too-sweet powdery quality that kept it together without giving me that “sticky” feeling on the tongue. *

Chocolate & Peanut Butter - this block is a combination of the first two flavors, about 25% is chocolate on the top and the 75% on the bottom is peanut butter. The variation between the two textures is awesome, and of course chocolate and peanut butter are a natural fit. *

Chocolate Mint - this piece could have gone a few ways. It could have been a vanilla piece flavored with mint and then a layer of chocolate fudge. Instead this is a chocolate fudge with a creme de menthe flavor to it. It was quite cool, not too strong and refreshing with a good authentic peppermint note (it does have peppermint oil in it). The mint made it seem a bit less sweet but the mint wasn’t so overpowering that it infected the neighboring pieces. *

Vanilla - I was a bit lost on what this should be. It’s just butter and sugar, right? Well, this isn’t quite grandma’s recipe. Sugar, milk, butter, partially hydrogenated palm kernel and cottonseed oils, cream, corn syrup, maltodextrins, natural and artificial flavors, invert sugar, soy lecithin, potassium sorbate and salt. Maybe it needs some real vanilla bean in there.

Penuche - I love the idea of penuche and sometimes get a version of it I love at the local shop by my office. Penuche is basically a brown sugar fudge. It’s grainy and maybe even a bit greasy, but I love it. This one was smooth and had the brown sugar notes, but mostly it just tasted like a good cooked buttercream frosting would.

Maple - was much softer than the other pieces. Not so soft that it lost its shape once out of the wrapper, but definitely a little droopy. The flavor also seemed smoother, very strong in the woodsy pecan end of things. Sweet, aromatic and definitely one of my favorites. *

Butterscotch - I wasn’t sure what butterscotch would be like, I assumed it’d be like butterscotch pudding. Instead, when I opened the package I was greeted with an aroma like putting my head into a bucket of butterscotch disks (the hard candy). The fake “flavorishness” aside, I enjoyed it. It was artificial and throat-searingly sugary, but the texture was nice and I really knew that this was supposed to be butterscotch.

Coffee - looked a lot like the Maple or Penuche. Instead the texture was quite different once I bit into it. It has the same grainy consistency that melts in the mouth that I like about fudge. The coffee flavors were mild but sweet and milky. It reminded me of coffee ice cream. This was my top pick of the whole assortment. *

Coffee & Chocolate - this one is rather simple, just a coffee fudge with a layer of chocolate fudge. But I didn’t like the addition of the chocolate much. It didn’t give it a chocolate punch, but did lessen the coffee flavors. The two fudges had a slight consistency difference as well, the chocolate was firmer with a tighter grain (is that a way to describe fudge or hardwood?).

Amaretto - my appreciation of amaretto is pretty shallow. I like almonds but I don’t care for marzipan because of the strong amaretto notes, which I associate with the same fake flavor that butterscotch is to true toffee. This smelled, to me, like a fine bath product. Sweet, a little floral and a lot like amaretto. It was actually pretty good ... nothing I’d eat, but I think amaretto fans would like it.

Irish Creme - is a combination of three flavors: Irish Whiskey, coffee and cream. Instead this tastes like coconut, butterscotch and maple. I’m missing the deep woodsy tones that whiskey can bring ... and I’m definitely not getting any coffee in there, but there’s a creamy flavor. I’d definitely keep eating it, if I didn’t have a bunch of other fruit & nut flavors to get to.

Chocolate & Coconut - looking at the side of this, it was evident that this was more than a coconut flavored chocolate fudge, there’s coconut flakes all through it. It smells woodsy, herby and a little bit like granola. Biting into it, it has a lot of chew from the coconut but the biggest flavor hit here is chocolate. The chocolate tastes deeper, richer and less sweet than the other versions I tried singularly and in combination earlier. This stuff is awesome. It reminds me of a less-sweet Mounds bar. *

This was where I reached a stumbling block. While I usually like bright colors & fun incorporated into my candy, something about these fruit ones just seemed wrong. So I picked around them in the box.

Pina Colada - this was bright yellow. While I was hesitant because of the color and the idea of pineapple and coconut in fudge didn’t sound like a good idea, the chocolate coconut was a pleasant surprise. This one doesn’t have as much coconut in it as the chocolate version, but there’s still a fair bit. It smells sweet and like a floral/peppery pineapple. The bite is soft, dry but with a very small grain (besides the bits of coconut). There’s a lot of pineapple flavor, but no tang to it. The coconut gives a lot of texture and a fair bit of authentic coconut butter flavor. It’s better than I expected, but still far too sweet.

