Also, there won’t be an entry a week from tonight–Friday the 6th–because I’m going to my first chocolate tasting! It’s at Pudd’nhead books in Webster Groves. If anyone in the St. Louis area wants to go, leave a comment and I’ll double check on the times for you.
Yay 60! I thought it would be fun to review the one candy I almost always have somewhere in my room. I just love these little candies and yes, they do spark in a dark room when chewed, just like everyone says.
You can either get these individually wrapped in a bag or in the classic roll; the ones in the bag are larger, and thus my favorite. The smell is sharp spearmint–some people (my father included) liken the scent to icy hot. The candies are in the classic ring shape and an opaque white.
The candies in the bag seem to vary in texture and intensity of flavor (that’s what keeps them from getting them a ten). Some of them are softer and have a very subtle mint flavor. Others–the best ones-are very crunchy with a spicy, sharp mint flavor that I find most enjoyable. Although I like both kinds, uniformity would be nice.
Other than that, if you’re a wintergreen/spearmint fan like I am, these are wonderful and delicious.
Bissinger’s is a local candy store, although their candy is sold in other locales as well. Apparently, they started in Europe in the 1600s and have been in St. Louis since the 1800s.
They’re meant to be a bit upscale, and the pumpkin bark is packaged that way, inside a dark green box with gold lettering. The bark itself is lovely–a large piece of light brown milk chocolate with wavy edges and orange swirled in among the brown chocolate.
I was a bit dubious of the idea of pumpkin bark–it could be very good or very bad. I didn’t know if they were going for pumpkin, as a vegetable, or pumpkin as in pumpkin pie. I had an idea that it may be the latter because Bissinger’s tends to lean towards the traditional.
My fears were unfounded. Wonderfully creamy chocolate is infused with hints of pumpkin and touches of cinnamon and nutmeg. It’s almost like eating a small piece of pumpkin pie with a very good chocolate sauce on top. This isn’t something you can scarf down like a plain milk chocolate, but it’s nice to have a very good chocolate to savor. This was incredibly delicious and deserves my highest rating.
Here’s part two of my Monastery candy review. The candy is the same as Wednesday–little caramel squares covered with chocolate with a swirl on top. The dark and milk candies are alternated in rows. The milk chocolate caramels smell a little creamier than the dark chocolate, but there isn’t much a difference in the aroma.
The caramel tastes exactly the same, and to be honest, the chocolate does too. The minimal roasted notes in the dark version are absent, and there’s a slight creaminess, but otherwise the tastes are quite similar. This isn’t a flaw exactly, as the chocolate is quite delicious, but it is worth mentioning.
The caramel is just as delicious and again, this a great treat for caramel lovers.
Just as the name says, these candies were made in a monastery. This brand employs monks and nuns to make their candies. Their website name is monasterycandy.com, which I find both informative and amusing. The assortment includes both dark and milk chocolate; I’ll be reviewing the milk chocolate on Friday
These are small chocolate-dipped squares in a blue box with a silver-detailed picture of a monastery on the front. The aroma is a definite cocoa smell, but it’s hard to pick out any specific notes, perhaps because of the mixed chocolates in the box.
The chocolate is of good quality, and it’s nice and thick. However, aside from slight roasted notes, it doesn’t come off as “dark” to me. It’s fine other than that, but I was hoping for something closer to the Riesen coating.
However, the star here is meant to be the caramel, and it delivers. The flavor is rich and buttery with vanilla notes, and the consistency is neither too firm nor too stringy. A real treat for caramel lovers.
I thought it was time to review a childhood favorite. This was also my dad’s least favorite candy, because it spills easily, gets everywhere, and lurks in car backseats, only to be found 10 yeasr later when you’re cleaning out the car to sell. I still don’t tell him when I bring a box into the house.
I bought the jumbo box–which has ten ounces worth of Nerds in assorted flavors–but they are perhaps best known for their small boxes which are split in two, with each side containing a different flavor. The Nerds logo used to be in block letters in the early 90s, a useless fact that I thought was worth sharing.
