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New Zealand

Friday, June 15, 2012

RJ’s Licorice Allsorts

RJ's Licorice AllsortsThere are lots of different kinds of black licorice with different flavor profiles and styles. There’s American twist licorice, Dutch salty licorice and Australian soft chew licorice. New Zealand even has its own brand, RJ’s Licorice.

I picked up this sample package at the Fancy Food Show earlier this year. It’s RJ’s Licorice Allsorts and they’re made with all natural ingredients, with no artificial colors. I thought this was a great idea, because I’m often turned off by weird flavors and aftertastes from artificial colors.

The other New Zealand twist on this is the flavor set for these candies, they come in four colors and flavors: Passion Fruit, Black Cherry, Lime and Orange.

RJ's Licorice Allsorts

They smell really good. They’re soft and have a strong anise and molasses note. The stack for the little sandwiches starts with a white layer or fondant, which seems to be unflavored or at least lightly flavored. Then there’s a thin square of black licorice. On top of that is the special flavored fondant. This fondant is just a soft sugar mixture, there’s no coconut in there like some Allsorts feature.

The orange pieces are Orange flavored. The white fondant is like a frosting, sugary and sweet and with only a light and soft touch of orange essence. There’s no tartness and little balance. The licorice layer is soft and pliable, chewy and has a nice profile. It’s a mix of woodsy molasses, toffee and other burnt flavors. It’s only the faintest bit bitter and quite sweet in that light way that licorice is. The white layer is unflavored, as far as I can tell.

The green looks rather like a highlighter and is Lime. This one was not entirely pleasant. I didn’t care for the lime layer, it was sweet and weirdly artificial even though it does use natural flavorings.

The faint pink is Black Cherry and has a great profile. The flavor is floral and a bit more punchy than the previous citrus ones. It dissipates quickly but still goes well with the licorice layer. It tasted far sweeter though on the whole than the other flavors.

The yellow sandwich was Passion Fruit which was the odd one in the batch. It was musky and had strong honey and floral notes. It goes pretty well with the licorice, which I never would have guessed. But still, it was a lot of different sweet notes, too much for me.

If you’re the type who likes very sweet and sugary candy, the type of person who eats straight sugar cube, this is a good choice. It wasn’t licorice-y enough for me and without enough of a fruity note from the fondant. I’ll stick to plain licorice from RJ’s for now.

Related Candies

  1. Trader Joe’s Allsorts -a- Licorice
  2. Gatos Licorice
  3. Haribo Pearlico Lakritz
  4. 12 European Licorices
  5. Leaf Schoolchalk, Allsorts & Pipes
  6. Lifesaver Musk
  7. Bassett’s Licorice Allsorts


Name: Licorice Allsorts
    RATING:
  • SUPERB
  • YUMMY
  • TASTY
  • WORTH IT
  • TEMPTING
  • PLEASANT
  • BENIGN
  • UNAPPEALING
  • APPALLING
  • INEDIBLE
Brand: RJ’s Licorice, Ltd.
Place Purchased: samples from Fancy Food Show
Price: $5.00 retail
Size: 6.3 ounces
Calories per ounce: 107
Categories: All Natural, Candy, Fondant, Licorice Candy, 5-Pleasant, New Zealand

POSTED BY Cybele AT 2:30 pm     All NaturalCandyReviewFondantLicorice Candy5-PleasantNew Zealand

Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Loukoumi Artisan Confections

Last week I wrote about one of the oldest known confections, Jordan Almonds. This week I’ve got a huge array of Lokum, or Turkish Delight in front of me.

Rose Turkish Delight Sweet jellies have been know for at least 500 years in the Middle East and Indian subcontinent. Early versions used honey and other fruit juices as a sweet base. Modern Turkish Delight uses sugar for the most part. But the result is similar. Instead of a firm and gelatinous confection like a true jelly (which has pectin as a thickener) or gummi (which uses gelatin as a thickener), Turkish Delight is a fiendishly simple, relying on a touch of starch and careful cooking to create a semi-solid cube of delicate, sweet flavor.

This is from Loukoumi Artisan Confections based in New Zealand since 1970. They use the traditional recipe for the product and it was absolutely fresh when I got it, so this was a real treat.

Rose Turkish DelightThe first flavor I ever tried of Turkish Delight (which I think I knew as Turkish Paste when I was a kid) was Rose. I find floral flavors to be fresh tasting for the most part, though I know many of us find them a bit soapy.