Chocolate Raspberry - the bright pink and malleable texture makes this look something I made with Playdoh. The raspberry flavor is all fragrance and food coloring. I ate that one bite shown and didn’t want to go back for more even if it meant a scathing paragraph here.

Chocolate Strawberry - this smelled like strawberry ice cream and kind of tasted like it too. It was very sugary and the chocolate kind of brought it down a notch, but then the bitter taste of the food coloring kicked in. I know some folks probably like this, but it’s not my thing.

Even though it ended on a down note, the tasting experience with Rosa’s Fudge was fun. I found out that there are some specific flavors that I think go well with fudge. (I also think nuts go great with fudge, so if you’re a walnut person, I wholeheartedly recommend it even though I’ve never tried theirs.)

Rosa’s offers custom packed boxes based on your flavor preferences, so you’ll never end up with a block you don’t want. My choices (marked with a *) now ranked in order: Chocolate & Coconut, Coffee, Peanut Butter, Chocolate, Chocolate & Mint and Maple.

The whole thing gets a 7 out of 10 rating. Good price, spare packaging & excellent shipping. The flavors were distinct, classic and well executed.

Rosa’s Fudge is sold on their website ($12 for 12 pieces - 15 ounces) as well as at some candy counters in the northeastern United States.

Related Candies

1. Spoonfudge
2. Mint Chocolate M&Ms
3. Caffe Acapella - Coffee Confections
4. Trader Joe’s Irish Cream Chocolates
5. Flippin’ Fudge
6. Jim Beam Fudge
7. Coffee Beat

As an impulse by at Gelson’s (one of the upscale grocery stores in Los Angeles), I picked up this Marich Easter Select Mix.

I thought the packaging was really nice, better than the crunchy stand up bags that I usually see these sorts of mixes in (the current version of the Jelly Belly Easter mix was on the same shelf). The sleeve slips off to reveal the clear box, which opens easily and can be used for serving in casual settings.

It was expensive, though, for a mix of sugar candy (there were three foil covered chocolate eggs).

The package was $6.99 for 12 ounces ($9.32 a pound).

The package describes the contents as A cheery Easter assortment of creams, milk chocolate eggs, mints and jelly eggs..

The colors are bright and pleasant and there is a really nice mix of shiny little candies, I definitely bought these for the looks.

There were only three Foiled Chocolate Eggs in my mix, which was fine with me as I wasn’t buying it for the chocolate anyway. I thought the foil was a little dated, but that really didn’t matter after I ate one. The chocolate is quite distinctive - very sticky and smooth, strong dairy and malt notes with some caramelized sugar in there ... really tasty. It’s a big change from Hershey’s or Dove.

The Easter Creams are a fondant, like Candy Corn. They come in a variety of different molds (chickens, rabbits, chicks and decorated eggs) and flavors (lime, lemon, strawberry, vanilla and something called Wildberry).

The creams are very firm and have a bit of a shiny shell on them (a confectionery glaze perhaps?). They don’t smell like much. The flavors are mild and exceptionally sweet. The texture is a bit crumbly but ultimately very smooth. I don’t know what this wildberry thing is, but it tastes like a cross between violet, bitterness and raspberry. My favorite was actually the lime followed by the vanilla. Lemon was good but far too close to flavorless and strawberry had a bigger pop of flavor but also an artificial color aftertaste for me.

The little Nonpariel Pectin Eggs were quite bright. The little crunchies are a combination of magenta, purple, orange, white and yellow ... quite a riot of colors. Which is too bad, because I’m pretty sure that the colors are what made the crunchies so incredibly bitter. I don’t know if there’s something going on with my tongue lately or these really are this weird.

The fun part though is the wonderfully smooth & tangy orange jelly inside. It’s a very firm and flavorful jelly, almost like a gummi. They brought to mind these gummis I had from Jelly Belly a few years back (that they don’t seem to make any longer).

I tried peeling them, but that was simply too much trouble.

Next were the huge Jelly Beans. They’re a full one inch long and have a slightly translucent quality to them.

The shell is thin and crisp, beneath that is a consistent grainy layer, then a smooth and light jelly center. The biggest disappointment was the clear one, which was pineapple. For some reason it was horribly bitter on the outside to me. I couldn’t figure it out, especially since I kept thinking when I ate them without looking that they were spiky blue (that something about my synesthesia).

The Easter Holland Mints were the only other “chocolate” item in the mix. These were quite bit, bigger than the ones I get from Jelly Belly or Koppers.

The shell is flawless and shiny. It has a nice crunch to it, like an M&M. The dark chocolate beneath that is slightly bitter but otherwise creamy and mellow. The mint center is a soft but dry fondant (that’s uselessly colored light green). It’s a mild mint and the whole combination is great. There were only four in my mix, so I sadly didn’t get to enjoy many of them.

