Shamu and the Cherry Tree

Hi Gang! Sorry for the long break - I've been extremely busy motivating as many people as possible. (And stocking up on Easter candy!! Soon to come!)

I have to finish up the whole cherry thing - there's just no better time than the present.

Endangered Species Chocolate has a 48% cocoa milk chocolate with cherries bar. This is one of those bars that have a kumbayah component:

10% of net profits are donated to help support species, habitat and humanity. (I guess that covers just about everything.) Inside the wrapper, you can read all about the dolphin. (Too bad it wasn't the killer whale.) You get some info about dolphins and some clever ideas on how you can help save the species - example: "pick up litter everyday - trash is often confused with food by mammals." Hell, just yesterday I saw a dolphin on the side of the road trying to eat a Whopper wrapper.

Killer whales confuse stupid humans for food too. As do tigers. That's not on the wrapper.

Here's the actual chocolate, but when you're saving a species, who cares, right?

The chocolate is okay - nothing bad, smooth. But cherries? What cherries? I can't smell them, I can't taste them. I can see a few. They are there, but the flavor is completely overpowered by the chocolate. Why bother? Oh yeah - to help the dolphins. Kumbayah.

Seeds of Change has some kumbayah propaganda too - "1% of net sales are used to advance the cause of sustainable organic agriculture worldwide." It's all about the organic thing.

I love their packaging - inside are three individually wrapped bars. Much better than just one giant bar.

I like the darker chocolate (61% cacao) much better with the cherries and I can taste them better. This is a really good bar. And I have to say the Seeds of Change sales rep at candy expo was the best! She was so enthusiastic and nice!!

New Tree has lots of different flavors - this one is Blush. It's billed as "rejuvenating" (sounds like a line for spas):

These boxes are little - two inches tall - one inch wide - with three pieces inside. Cute.

Taste? Ugh. 73% cocoa - and cherry? I can't sense any cherry. The only way I can think of to describe these is bland. Bland chocolate - that's just depressing. I do not feel rejuvenated.

Chocolove is one of my favorites:

Now this isn't fair because this bar also has almonds which makes it REALLY delicious. Crunchy nuts, chewy cherries and nice dark chocolate.

I love Chocolove!!

Seattle Chocolates has the most gorgeous wrappers - I love them! Very colorful and so art deco!

This is a dark chocolate truffle bar with praline pecans and cherries.

The truffle filling gives this bar a creamy rich taste, but I can't taste any cherries. I'm sad - I had high hopes for this bar! Not very exciting.

Even Choxie has a bar with cherries:

This is a mini bar in dark chocolate with almonds and cherries.

And as with all the Choxie that has gone before - yuck. It has a cherry taste (a nice change from some of these) but the chocolate is awful.

This Choxie bar sounds great - solid milk chocolate with roasted Mission almonds, cashews and Montmorency tart cherries. The nuts are there, the cherries are there, but the bar still sucks. Choxie just isn't very good. Here, Shamu!

Looks good, but the Hershey bar with almonds is much better.

This bar has all the goodies just sprinkled on top - no cherries, but strawberries, blueberries, cranberries and white chocolate chips. It's from Hebert Candies (http://www.hebertcandies.com/) and is a Fully Loaded bar. I mean that's the name, it's clearly fully loaded.

It looks pretty good, right?

And it is! Truly! But all those berries and the white chocolate make it too sweet for me. The chocolate is WAY better than Choxie. It's an interesting and good bar - worth trying. If it had nuts, I would LOVE it!!!

The Twin Bing is by the Palmer Candy company (http://www.palmercandy.com/) - not to be confused with R.M. Palmer, the maker of copious quantities of el cheapo chocolate. I read about this candy bar - it's one of those first made back in 1923. And I was prepared to hate it. I mean look at it!

It has a cherry flavored center surrounded by chocolate, wrapped in a ball of chopped peanuts in chocolate. It looks kind of creepy. I made be the only person alive who likes this, but I do! I took one tentative bite and then ate the whole thing! I can't explain it. Maybe I confused it with food.

It's no gourmet treat (that's not a real cherry in there) and it's not something I would buy again, but I gotta tell you, I liked it way more than I thought I would. It must be the peanuts? I have no explanation.

Did you have any idea there was so much cherry and chocolate candy out there? I'm not a huge cherry fan, but the ones I can't stop eating are the cherry cordial Hershey's Kisses! I love them.

Takeaways?

Try new things - you never know what you might really like.

As always, don't judge a candy bar (or Bing) or anything else by its appearance. Things can look ugly and still be awesome. It's what's on the inside that counts.

And finally, don't get in the mouth of a killer whale.

A Poxie on Choxie

Hang in there, gang! We are almost done with all the holiday chocolate!

I've got some more Choxie we need to review. The first is a three pack of holiday bars:

This one is a milk chocolate creme brulee truffle bar:

Wow - this is a pretty good, albeit RICH bar. It is "caramel and vanilla infused white chocolate truffle with a touch of toffee, blanketed with milk chocolate." It's the toffee that makes it so good - I wasn't expecting it. It mimics the carmelization on the top of a real creme brulee. I am shocked and astonished and thrilled. VERY sweet and rich, but a good bar.