Nerds are, basically, tiny candy nuggets in different colors and with different flavors, all with a slight, tangy sourness. Flavors include strawberry, grape, watermelon, and others, and while the taste is on the artificial side of the fruit flavor spectrum, they’re still quite appealing.
These aren’t gourmet quality or close to it, but still delicious and a nice treat.
I apologize for the lack of review yesterday. I’ve decided to go on a Monday-Wednesday-Friday review schedule. School’s gotten a bit rough, and this will allow me to stretch out my candy stash a little more, too.
So on to the review of the day. I was a little nervous about this. The most cacao content I ever had had was somewhere in the fifties, and I was a little worried about this being overly dry, astringent, and scary. The chocolate has a very intense aroma, which did little to assuage these fears.
The bar is in the same cardboard envelope packaging as the milk chocolate Valor; the chocolate is very dark in color with a nice loud snap and a lovely gloss to it. And the taste is so much better than I was expecting. Yes, it is intense, with tobacco notes not found in lighter chocolates. But the flavor is so much more rounded, and so satisfying–I only needed one square of this. It was much sweeter than I expected, and not as dry, either.
Thanks to this I’m ready to try higher percentages–a solid 5.
My first Spanish chocolate! I have a 72% Cacao bar from them in my review box as well, but I spent the day ironing out the mess that is my course schedule and I needed something tried and true.
The chocolate is packaged in what has become my preferred format, a heavy cardboard envelope with the chocolate sealed in foil. This particular bar is broken up into fourteen pieces, each with the Valor name. The chocolate is glossy, well-molded, and with an inviting, creamy aroma similar to Dairy Milk in its powers to draw me in. Almonds–whole ones at that–stick out of the underside.
The chocolate melts at a touch, a sign of its quality, and its taste is authentic and rich–the box indicates that it contains 34% cocoa, not bad. I’m not knocked on my back with sweetness, nor do I feel like I have to have more to get a fix–two of the squares were quite adequate for me. There was the slightest astringency to the chocolate, which normally I wouldn’t like, but here I did. The almonds deserve special note–whole, crunchy, and divinely fresh, they lent an earthy, nutty finish to the chocolate.
I had never heard of this brand before and was a little worried, but I can’t wait to try more. A much-needed upgrade from Hershey’s Almond, and too yummy for words.
The only black licorice I’ve ever had is Good and Plenty, and it seemed time to change that. I decided to start with something safe–I know there’s stronger black licorice out there, but I wanted to acclimate myself to it.
The licorice wheels are fairly large and made of a strand of licorice wound around and around to form the wheel. They’re light black and smell like a combination of anise and molasses– quite appetizing! Quite a few come to the bag–Haribo gives you a lot of candy for the money, which is always a good thing.
The wheels are slightly sticky, but not too much so, and the bite is firm–not too chewy, but with a little bite to it. The licorice flavor is definitely there and definitely noticeable, but it isn’t too strong for me–the taste has a clean, refreshing air to it that I really enjoy.
A good introduction to a candy I have long neglected–perhaps I’ll learn to be a little more adventurous someday.
I just loved Droste’s White Chocolate Pastilles, and I got these for Christmas from the same neighbor who gave me the peppermint bark. I’ve been trying to appreciate milk chocolate more lately, and these should help.
Like all of Droste’s pastilles, the milk chocolate comes in small wafers sealed inside a foil tube, which is then tucked inside a cardboard tube–this time blue. The wafers have a cool chocolate aroma that remind me slightly of a chocolate milkshake.
The wafers have a great firm bite and a lovely slow melt, which allows you to let the sweetness spread on your tongue. The milk adds creaminess and sweetness, but it’s a lovely sort of restrained sweetness, more rounded than a lot of milk chocolate. Two wafers–which is only 60 calories–makes a lovely treat.
This would make a great chocolate to keep around the house for a daily snack.