I’ve been seeing more Marich products in stores lately. I reviewed their Triple Chocolate Toffee a while back. I got a hold of a few handfuls of some of their chocolate items when I was working on a photo shoot for Candy Warehouse. I thought I’d share a few thoughts on those (not a full review):

Capuccino Almonds

The almonds in my assortment were huge. Some of these pieces were an inch and a third long.

The almonds at the center are well toasted. The milk chocolate coating is a coffee flavored chocolate. It’s a nice combination, the coffee flavor tastes especially authentic (although a bit chalky towards the end, as I think they’re using real ground coffee in there).

Dark Chocolate Covered Candied Ginger

These little cubes of ginger have a thick and glossy coating of dark chocolate.

I always enjoy chocolate covered ginger and was frustrated when I bought it at Trader Joe’s and the pieces were a bit sticky. These are perfectly sealed in the chocolate shells. The ginger is at once woodsy and warming. The extra sugar balances it all out with some texture and sweetness.

The Raspberry Chocolate Cheesecake was definitely the unique one in the bunch.

It’s a real dried raspberry center. Then it’s covered in dark chocolate. Then a white chocolate coating with a final veneer of raspberry flavor on that.

The tangy raspberry dusting mixes with the sweet and milky white chocolate to give that cheesecake flavor (or maybe more of a yogurt flavor). The real raspberry center certainly has a pop to it ... and a lot of texture which includes the seeds. The dark chocolate seems to enhance the seedy flavors. This one simply doesn’t work for me.

Also on the red side of things were the Pastel Chocolate Cranberries.

The outside is a red-colored white chocolate, then a little layer of chocolate. The center is a dried cranberry.

What I liked about these were how tart and intense the cranberries seemed to be. I eat dried cranberries quite often, but they’re usually sweetened. If there were sweetened, it certainly wasn’t too much. The tangy chew of the soft and moist berries went well with the otherwise flavorless red shell.

A few other items I tried were a Peanut Butter Caramel that had a caramel ball center, a layer of peanut butter and then a thin chocolate shell dusted in confectionery sugar. The caramel wasn’t quite chewy enough for me so all the textures melded together.

I also tried a hard crunchy shell chocolate covered caramel. They looked like quail eggs. I can’t quite describe it, it was like a chocolate creme brulee.

They make a Dark Chocolate Covered Toffee Almond, rather similar to the Sconza one I tried a few years ago. The dark chocolate was good quality, nice and buttery. The nuts were well toasted, sometimes it seemed a little too much so though. The toffee was crunchy and crisp.

On the whole, they’re an inventive company that makes a lot of really fun products. Most are great quality, I would love to see them decrease the amount of artificial colorings (they do make a line of all-naturals, too).

Related Candies

1. Milk Maid Caramel Apple Candy Corn
2. Big Bite Gummy Bear
3. Smooth n Melty
4. Gourmet Goodies Candy Corn
5. Krunchy Bears

Tonight marks the start of Passover (the 15th of the month Nisan).

The dietary restrictions during Passover not only mean no grains, chometz, except for matzo meal but also no kitniot (legumes). This means a lot of the ingredients commonly used for candy preparation are forbidden during this festival. No peanuts is obvious, but also no corn syrup, no soy lecithin, no cornstarch, no soy or canola oil.

Most observant Jews I know simply go without candy during this time or stick to the tried-and-true holiday specialties like macaroons or chocolate dipped matzo. I know that it’s possible to make great candy that’s Kosher for Passover - something that goes beyond the mediocre Manischewitz molded chocolate items.

The Gelson’s Market near my house had a nice display of Passover items near the entrance and I was pleased to see a few more upscale and decadent items than the common jelly slices. I picked out these Chocolate Dipped Mint Cremes from Manhattan Chocolates.

The box was pretty, just green themed on white with chocolate drip along the top. Inside it was a little less upscale. The mint cremes are nestled in little cubbies in a plastic tray, which isn’t such a big deal, except that the candies were much smaller than their little nooks, so they rattled around quite a bit when I carried them home ... and is probably why they look a bit scuffed. (A piece of that fluffy, corrugated waxed paper would probably help.)

The ingredients look great: Chocolate (sugar, chocolate liquor, cocoa butter, vanilla), sugar, tapioca syrup, natural and artificial flavors. (During the rest of the year there’s soy lecithin in the chocolate and corn syrup instead of the tapioca syrup.)

There are 15 pieces in the box, which holds 6 ounces (so each piece is .4 ounces).

