Monday, February 8, 2010

Who Dat Candy

That was one hell of a Super Bowl!! After going to a Saint's game and putting together a sales meeting where we created the Sell Dat Nation in Baton Rouge, I was totally cheering for the Saints.

So in honor of the Super Bowl champs, we'll check out some Louisiana treats. I snagged all these in the airport (which means they were insanely overpriced - but what the hell).

These "Gator Bites" are "fudge dipped mini sandwich cookies with toffee sprinkles":




I guess the toffee "sprinkles" are the gator teeth. These are not bad - especially if you are stuck in the airport for three hours with nothing else to eat. Are they extraordinary? No - they are cheap cookies covered with cheap chocolate. The toffee really helps. I believe toffee makes everything better. These are by Shakespeare's Chocolate - www.shakechocolate.com based in IOWA. Don't really think of Iowa as the gator capital of the world.

I found these in Target? Walmart? Hell, I can't remember:




Wow - how different they look! They are really the exact same thing minus the toffee. They have a thicker coating of chocolate. They are made by Nassau Candy www.nassaucandy.com. While they look better, I actually like the sloppier looking gator bites better. Who dat!! Less chocolate and more cookie seems to work better here. But don't forget the toffee!.

New Orleans is known for their pralines. These are all by Aunt Sally's and they are basically sugar, pecans, corn syrup, evaporated milk, cream, butter, and molasses. These are so NOT light!!! Let's face it - New Orleans is not known for it's health food.











This one was weird - I swear it had a strange bacon like taste! What the hell? Didn't like it.

This one was even more horrible to me:



It looks just like the first one, but has Tabasco sauce in it. Yuck. I like my candy to be sweet, not spicy. Definitely not working for me. Bleech!

Hey - chocolate!! Triple chocolate!!





This was okay - I like the nuts, but I'd rather have chocolate than this butter, cream, corn syrup, thing. These pralines just aren't working for me. Yucko.

It looks good, though, right?






I thought the lite version would be horrible, but it was actually the best of all! Whoa! At 85% less sugar and 40% less calories, why eat that other crap?






This one is a chewy rather than a creamy praline:





Look at all these nuts!! I thought this would be awesome!!






Not so much. I'd rather have the pecans with a light glaze or covered in chocolate or just naked. Boo!



Here's the same thing by Woody's, but it also has walnuts:









I like the addition of the walnuts - helps offset all the sweetness. But still - eh. What a waste of a lot of good nuts.






Awww. At least we had the Gator Bites. And the Super Bowl. Who dat!!!!!!

4 comments:

diane said...

Just goes to show you that regional options still may not be better than a good ol' Reese's cup (or 2)!

Denise Ryan said...

Diane - you get a BIG amen! on that one!!! Have you had any of those little hearts? LOVE them!!

Melissa Nott said...

I'm impressed by your blog and also the fact that you appear to be quite thin. How do you do it? Chocolate covered cookies can be made to your own taste in a few simple steps at home. A link to my recipe is here. I call them "potluck" cookies because they're so easy to whip up before a gathering. Delicious . . . thanks for the beautiful pictures in this blog.

Denise Ryan said...

Melissa - the cookies sound great! And thanks for the compliment! : ) I'm still hoping they'll invent a "eat whatever you want and not gain weight pill"!