sugarhog.net

Well, we’re close to the beginning of a new semester.  I’ve got a 300 level course to teach this semester, and it starts at eight in the morning.  Such a joy, I can’t even begin to tell you.  On the bright side, teaching this class, which is about leisure in the modern world, should be very useful while studying for my qualifying exams.

Mitsuya Cider is a carbonated beverage from Japan, which used to be sold in ornate metal bottles, and is now sold in boring plastic bottles.  It’s an old drink, dating back to 1884.  These candies are mixed flavors, including the original cider, peach, apple and grape.

Each individually wrapped piece is round and about marble sized.  They are mildly effervescent, not so much that you can see bubbles on the surface, but you can feel a foamy fizz on the tongue.  The only catch with the effervescence is that it gives the candies a rough surface, which is a little harder on the mouth.  They don’t have major voids or sharp edges.

Grape: This flavor is more like a concord grape than a popsicle-style grape.  It’s a fairly intense flavor, and could be overwhelming, but it settles down after a short time.

Cider: This is really good.  It’s a lemon-lime flavored piece, but it’s very smooth, almost creamy.  The fizziness kind of detracts from this piece - while I can see carbonation in a drink making it better, the foamy texture of the fizz (baking soda is a part of it) doesn’t really work with more subtle flavors.

Apple: A slightly tart, natural cider flavor, just like I would expect a cider candy to taste.

Peach: I don’t much care for this one.  The peach flavor is kind of musty, with a lighter peach flavor as mostly an aftertaste.  Peach is a tough flavor to get right - it’s a very light, fresh, subtle flavor, and this doesn’t quite catch it.

As a side not, Tootsie Roll is running a contest.  At the end of the twelve-month sweepstakes, five people will win 27 pounds of Tootsie Roll candies!  Oh, and one person will win $50,000, which can be used to purchase far more than 27 pounds of candies.

LOWDOWN: Very nice flavors, but the fizz is distracting.

SCORE: 6.5 out of 10

Purchased at: Saraga

Price: 2.49

Today’s entry is a little different.  You see, I went to the State Fair yesterday, and that met my grease and sugar content needs for the next few days.  I figured I would talk about the sweet things I ate yesterday instead.

Deep-Fried Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups: These are fairly straight-forward - a Reese’s PBC covered in batter and deep fried, then stuck on a toothpick and covered with powdered sugar.  If they sound a little nauseating, they are.  It is rich, and tastes a lot like a doughnut with a peanut butter center and a bit of chocolate.  Although the chocolate melted, the peanut butter stayed fairly intact.  One was enough, especially since I had already had a big chunk of a…

Deep-Fried Twinkie: These come covered with powdered sugar and chocolate syrup.  The vendor assured me that my tongue would think my taste buds had died and gone to flavor heaven.  My own assessment was that it was good and interesting, but no perceived death took place.  It’s not obvious that there is a Twinkie in it - it sort of blends with the batter and makes something spongy but dense at the same time.  I won’t get it again, but it was all right.

Caramel Apple: A classic.  The apples they were using hadn’t become mealy, and the caramel was good.  It’s one of those things I can’t miss when I go to the fair.

Peach Cider Slush: It’s a drink, but substantial enough that I’m counting it as a food.   My God, these are good.  It tastes just like drinking a peach, and it even has little bits of fruit floating around in it.  It was a much more appealing slush than a slushy whose flavor is “red”.

 Elephant Ear: The last time I went to Six Flags, I got a funnel cake.  It turned out they used pre-made, frozen funnel cakes which they then dropped in the fryer.  It was awful, and it made me pay attention to how things like fennel cakes or elephant ears.  These were made from scratch (well, dry mix, anyway), rolled out flat, fried and served with cinnamon sugar.  It was light, crisp and chewy, just the way they are supposed to be.

Cotton Candy: Of course.  I do miss the days when you could ask for specific flavors or colors, instead of getting a bag with three or four assorted balls.  I miss the cones, too, although seeing as I still have more than half of the cotton candy left, it’s probably better this way.  Sweet, melty bits of fiberglass-textured sugar.  Banana is my favorite flavor.

I didn’t try the deep-fried cookie dough - I had a chance, but it looked highly unappealing after all the other greasy food.  I highly recommend going to the fair with others - it’s the only way to come out not weighing two thousand pounds.  Check out the hog barn - seeing the half-ton boar made the deep-fried bananas foster cheesecake on a stick even less appealing.

Chuao is a fairly new chocolate company, and its claim to fame is using Venezualan chocolate in various unusual combinations.  It has grown at a good clip, with boutiques from coast to coast (4 in San Diego and 1 in Miami counts as coast-to-coast, right?).  It’s best known for its interesting truffles and bars, with the Pods being a recent addition.

The top of the cardboard box lifts up, with two stacks of three pieces side-by-side.  They’re tidily packed, and it almost looks like a display box.  Each piece is quite thin, shaped like a cacao pod, and emblazoned with “Chuao Pods” in a rather swoopy font.  The dark chocolate is not thick, and really needs the structured packaging to keep them from becoming a mash of chocolate and caramel rather than a pod.