This rose was a medium pink (kind of alarming, but completely natural). The squares are heavily dusted with powdered sugar, which is the worst thing about Turkish Delight. It’s just not keyboard friendly.

The squares are surprisingly light, not dense and gelatinous, more soft and fleshy like Mochi can be. The texture is more like a soft and smooth paste than a jelly as well. Think of it like a firm honey.

The flavor is rather strong for rose - very straight ahead and traditional, like pushing your whole nose into a bouquet of heavily scented tea roses. But it melts easily on the tongue and doesn’t feel too clingy or cloying.

Manuka Honey & Rainforest Lemon Turkish DelightOne of the flavors that had me most excited when Ross McKenzie of Loukoumi contacted me was the line of Manuka Honey flavors. Manuka is from blossoms of the Tea Tree bush and has a strong balsam & spicy flavor to it. I tried the Manuka Honey & Rainforest Lemon which has aromatic Australian Lemon Myrtle.

I absolutely loved the design of the box on this one. Inside each of the boxes is an inset tray lined with light paper. They were only 250 grams instead of a full pound (I’m often stymied when I find Turkish Delight in prepacked pound boxes - I can’t eat all that!).

Even though the pieces are a delicate golden yellow color, there are no colorings in there, it’s all from the ingredients.

Honey & Lemon Verbena Turkish Delight

It smells like freshly baked lemon cake.

And oh, the flavor.

It feels a bit softer and smoother in the mouth than the Rose (if that’s possible). It’s not a sweet and has an aromatic quality that mixes the mellow honey notes with the light lemon, like a lemon essence or lemon balm.

It’s barely sweet, like a bubble of honey with a touch of zest to it.

I can see how Edmund would sell out his family for something like this.

Pomegranate Turkish DelightThe last flavor I got was one I wasn’t quite sure of from the description. Pomegranate.

All of the Turkish Delight I’ve had to date has been aromatically flavored, that is, it’s all about the scent of the flavor. Lemon, orange or rose, it’s never been juicy or tangy in any way.

This box even looks different from the others, with an extreme close up of luminous beads of pomegranate. It says: The sharp distinctive flavors of the pomegranate complement our soft, rich delight to create a perfectly balanced sweet that will leave your taste buds spellbound.

Pomegranate Turkish DelightThe scent is dark and jammy, like a mix of piping-hot blueberry pie and those raspberry filled shortbread cookies.

The flavor is at first sweet but dark and mellow, then the rich berry flavors come more forward. There’s a little tangy bite to it that really reminds me of a berry jam. It’s a much more intense flavor than the other Turkish Delight varieties here.

Loukoumi makes a wide variety of other flavors, I sampled but a few. They include the traditional array: Almond, Hazelnut, Lemon with Peel, Orange with Peel, Berry, Mint, Vanilla and Lime. And a range of gourmet flavors (many incorporating New Zealand & Australian flavors): Honey & Fig, Honey & Ginger, Honey & Hazelnut, Honey & Quince, Liquorice and Manuka Honey & Blackcurrant.

There are some major and minor issues with these confections. Turkish Delight is notoriously hard to eat. One of the things I like about most candies is that they’re usually pretty easy to portion out and are ready to eat out of the package and require little or no cleanup. I got powdered sugar everywhere trying to eat these out of the box. It’s a little easier when put a few pieces into a small dish and just ate it with it under my chin to catch the poof of powder.

The second issue is humidity. Dampness is not their friend. Luckily Southern California is a great climate to eat these, even when it’s visciously hot. But if they do get a little damp they will get a bit of a crust on the outside, just a bit of graininess. It won’t be great for the texture, but doesn’t impede the flavor.

The third issue is getting a hold of it. Their website isn’t up now, but I’m hoping that soon I’ll be able to tell you about a place here in North America that you can order from (and save the international shipping).

Those issues aside, this is the best Turkish Delight I think I’ve ever had. I am really curious to try many more of the flavors, especially the honey based ones.

This is why we keep traditional methods alive, they work.

UPDATE 2/27/2009: Natural Candy Store is having an insanely good sale on Loukoumi right now. If you’ve been curious to try it, now’s the time to grab some. They even had a custom box of Citrus Mix designed, so you can really get an assortment.