They’re rather tall, more like a cream chocolate than a patty, a little larger in diameter than a quarter.

The chocolate shell is nicely done, no voids or little leaky spots. They smell sweet and a bit like toasty hot chocolate. There’s only a slight whiff of mint.

Once I bit into one, the cream revealed its mintness. It’s soft, the cream is quite silky with only a slight small grain to it. It’s not flowing soft like a Junior Mint and not hard and crumbly like a York Peppermint Pattie ... just a bit in between.

The dark chocolate shell is sweet and not quite bitter enough to offset the very sweet center. But overall it’s a very good post-Seder treat to refresh the palate after those bitter herbs.

I wouldn’t call these glorious or anything, but if I were in a week where I was limited in my choices, the Manhattan Chocolates seem very promising as a line. They’re also lactose free - all year round.

Carl at the National Confectioners Association also found that Oh Nuts! has a great selection (and there’s still time to order before Passover ends).

Related Candies

1. Ritter Sport Peppermint
2. Mint Cremes from the Makers of Jelly Belly
3. Sweet Earth Chocolate Cups
4. Joyva Joys
5. Halvah and Turkish Delight
6. Candy Source: Economy Candy, NYC
7. Manischewitz Frolic Bears

Tucked away in Wisconsin is a little chocolatier called Kohler Chocolates. It’s known mostly to the folks who vacation there at the Kohler golf & spa destinations north of Milwaukee near Sheboygan.

Recently Kohler Chocolates has started selling online and appearing at trade shows to promote their products nationwide. (Which often means an appearance in Oprah Magazine. I’ve never read Oprah’s publications and don’t know much about her taste in candy and don’t usually follow recommendations of talk show hosts.)

Last year I got a hold of one of their bars via All Candy Expo, but it was a cherry one, so I didn’t think that’d be a good introduction so I waited. This year, just a few days before Valentine’s Day I got a nice selection of their boxed chocolates: Garden Ganache Truffles and Dark Mountain Toffees. They also make Terrapins (like Chocolate Turtles), chocolate bars, trail mix and a variety of barks.

The Garden Ganache Truffles are stunning. The box is a large tray with huge dome-molded truffles in bright colors. It’s presented with a clear top for maximum impact. It’s one of the rare instances where the product looks exactly, if not better, than the photos on the website.

The website is a bit vague, however, on the array in their Garden Ganache. The ten piece set features flavors inspired by spices, tea, coffee, nuts and fruits.  The package is also maddeningly vague on the ingredients. It mentions the fillings, I believe, but none of them mention the actual chocolate ingredients. 

Asian Spice (Burnt Orange) - this was the first piece I tried because it smelled the strongest out of the box. The aroma of star anise was quite overwhelming, so I thought in order to preserve the flavors of the rest, it had to go.

It’s a wonderfully solid truffle, about 1.5” across and wonderfully tempered. The shell isn’t that thick, but has a nice snap and with all the truffles there was no sign of cracking or leaking.

Though this was the first truffle I tried, I didn’t realize at the time that the center was different from the rest. It was thick and almost fudgy or like a dense brownie. Not quite grainy, it was a bit crystalline when I bit into it, but it melted quickly. The five spice was very pronounced, with the licoricey anise and fennel elements at the forefront. There was only a slight hint of cinnamon and cloves to it, and of course the chocolate flavors of smoke, cedar and coffee.

Creme Fraiche (White) - this was a wonderfully light truffle that allowed the flavors of the chocolate to come through. The ganache was very creamy and had only the slightest dairy tang to it.

Rasbperry (Red) - though fashion right now seems to dictate lots of crazy flavors, I do love a classic raspberry truffle.

This was quite vivid. The center has a nice jammy raspberry component - no seeds but a good authentic berry profile with a slight tangy note and strong florals.

Passion Fruit (Light Orange) - this was one of the few white chocolate centers. It had a wonderful musky/herbal scent that reminded me of mango skins. The nice thing about passion fruit candies is that they always seem easier to eat than actual passion fruits.

This was a good mix of sweet and tangy with some strong zesty notes with just a touch of milk. I was really surprised by this, I’m not ordinarily a fan of tropical fruits mixed with chocolate.

Pear (Light Green) - this one seemed to be more themed like a pear liqueur than a pear puree. The center is a chocolate ganache with fragrant & fresh touch of pear flavor, it’s almost fresh fig meets banana.

Chai Tea (Green) - the spice flavors here were strong. It tasted mostly of gingerbread, the dark chocolate flavors subbed for the molasses notes and ginger with a touch of cinnamon & nutmeg dominated.