The dark chocolate is pleasant and fruity, with a moderate strength to it.  It has a bit of waxiness, but not too bad.  The caramel is very sweet, with warm undertones and an almost florid fruitiness.  I wasn’t sure I liked these at first, then, as I ate it, I liked it, and then, once it was done, I wasn’t so sure again.  At first, the flavors don’t blend well.  The chocolate tastes too bitter and the caramel tastes too sweet.  As I ate it, the flavors began to blend.  They came into balance, and the warmth of the caramel comes into play.  It all works well together.  Afterwards, the flavors separate again, leaving a rather sticky feeling in my mouth.  You’ll probably want something to drink with these.

LOWDOWN: The middle is great, either end is so-so.

SCORE: 7 out of 10

Purchased at: Costco World Market

Price: 4.99

I didn’t even know Pez came in chocolate.  I’m a fan of the old fruit flavors, and I’m always up for a new variety.  I saw these and thought, Pez and chocolate do not go together in my mind.  At all.

The scent is much like a chocolate sucker, very sweet and sort of chocolatey.  It also reminds me of chocolate soda, which I used to drink all the time (when I could get my hands on it) through my childhood.  The pieces are very pale buff.  Each piece is stamped with the Pez name, and looks just like a Pez should.  They do, of course, fit into the classic Pez dispensers, but I didn’t see any that were sold as part of a dispenser pack - they only came in refills.

The flavor is… wierd.  It doesn’t taste like chocolate at all, other than as a mild aftertaste.  It’s very sweet and has a fruity, almost cherry-like flavor.  It’s unappealing, which is not something I ever thought I would say about a Pez.  I don’t have any desire to keep eating them, even though I normally can’t stop eating them until the package is empty. 

LOWDOWN: Certainly not inedible, but not appealing.

SCORE: 3.5 out of 10

Purchased at: Costco World Market

Price: 1.49

I lifted this picture from Candy Addict.  My camera battery is down and the battery recharger is mysteriously missing.

These, along with Bottle Caps, were the cola-flavored candies that dominated my youth.  I didn’t eat a lot of them, but they were fun, and they looked like little bottles, and they were cheap.  When you’re pulling in a couple bucks a week, cheap was a major factor.

Over time, I’ve come to favor softer gummies.  Haribo candies are not hard, nor are they teeth stickers, but they require quite a bit of chewing.  The flavor is great - it’s a classic Coke flavor, with a bit of a kick.  It’s just like it’s always been, and the chewiness makes each piece last a while.  While I can’t say that I love them as much as I used to, they’re still a fun thing to eat.

LOWDOWN: Good flavor, chewy, nostalgic.

SCORE: 7 out of 10

Purchased at: Target

Price: 1.99

I love the packaging on this candy - there’s something about the vending machine look and the smiling bottle of orange drink that just make me feel happy.  The mix is based on five popular Japanese drinks: Dakara, C.C. Lemon, Natchan Fruity Orange, Caffe Latte Boss and Dekavita C.  It apparently used to contain C.C. Grape and BikkleThere’s a whole bunch of fruit juice in these, which is always a good sign.  There’s Oolang tea extract, but no coffee, which is a bit alarming, given that there is a Caffe Latte in the mix.

Dakara is apparently a planet on StarGate.  The Dakara in this package tastes nothing like a planet and more like a blend of pineapple and grapefruit.  These are hard candies.  Fortunately, they’re not “slice the inside of your mouth” hard.  Dakara is a little overwhelming, but pleasantly tart and refreshing.

C.C. Lemon is very lemony, but has a vaguely soapy flavor.  That’s a problem some lemon candies run into.  There’s a bit of fizziness to it, which gives it a nice edge, but I can’t say it’s all that great.

Natchan Fruity Orange has a fairly mild candy-orange taste, reminding me of orange Tang.  It has an awful lot of sharp edges, and I had to be careful not to cut my mouth on it.

Dekavita C is… um… sharp.  And fizzy.  I don’t know what the flavor is, but it’s definitely some kind of citrus.  According to its manufacturers, it’s a “health tonic,” which aren’t well known for producing delicious candies.  It tastes healthy.  Take that however you want it.

Given my “coffee is icky” taste buds, I have passed on the Caffe Latte to an actual coffee drinker to review.  She has declared it “very good.”  I can personally tell you that it smells very good and is a nice, even tan.  You’ll just have to try it for yourself to see if my proxy reviewer got it right.

LOWDOWN: Decent candies, especially if you like citrus, but watch for sharp edges.

SCORE: 6.5 out of 10

Purchased at: Saraga

Price: 2.49

This seems like a good week to do some soda-related candies.  Why?  I really have no clue, except that it’s hot, and it seems like a good time for a theme.  I haven’t done any theme weeks for ages. 