Related Candies

  1. Little Flower Candy Co
  2. Melville Candy Company Honey Spoons
  3. Nutpatch Nougats
  4. Regennas Clear Toys
  5. Halvah and Turkish Delight
  6. Candy Essay: Turkish Delight
  7. Turkish Delight
Name: Rose, Honey & Lemon Myrtle and Pomegranate Turkish Delight
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Loukoumi Artisan Confections
Place Purchased: samples from Loukoumi
Price: unknown
Size: 250 grams each
Calories per ounce: unknown
Categories: Jelly, New Zealand, All Natural

POSTED BY Cybele AT 1:12 pm    

Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Dove Beautiful vs Bloomsberry Beauty-Bar

Beautiful vs Beauty BarWith all the health claims & research studies revolving around chocolate these days it’s not surprising to see bars also capitalizing on our vanity to get a few more sales.

I got both these bars around the same time, both samples. The Dove Beautiful bar is fortified to help promote beautiful-looking skin. The Beauty-Bar from Bloomsberry & Co is formulated to make you feel gorgeous ... on the inside.

Dove Beautiful Bar

Well, I admit, it’s a beautiful bar to look at.

Dove Beautiful BarThe Dove Beautiful bar features vitamins C & E plus the natural flavanols in cocoa to make you attractive.

The full array of additives is: tricalcium phosphate (10% of the RDA of calcium), ascorbic acid (10% of the RDA of Vitamin C), vitamin E acetate (10% of the RDA of Vitamin E), niacinamide (10% of the RDA of Niacin), zinc oxide (10% of the RDA of Zinc) and biotin (10% of the RDA).

The bar looks a bit darker than the standard Dove Smooth Milk Chocolate fare. It has the same slightly soft snap. A sweet scent.

The melt is nice, a bit cool on the tongue, milky and less sticky than its unfortified counterpart.

The flavor has some dairy components to it ... and an odd taste as well. I can’t put my finger on it, but I want to say that it tastes like drinking out of a galvanized bucket. Slightly metallic ... not in a bad way, just in a narrowly noticeable way.

I’ve come to understand that I’m not the kind of person who likes to compromise on my candy. My candy is made for enjoyment and mucking around with the taste in order to pump up its nutritional value means that it simply doesn’t fulfill its primary obligation - make me happy. Instead it makes me furrow my brow ... and that’s not beautiful.

Rating: 5 out of 10

Beauty Bar - Bloomsberry & CoThe second bar is just another in Bloomsberry & Co. huge line of high end novelty bars.

Bloomsberry & Co. has made a name for themselves world-wide with their inventive, imaginative and whimsical box designs (flat pack Easter bunny and eat me have made me chuckle - laugh lines are beautiful right?). I have fully advocated using chocolate bars instead of greeting cards, and their line meets most needs with all the major holidays covered and a line with an ultra-modern take on romance (and chocolate obsession).

All that aside, the funky box is fun the first time, but just like the pretty picture on the greeting card, what does it say inside? Well, to start with, the foil inner wrapping is also lovely. It’s a graphic paper with a foiled paper under that ... plus the box. That’s a lot of protection.

Beauty Bar - Bloomsberry & Co

And all that protection paid off, the bar was pristine.

Instead of a lot of crazy additions, this is simply dark chocolate (sugar, chcoolate liquor, cocoa butter, soy lecithin & vanilla). It doesn’t say what the cacao percentage is.

If I understand it correctly the idea goes like this: if dark chocolate is what you want and if you get what you want, you’ll be happy and happy people are beautiful. Or something like that.

The bar is thick and has a profound snap to it. The flavor is well rounded, if a little bland. It satisfies a craving, but doesn’t really do much else to make me swoon. As the bars usually retail for $4 to $5, unless the box is just so spot on, I’m going to pass. There are some wonderful bars that not only come in nice packages (that say more about the chocolate than my desires, of course) but area also tasty on the inside.

Rating: 6 out of 10

Both bars are Kosher.