Of all the Choxie gingerbread offerings, this one is the best. It's a milk chocolate gingerbread truffle bar. It has some gingerbread cookie pieces in in, but they are relatively small (unlike those horrible bits). But this is nothing to run out and buy. Nothing great.

The hazelnut bar had a lot of bloom on it, looking pretty crappy I must say:

This is the milk chocolate hazelnut biscotti truffle bar. The description reads: "satiny milk chocolate yields to reveal a duet of tastes and textures, with pieces of crisp almond biscotti and hazelnuts throughout." Oh la, la! After seeing that bloom, I was skeptical. But damn, this was the best one! I love nuts, so the hazelnut flavor was a big hit with me. I thought the biscotti might make it too dry, but no - delish! I am shocked!!

But I will not remain so for long:

These are dessert truffle meltaways and the assortment is pretty even:

You know how I hate it when you get ten of one flavor and three of another.

The first one is apple pie:

I think apple pie is one of those flavors that doesn't need to be a chocolate. This did taste like apple pie, but was such a poor rendition of apple pie that it's not worth it. Maybe if the center was creamier? I don't know - let's just say one of these was enough to last me the rest of my life. And I like apple pie. But not these.

Pumpkin Pie:

Yucko - all I can taste is a weird spice - no pumpkin. Gross. And I love pumpkin. Evil.

Dark chocolate mousse:

This wasn't too bad - had a good rich dark chocolate taste. But it isn't the best dark chocolate in the Universe. And everything else in the assortment is horrifying.

Gingerbread:

What happened? The bar was good! This is horrible! It doesn't taste like gingerbread and has a weird aftertaste.

All I can say about this box is YUCK.

So far, all I can endorse are the bars. The rest of this stuff is pretty terrible. This is the last of the Choxie holiday stuff - the "Slice of the Holidays" truffle collection:

More pie. I'm scared. First up is milk chocolate pumpkin pie:

Huh? I can't taste any pumpkin. The outer truffle shell is pretty thick and these also have more chocolate in the center of the truffle. Unusual - something about their production. Boo!!


This is dark chocolate cherry pie:

Tastes a little like cherry, but nothing great. Again, maybe too much chocolate? See the lines of chocolate through the filling?


Key lime pie:

This was very not good. I'm not sure I'm the best one to judge because I don't really like key lime, but it tasted kind of fake - kind of chemically. Ew.

White chocolate banana creme pie:

Ugh - same for banana. These are really just not good. The chocolate isn't very smooth and the flavors seem off - not authentic.


Apple pie:

Again, awful. Chemical? Weird spice? Makes me want to taste an apple. Creepy.


Pecan pie:

Glaaack. These are all bad, bad, bad.

Here's what I think about Choxie to date:

Very cool boxes and the chocolate is great to look at. They have some awesome designs.

The bars are good - we'll try some more.

The other stuff - truffles, etc. - is really bad. And this stuff isn't really cheap (a la Palmer), so it should taste a little better.

Thoughts:

Just because it can be chocolate, doesn't mean it should be chocolate. Apple pie ROCKS. Apple pie chocolates are the spawn of Satan.

Another example - Quaker just made a creme brulee rice cake. Would you like to ponder that for a moment? I'd go so far as to say the exact culinary opposite of creme brulee is the rice cake. No good can come of this.

Fancy packages do not mean good content. Over and over we learn this. I'm going to start wearing burlap.

Two rights can make a wrong. Apple pie = right. Chocolate = right. Apple pie + chocolate = wrong. Very wrong.

Two rights can make an even better right. Chocolate = right. Peanut butter = right. Chocolate + Peanut butter = yahoo!!!!

Food math is confusing. I need a Reese's.

A Chocolate Sheep in Wolf's Clothing

You all know I appreciate it when companies make new, special products for the holidays. Not just different wrappers, but actual different chocolates - either their shape or color or flavor - it's festive and I like it!

But sometimes, there is just a truly pathetic rip-off.

I saw these and thought they were something special for the holidays:

Imagine my surprise when I opened the box and saw that all Mars did was slide a festive box over the same old product:

Oh - so Mars killed all those extra trees for THAT? Just to fool suckers like me? (Some body call the Naked cowboy! Maybe we can get in on his lawsuit!)

They even changed the plate the Twixels sit on to a fancy Christmas plate But it's just the same ol' Twixels. Cheaters. Here's what they look like inside:

Each one is only 35 calories, but trust me, if you open this package, you ain't eating just one.

I like Twix okay - I like the cookie, chocolate, caramel thing. In comparing these three flavors, however, Triple Chocolate is too chocolately for me.

French Vanilla is pretty good, especially if you're a big vanilla fan. It would be my second choice.

Caramel is my favorite. Now I wouldn't send you out in a rush to get these, unless you're having a party. If you're like me, once I start eating these little sticks, I find it hard to stop. Better to just get a bar - there's more caramel and the portion is controlled way better. And this holiday scam just pisses me off.

