Hershey - It Really IS the Sweetest Place on Earth!

I was lucky enough to do work for a client in Lancaster, PA last week, and I got to head back to one of my favorite places - Hershey, PA! You know you are in the right place when you see this from your windshield:

And things just get better! Forgive the blurriness - I was driving. Yes, photographing and driving. Not good.
 

The streetlights really are shaped like Hershey's Kisses - they alternate between wrapped and unwrapped.  and you gotta love the American flags.  You can't see it here - but there was baskets of flowers everywhere and loads of green grass and quaint houses.  Hershey is so pretty.

As soon as I got there, I headed straight for Chocolate World.  I feel these guys were there just to welcome me.  "Yay!" they say!  "Yay!" I say!

As soon as I got there, they were doing a chocolate tasting, so I popped in.  The last time I was there was back in 2007 and things have changed a lot.  Back then you got TONS of chocolate, it was great!  Now they have a fancy room (back then you were just in a restaurant area, it seemed almost illicit.  People walked by, looking at you like you were getting something special.  Which you were.) and you get very little chocolate. Especially considering it costs $10.

The girl went through it like she had done it 1,000,000 times before which I'm sure she had.  But it's chocolate!  You are in Hershey!  Get some emotion going!!  You know how I feel about non excited chocolate people.  What the heck is wrong with them?  What could be more fun?

And don't say, "If you did it for a living, you'd feel that way too."  I do!  And every time I get to give "Motivation by Chocolate" I love it!  Maybe she was just having an off day.  (I wanted to cast her from the stage and take over.  I would have had a blast with that tasting!)

Afterward, I wandered into their bakery - how I love bakeries! I love anything with copious amount of frosting involved:

Who wouldn't love getting one of these for their birthday?

Chocolate chip cheesecake:

Wow - these looked really good - Reese's PB & J!:

Hershey's Bliss Raspberry:

Smores - yum!!!

Pina Colada - eh.  But Reese's White PB Cup? - YES!!!

Almond Joy:

Take 5:

Heath Cheesecake - woohoo!!

Now here was a little enthusiasm!  I was raving and taking pictures and basically dancing with glee at the sight of all this fat and sugar.  And one of the cute bakery ladies pulled this out of the back to show to me.  How lucky is Elizabeth?

And how lucky are we?  Milton Hershey's birthday is on the 13th - and I, for one, am so glad he had the vision to build the Town of Hershey.  So think of him on Thursday and raise a bar (or a chip or a cookie) to the man who built the Sweetest Place on Earth.  Happy birthday, Milton Hershey!  And thank you.

Happy Valentine's Day!!!

Happy Valentine's Day!  I'm still struggling with my life balance - dating a great guy, running my business, trying to keep working out AND writing the blog.  It's all obviously not going to happen.  So far, the blog has been taking a butt kicking.  Sorry gang!  The good news is I'm not buying my own Valentine's Day present this year, and I'm sooooo lucky to have love in my life.  But, I know what it's like to be solo, so I'm not going to turn into a sap.  For those of you who are single - hang in there - there's always chocolate and fun and loads of life to be lived.  For those of you who have love - hold it dear.  For those of you hanging on to someone who doesn't treat you right - get the hell out.  They are not going to change and you deserve better.  For all of you - this is my Valentine's Day gift to you!!!

Dove introduced these dark chocolate and cherry swirl heart promises:

I love the way they look:

I wish I liked the taste as much as their cool apprearance.  Too much cherry for me.  I still think the Hershey's Cherry Cordial Kisses do this combo best.

And while I think the messages in the wrappers could be better, at least Martha Stewart is out of the picture.  I just don't want that felon in my candy. 

Woohoo!  My freinds at Just Born haven't let us down!  Milk chocolate and dark chocolate covered Peeps!

You know how I like to compare.  Before now, my favorite chocolate covered marshmallow heart was from Hershey (hate the evil Russell Stover):

I don't know what happened to the Hershey heart, but it looks like it had a very bad night:

Look at what happened when I autopsied the Peep hearts!  Holy cow - this color has never before been seen without the help of a black light (those of you under the age of 35 probably don't even know what that is).  It's raspberry marshmallow - possibly from the planet Zenon.

And here's the autopsied Hershey Heart:

The verdict?  The marshmallow in the Peep Hearts is fluffier; it's more chewy in the Hershey Heart.  So marshmallow wise, I gotta go with the Peeps.  The Hershey milk chocolate is the best, but the combo of the super sweet raspberry marshmallow and the dark chocolate is a winner.  Overall - the best is the dark chocolate raspberry Peep Heart.  But if you don't like raspberry - hello Hershey!!  If you don't like marshmallow, well, keep reading.

I was amazed by these (I thought they would be horrible) - from Tootsie, maker of Junior Mints - raspberry cremes:

When I first saw them, I thought - what a great idea!  Why didn't they think of different flavors before?  And where the hell is peanut butter??? 