Related Candies

  1. Dove Silky Smooth Milk Chocolate Bars
  2. BonBonBars: Malt Ganache & Scotch
  3. Theo 3400 Phinney Bars
  4. Charles Chocolates Bars
  5. One Dollar Bars
  6. Vosges Exotic Candy Bars
Name: Beautiful & Beauty-Bar
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Dove & Bloomsberry & Co
Place Purchased: samples from Dove & All Candy Expo
Price: unknown
Size: 3.53 ounces
Calories per ounce: 156 & 160
Categories: Chocolate, United States, New Zealand, Mars, Kosher

POSTED BY Cybele AT 10:20 am    

Wednesday, September 20, 2006

Lifesaver Musk

Months and months ago a reader suggested I get familiar with a strange favorite it Australia - musk sticks. Basically they’re pressed candy stick flavored like musk. You know, the perfume. I figured if I’ve eaten violet candies, rosewater ice cream and 10 year old Lifesavers, there’s no reason I shouldn’t try these.

image

I found them at Mel & Rose’s, which seems to carry a lot of Australian candies. The package doesn’t make them look that appealing, the word musk has those little “smell wafts” coming off of it. The candies themselves are the pressed chalk variety like Pep-O-Mint, not a hard candy like the Butter Rum Lifesavers.

They smell like incense or a soap shop. It’s more like a lightly floral patchouli. So when I took the photo and then put the roll in my desk drawer, it was kind of like a sachet in there.

The little candy is sweet and of course easy to crunch. The flavor has no other notes besides this soapy detergent scent and made me wonder if this is what it’d be like to eat incense cones. There isn’t any listing of ingredients on the package or dietary info, so for all I know, they are meant to be burned.

I have no idea if the Lifesavers version of musk is consistent with the other musk sticks so popular in Australia and New Zealand, but I think my curiosity is satisfied. I suppose if I were trying to cover up strong mouth odors (like smoking or antibiotic side effects) this might be a good candy, but for some reason I think my neck should be perfumed, not my breath.

Note: though these candies are branded Lifesavers, they’re made by licensing agreement by Nestle.

Name: Lifesavers Musk
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Lifesavers (Nestle)
Place Purchased: Mel & Rose's
Price: $1.00
Size: 22 grams
Calories per ounce: unknown
Categories: Mint, New Zealand, Nestle

POSTED BY Cybele AT 6:22 am    

Thursday, February 16, 2006

SweeTarts Rope

There are a few new red licorice products out lately. Both Twizzlers and Wonka are in on this new explosion, perhaps fueled by Airheads’ new products.

image

The SweeTarts rope is one of those new products. Kind of like the Twizzler Twerpz, these are a cherry red licorice tube filled with a blue, sour paste which is then dotted with little crunchy Nerd bits.

The texture mix is really interesting. You have the rather bland chew of the licorice, which is soft and clingy. Then you have the soft, frosting-like sour paste that doesn’t have much flavor in it’s own right, but has these little crunchy bits that are powerfully packed with more sour.

I tried eating this several ways. I tried the traditional bite and chew method, which mixed the flavors and textures and variations of sour and sweet very nicely. Then I tried squeezing the rope until the blue sour paste came out. That wasn’t as satisfying because I couldn’t get most of the paste out that way.

I was tempted to find a sharp knife and slit the straw open and scrape out the blue goo ... but then I thought that was a little too evil and I just ate the rest of it the normal way.

The photo on the package of the cross-section shows colored Nerds in there, but I think they kind of dissolve after a while.

I think this is a fun new candy and I’d probably eat it under the right conditions, but in order to get me to buy it again, it’s gotta come in a citrus flavor variation. Given the choice, the Twerpz are gonna win out. I like the filling in those a bit better (it’s more like a Starburst fruit chew).

If you’ve tried them and want to tell Wonka what you think, they have an online feedback survey. This product was manufactured in New Zealand. I don’t think I’ve picked up a Nestle product in a long time that was actually manufactured in the United States. On another strange note, the Rope was rather hard to photograph. Something about its matte texture just sucked the light in and gave it this weird velvety look in the photos. They’re not really that alien looking.

UPDATE 4/5/2009: It appears that the SweeTarts Rope has been discontinued. However, Nestle is introducing a new product called Kazoozles that looks an awful lot like these. Keep an eye out for them.

Related Candies

  1. Candy Tease: Spring 2009
  2. Wonka Tinglerz & Nestle Buncha Crunch
  3. Wonka Nerds Jelly Beans
  4. Head to Head: Chewy SweeTarts vs Chewy Tart n Tinys
  5. SweeTarts: Chicks, Ducks & Bunnies (2006)
Name: SweeTarts Rope
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Wonka (Nestle)
Place Purchased: 7-11 (Hollywood)
Price: $.85
Size: 2.1 ounces
Calories per ounce: 104
Categories: Chew, New Zealand, Nestle

POSTED BY Cybele AT 9:28 am    

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