Speaking of pissing me off, look at this packaging fiasco:

Now this little box looked kind of cute, cost about $6 and seemed to have 4 cute chocolates in it. Well, when you pull the ribbon on the bottom and open it, it unfolds into this:

The first flap has a gift tag you can complete. The second part reads, "You must have been very good this year." And the third panel holds the chocolate - I've removed the cover here:

THIS is what you get for being good? Look at how freakin' tiny these things are:

Yes, that is a Q-Tip. Yes, these are about the size of a dime. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? All that for this? That's just wrong.

Let's see how the damn things taste. The one with the green Christmas trees is milk chocolate pecan pie flavored. The taste? Nothing like pecan pie (they were too tiny to autopsy, by the way). Tastes kind of chocolately, but that's it. What the hell?

Okay - let's try the gingerbread man (I do think these are cute, but I'm finding it hard to get past the microscopic size.) These are supposed to be milk chocolate gingerbread flavored. Okay, maybe a hint of gingerbread, maybe. But nothing to write home about. We've had much better gingerbread options.

The red and purple circles decorate dark chocolate brandied cherry flavored. Slight cherry taste - Hershey's cherry cordial creme Kisses are WAY, WAY better than this. There are many better cherry options.

And the final polka dotted one is dark chocolate spiced orange flavored. This one wasn't too bad - had the most flavor. of all the chocolates.

Summary - Twix bars are better and I hate being tricked. That choxie box is a complete rip-off.

Once again, we learn we can't judge a book by it's cover. You can wear a Santa suit and still be a Grinch. You can dress like a success and still be a complete failure. You can even tattoo a gingerbread man on your chocolate self and not even taste like gingerbread!

Why are we so susceptible to this? We don't want to spend the time. We don't want to really get to know the average looking guy at the bar when the really hot guy is flirting with us. We don;'t want to have to really look at the book, we'd rather just pick up the one with the most interesting looking cover.

So what do we do?

Learn from your mistakes. Where do you tend to make mistakes based on appearance? I know mine - all these hot guys I date who eventually treat me poorly. If I slowed down and got to know them better, I would have seen that they were not attractive at all on the inside where it really counts.

Slow down! I need to pay more attention to the weight of the chocolate, maybe then I would realize how much cardboard I was buying and how little chocolate.

Make it work for you! Realize that you will be judged by your cover. Make it the best you can - you want to make sure people get to know how awesome you are - don't let them pass you by because of your wrapper.

Just ask the Naked Cowboy.

Eggnog, Pecan Pie, and Gingerbread

Well I've been regaling you with reviews of cheapie chocolate, how about some of the fancier brands? Both Ghirardelli and Godiva did some special seasonal flavors.

Let me just say - WOW! This has a great flavor with that smooth Ghirardelli chocolate. This is more than just chocolate with some pecans tossed in - it smells great, just like real pecan pie and has that special pecan pie taste. I think the pecans are carmelized. Very, very good. and I live in the land of pecan pie, so I should know.

They also did eggnog:

Okay, I don't like this. I like the fact that I can taste the cinnamon, but I don't like this one. Now, I'm not a big eggnog person, so if you like eggnog, you might like it.

Godiva did eggnog (boo!) and gingerbread (yay!):

The dark chocolate one is the eggnog. and yep, I don't like it. Too eggy. I liked the cinnamon taste of the Ghirardelli, which I didn't taste here. But I did like the dark chocolate. The perfect one in my mind would combine dark chocolate and cinnamon with the eggnog. Wait, the perfect one in my mind wouldn't have any eggnog. Yuck.

The gingerbread is much more up my alley:

I actually like this one. The gingerbread taste is fairly subtle. It's good. Is it better than chocolate covered gingerbread? Not in my book? I am standing by my assessement that Godiva is overpriced. $2.25 a truffle? Please! I can get a whole bunch of Archway gingerbread men for that. And they are better!!

Two more gingerbread concoctions - the first from Crate and Barrel. is gingerbread caramels:

I had high hopes for these. I love gingerbread and love carmel. And when I first starting eating one, I thought it was great. BUT over time the spices really came out and were overpowering, leaving a terrible aftertaste. So disappointing! And so NOT good. ARGH! Not cheap and now I have a whole tin full of awful caramels. Don't get these, even if they are half price.

These are by Choxie, Target's chocolate. I haven't tried Choxie yet, so we're going to see more of them. They are not off to a good start:

The box reads: "the home-baked crunch of warmly-spiced gingerbread pieces, dipped in sweet white chocolate swirled with dark." The box lies.


These are spitters. Yep, they are so bad you have to spit them out. They have a weird salty taste that makes me wonder what really is in the middle of them - it sure doesn't taste like "warmly-spiced gingerbread". It's bad. this doesn't bode well for Choxie.

Just because a flavor is good, doesn't mean it needs to be a chocolate (or a caramel or a jelly bean or a martini.) Stop the madness!