I popped the poor autopsy subject picture here into my mouth, honestly expecting them to suck.  I have to tell you, they are great!  A lot of it is that awesome size (totally poppable) and the chocolate shell/creamy filling combo that makes the Junior Mint so addictive.  I find these impossible to stop eating.  Go Tootsie Roll!

Thanks for reading!  I hope all of you have a fantastic Valentine's Day - regardless of the state of your love life.  I think it's a great day to celebrate our love affair with chocolate and with life - something that will never change!  Love to you all!!

Coconut, Summer and S'mores!

One of the very cool things about going to Candy Expo as a blogger is that you are considered "press".  And the press get a great big bag full of candy.  This was one of the things in there:

Atkinson's (makers of the Chick-O-Stick) also makes these.  I saw a booth that sold ONLY these in all the colors of the rainbow.

While it looks festive, I thought the taste was pretty lame.  Kind of dry and tasteless.  And no chocolate involved.  Bleech.

This one from Candy Farm http://www.candyfarm.com/  (a division of Dayton Nut Specialties) was actually a lot better:

It was thicker and the coconut was much less dry.  But this is still a boring candy to me.  They come in different flavors - I liked the chocolate flavor here, but much prefer a real chocolate coating over my coconut.  Coconut lovers - what do you think of these?  They must be popular, I saw a few companies making them.  Anybody have some thoughts?

For 320 calories a slice (these are called coconut slices, BTW), they just aren't that good.

Since I've been planning to blog about coconut, I had to snag these in A Southern Season (my favorite, but oh so expensive food store in Chapel Hill, NC):

They are handmade toasted coconut marshmallows:

And they are pretty darn amazing!  You can see the shredded coconut all over the top.  They also contain almond  and vanilla extract - the almond gives them an awesome taste.  And the marshmallow is so soft and fresh - wow!  I'm not the world's biggest coconut or marshmallow fan, so this is really saying something!

When I got them to the register, they told me there was a BOGO (buy one get one free) sale, so I HAD to get another bag.  I opted for Vanilla Bean (lavender marshmallow just sounded too gross):

These were just average to me.  They would probably be AMAZING toasted, but I'm not going to all that trouble.  I'm happy they were free.

Speaking of toasting marshmallows, I was at a conference last week where the dessert was served outside by a big fire pit where we made s'mores.  (How cool is that?  Go Embassy Suites, Concord, NC!) The hotel had a great set-up, but they were using DARK chocolate disks.  Dark chocolate disks don't melt.  Classy, but we really needed milk chocolate.  So, if you're going to make s'mores this summer - use milk chocolate.

One cool thing they did was add a swipe of cream cheese to the graham cracker.  Never had that before - it was really good!  So experiment - have fun!

If you don't want to make your own s'mores, you could get these:

They really are mini - a little bigger than a penny:

And, as usual, they don't really look like the picture on the box.  Verdict?  Please.  How can this even be compared to a s'more?  They taste like little cheap cookies.  Not even very graham crackery. Definitely not marshmallowy.  In fact, I'd say these taste nothing like s'mores.  Either go real or don't go at all. (Goldfish S'mores - covered in another entry - are better.)

I found these at Candy Expo - they are made by the GudFud company (http://www.gud-fud.com/).  And, in concept, they are great:

Little prepackaged chocolate filled marshmallows.  They also some in fruit flavors which I didn't try.

They are horrible.  Think stale, flattened marshmallow filled with some chocolate-like substance.  YUCK!

Their company tagline is "the best thing to ever happen to a marshmallow."  No, it's not. 

But THIS might be!

These are soooo cute!  And at 10 calories a piece, you can't beat them!  Would make great decorations (cakes, cupcakes, etc.) and they taste good too.  Instead of having that weird powdery coating, these have one that's more like granulated sugar, but very fine.  From Harry and David - YUM!

This bar is also from Candy Expo and is billed as a "feel great super food" - which usually means "tastes like crap":

I have it here because it is called an "exotic COCONUT almond bar":

While it looks good, it tastes pretty boring.  I'd rather have a handful of almonds.  I couldn't even taste the coconut.  But it's all organic!  Kumbaya!  You'll live forever eating these, but you won't want to.

While these have been out for a while now, Hershey was pushing them hard at Candy Expo:

And I gotta tell you, these are good!! They taste coconutty and I swear there are little chunks of coconut in there.  I think they blow the coconut M & M's away.  The M & M's taste more chocolately - not very coconutty.  These are like little Almond Joys.  Well done, Hershey!!!

Since I had the coconut M & M's to compare with these, I tried Sarah Silverman's M & M trick. (38 seconds in the microwave)  Holy God!  She is right!!!  Try, it, try it, try it - it's awesome!!!!!!

Try something new - microwave your M & M's, make some s'mores with different ingredients - it's summer!  Celebrate food and fun!