Earl Grey (Blue) - I’m definitely a bergamot fan. This didn’t disappoint. The chocolate is strong and the dark balsam zest notes blend well with it. The black tea flavors of Earl Grey are kind of missing, but I didn’t really expect them to make a strong showing (as they didn’t appear at all in the chai either).

Coconut (Yellow) - this was a true truffle, not some sort of upscale Mounds bar.

The coconut flavor was deep and round, though it still had some dark rum notes to it, but it didn’t verge into Pina Colada territory.

Macadamia (Tan) - this was the other white centered piece. It’s also the only one with actual nuts in it. Macadamias remind me a bit of coconut, with its strong oily flavor and crispy crunch, this was rather similar to the coconut in that respect. The nuts were fresh and had a bit of a green banana flavor to them as well. Not too sweet, it was a nice change from the darker and spicier varieties.

Hazelnut Coffee (Brown) - this has a pleasant hazelnut liqueur aroma. The center was just bit firmer than the others, but quite silky once it melted. There is more than a touch of espresso flavors giving this a much better profile than that sometimes artificial quality that hazelnut flavoring can do. I was a little disappointed that I didn’t get any real gianduia elements here (but that’ll be later with the toffees).

Kohler Chocolates also has a bright & unique take on the traditional toffee & chocolate combination.

Here they’ve taken tiny chunks of toffee (most look like little cubes) and molded them with a touch of dark chocolate at the base. They call them Dark Mountain Toffee and they come in six varieties. Like the Garden Ganache, they’re boxed with a clear top to highlight the actual candies. They were a little puzzle to figure out which was which (and I successfully avoided the walnut one).

The Orange Peel Dark Chocolate Mountain Toffee is an amazing combination.

Tiny little cubes of perfectly toasted sugar & butter toffee is mixed with chopped hazelnuts and candied orange peel and then drenched in dark chocolate with a teensy little snow cap of white chocolate.

While this sound like a riot of flavors, everyone has their part to play and it becomes more like a harmony. The dark and bass tones of the of the toffee and dark chocolate set the stage. Then the high citrus zest of the orange peel comes in followed by the spirited twinkle of the hazelnut crunch.

Cocoa Nibs was a very simple treat. The addition of the buttery crunch of cacao to the sweet toffee gave the whole thing a less-sweet taste, though I didn’t really get a lot of flavor from the nibs themselves because the chocolate is pretty strong as it is. If there was one that could be labeled the “plain” variety, this would be it ... not that there’s anything wrong with just having two elements: toffee & dark chocolate.

Mint - ordinarily I wouldn’t think that toffee and mint would go together. This has dried mint leaves though, which adds a more “tea-like” flavor to it and less like the potent mint-oil blast that many candies employ. While I liked the leafy tannins, the dark burnt sugar flavors and the rich buttery chocolate, the actual leaves in there bugged me a little bit. Not enough that I didn’t finish it, mind you.

Coconut had a very strong tropical taste to it, even though there didn’t seem to be more than a dusting of coconut flakes on the white chocolate drizzle there were more flakes inside. I would have preferred a more toasted coconut vibe to it, as I think that would go better with the darkness of all the other flavors, I wouldn’t kick this out of my cabana.

Hazelnut was radically different than all the rest. Mixed into the tumble of toffee cubes was some soft and buttery gianduia. The hazelnut & chocolate paste was nicely highlighted by the toasted butter flavors and then the extra cocoa buttery chocolate. The bite on this one was much softer, almost like a granola instead of a cluster. (Which makes me wonder if anyone has made a hazelnut paste granola before ... as if granola isn’t fatty enough.)

I’m really impressed with the presentation, the unique styling of the candy that highlights the combinations and the bright flavors.

For folks who are lamenting the loss of Joseph Schmidt (news here), these are definitely truffles that highlight the silky quality of chocolate without being overly sweet or flavored and are generous pieces. (Though they’re also more expensive and can only be ordered online or purchased in a scant few shops in Wisconsin.) The array of Garden Ganache I tried retails for $24.95 for 7 ounces (making them about $57 a pound) . The Dark Mountain Toffees are also quite impressive, though I’d prefer being able to just order the Orange Hazelnut one by the box. The pieces aren’t quite as weighty as the truffles (and probably require quite a bit of handwork) - the box of six retails for only $9.95.

Related Candies

1. Sterling Truffle Bars: Double Hazelnut Caramel Truffle & Cappuccino with a Twist
2. Michel Cluizel 99%
3. L’Artisan du Chocolat
4. Valerie Lemon Hazelnut Nougat
5. Joseph Schmidt
6. Valerie Toffees & Nougats
7. Vosges Truffles - Fall 2006
8. Enstrom’s Toffee