By the way, if you have your own blog, there is one candy you may want to avoid.  It is a spam magnet, which will get you more porno links than you can shake a stick at.  Well… maybe that’s not the best analogy…  I am going to space it out so this entry doesn’t get overrun with offers for the latest barely legal hardcore XXX anti-arousalfest - H o n e e s.  Typing all those words together was probably also not a good idea, but seriously, my spam filter catches dozens of comments a day for that entry.  Having said that, I am confident that the word Poppers will in no way be set upon by spambots offering 500 different types of semi-legal aphrodisiacs and “experience enhancers”.

These candies have an interesting concept behind them.  They are hard candies, flavored like A&W Rootbeer, 7-Up, Dr. Pepper and Crush Orange, with a liquid center.  The soft drinks they used are second-tier, meaning they are not the exclusive property of Coke or Pepsi.  It always surprises me that Dr. Pepper is not one of the Big Ones, because it’s one of my favorite candies.  It’s distributed by Pepsi in some parts of the country, Coke in other parts, and as an independent bottler in others.

The candies are little barrels about the size of a Tootsie Midgie.  The flavors are true, for the most part.  The A&W tastes like a root beer barrel, the 7-Up is nice and lemony and the Crush tastes of orange pop.  The Dr. Pepper tastes a little off - I can’t say what it is, exactly, but it definitely has a medicinal taste, like it’s something I should be consuming because Mom said I had to.  I think it has too much of that prune flavor.  I can’t say I’m too into the “liquid center”.  I put that in quotes because, while technically a liquid, it’s a rather sludgy syrup which doesn’t lend anything to the experience other than encouraging the candy to stick to my teeth.  It become overwhelming, taste-wise, in the root beer flavor, making it into a root beer atomic fireball.  I like root beer quite a bit, but I don’t think I could have several in a row.  Orange and 7-Up were more consistent and slightly more subtle.

LOWDOWN: 50% good all the way, 25% good most of the way, 25% think I’ll pass.

SCORE: 6.5 out of 10

Purchased at: I don’t remember

Price: ?

For some reason, the kid on the Kinder package gives me the creeps.  Maybe it’s the way that he looks the exact opposite of the candy, which is what he should be looking at.  Maybe it’s the super-gelled hair.  Most likely, it’s the enormous, glowingly-white teeth and the perfect, perfect skin.  It’s just… kind of creepy.

Anyway, this box contains eight bars, each of which is a touch wider and a touch shorter than a KitKat.  Each bar has a milk-cream center and a milk chocolate exterior.  Kinder chocolate is good.  It’s very milky, sweet and mild, but it is mostly sweet.  It really doesn’t have much personality to it.  The center is…  well, I can’t say I love.  It has a fairly dry, very sweet powdered milk flavor, and that’s not a taste I can get behind.  It’s most popular among kids, and I can see why.  It’s about as close as one can get to mainlining sugar, a taste popular with the little ones but less satisfying for adults.

LOWDOWN: Leave it for the kids.

SCORE: 4 out of 10

Purchased at: Meijer

Price: ?

I almost missed this variation on the classic Kiss.  We don’t have a Walgreen’s in Bloomington (although we get the commercials ad nauseum), but there is one on the way to Indianapolis.  We stopped for non-candy related reasons, and these happened to be sitting by the register, just the one bag all on its lonesome.  I haven’t seen them anywhere else, so good luck on finding them!

This Kiss is molded milk chocolate, with a marshmallow-flavored creme in the center.  The creme is fairly light, like a marshmallow should be, but it lacks the slightly resiliant sponginess.  It reminds me of marshmallow creme you can buy in jars.  It has a slight roasted flavor to it.  The first thing I always wonder when I see a product combining chocolate and marshmallow is, how will this taste with graham crackers?  I just so happened to have a bag of cinnamon graham Goldfish, so I can tell you that they taste pretty darned good.  In fact, I liked them better in combination.  They’re less obnoxiously, throat-constrictingly sweet that way.  I don’t think anything containing marshmallow would taste right unless it was ridiculously sweet, so these fit the bill.

LOWDOWN: Good on their own, better sandwiched between cinnamon graham crackers.

SCORE: 8 out of 10

Purchased at: Walgreens

Price: 3.29

Isn’t that a cute little caveman?  I’ve gone with calling them caveman chocolate because the only English on this package is Lotte, the name of the company.

Each irregularly-shaped piece has a candy coating in heather-grey tinted earth tones, making the pieces resemble tumbled rocks.  The candy coating is fairly thin, but adds a nice crunch.  I really like the chocolate in these.  It’s not as sweet as an M&M, smooth and creamy.  It melts quickly, so by the time I finished chewing on the candy shell, the chocolate had melted away.  They’re kind of addictive.  It’s a pity I don’t have any caveman-themed events coming up, because these would be cool candies to decorate a cake.

LOWDOWN: Yummy and fun.

SCORE: 7.5 out of 10

Purchased at: Saraga

Price: 0.99