White Chocolate - the NonChocolate

White chocolate is the red headed step child of the chocolate family. It's really not chocolate at all, (no cacao) but I still like it and I think we should keep an open mind. 

Can you believe I still have some Easter candy to review? I know, I know - time gets away from me! So much chocolate, so little time!

Lindt made a white chocolate Lindor truffle egg:

I can't say anything negative about this - sweet, delicious with that creamy truffle center.  Wow!

Neuhaus also did a white chocolate egg and this one is a solid "chocolate" egg:

 

This is also a great white chocolate egg - it's not as light and fluffy - not a truffle, but it's delicious.  It's hard to compare the two - both have great flavor, but are in such different consistencies I can't make a choice!

Now you all know I love Hershey's Kisses, but this white chocolate can't hold a candle to the Lindt or the Neuhaus - it has a waxier quality.  Nowhere near as good.  And the orange flavor is soooooo not my fav.  I could never eat another one of these again and be happy as a clam.

 

This is Lindt's Straccitella truffle egg:

It's the white chocolate truffle egg with some cocoa nibs on the outer layer.  The sad thing is, you can hardly taste the nibs at all.  Maybe if they were mixed all the way through?  I dunno - seems like they need more...something...maybe CHOCOLATE?

I found these at Harry and David:

They have a white chocolate outer layer, a dark chocolate layer and then the malt ball.  These didn't do anything for me.  The malt flavor seemed to offset everything else - kind of yucky.

These beauties are anything but yucky.  They are by one of favorite chocolatiers - Knipschildt.  And at $10.00 for five little eggs, they are not cheap.  But DAMN, they are delicious!

They are about the size of a robin's egg and are filled with a milk chocolate hazelnut paste that is amazing.  These are some of the best of the chocolates I had this Easter. 

These cuties are from L.A. Burdick and are the most adorable little white chocolate bunnies:

Each has an almond and a delicious chocolate and hazelnut truffle filling.  They also have a dark chocolate base:

L.A. Burdick makes the most gorgeous and delicious chocolates.  They also made this egg:

This delicious guy has our new friend white chocolate, then a layer of corn flakes (very crispy, very delicious!) and then a Gianduja filling (a sweet chocolate paste containing about 30% hazelnuts).    Not only is it totally cute, the combination of flavors and textures is wonderful.

So what did we learn?  White chocolate may not technically be chocolate, but it adds a lot to the family.  (Let's all join hands and sing "We are the World.")  It's mighty sweet, but it makes a great coating and has a lighter taste than milk chocolate.

Also - sometimes really great chocolate is completely worth the money.  There are artists who work in chocolate.

And finally, no chocolate is too cute to eat.

Have a great week - I'll be reporting from Candy Expo!!

Easter Odds and Ends

I was lucky enough to go by Harry and David's candy tasting on Sunday and found these little babies on sale. My Harry and David store had so much extra Easter candy, they were allowed to mark it WAY down. This bag of milk chocolate chicks was originally $8.95. I got it for $1.97:

Pretty and colorful (although looking a little tropical for baby chickens):

Cute! No Peep, mind you, but still cute:

These guys are a solid milk chocolate choice. They are not as good as the milk chocolate rabbits below from The Chocolate Bear, but they melt in your mouth and are pretty darn good. (I'd put them somewhere between Hershey and Lindt.)

I also snagged this gift tower for $19.95 (I figure the boxes alone are adorable!):

There were a lot of different things inside. The most interesting were these larger than normal jelly beans:

These INDIVIDUALLY wrapped malted milk balls (who's ever seen that?):

And these spring pretzels:

They are billed as yogurt covered:

While these (Easter Pretzels) by the South Bend Chocolate Company, are coated in white chocolate:

I love those Easter eggs floating all over the bag! In the Catholic Church pretzels are historically associated with Easter and were hidden like Easter eggs. The Pennsylvania Dutch make pretzels and I toured a factory or two in PA. I like pretzels. Although I would have been bitter if my parents had hidden them instead of Easter Eggs. In fact, I probably would have grown up twisted. (Bwah, ha, ha!)

You know, both are really good and it's pretty hard to tell the two flavors apart, but the yogurt is a little lighter and I like it better. Both have about the same calories, so it provides no big health benefit. The best (or worst) thing about these is you can't stop eating them! It's the salty and sweet combo - delicious!

For the most part, I find those gift towers to be a rip off - $5 worth of stuff in $20 worth of packaging. But it was pretty and on sale, so what the hell.

This was the single most impressive Easter treat I got this year (drum roll please!) from our friends at L.A. Burdick:

Love the elegant label! And look at this fancy packaging!

This egg - about the size of a small football is inside:

See how big it is? It's a Rocher Egg - a dark chocolate egg coated with chocolate-covered, caramelized almond slivers AND:

Filled with assorted truffles! Can you say, "OMG!" Screw pretzels!

This is simply and extraordinary act of chocolate wizardry. Those almonds in that dark chocolate are to die for!! And the truffles inside are so rich (made in the French fashion with cocoa powder all over them) it's mind boggling. L.A. Burdick is an amazing chocolatier and one bite of this creation will convince you. These almonds were put to a much, much better use that marzipan - bah! A+++++ I will definitely be enjoying this for a while! And will order more treats from this amazing chocolatier!

This little guy (cute) was in Mast General Store. You don't see very many dark chocolate bunnies:

Made by Canipes Chocolates and Candies from Myrtle Beach, this dark chocolate was pretty sweet. Must be low on the cacao. Average at best.

I was completely prepared for these to be horrible:

Don't get me wrong, I love the way they look - the nostalgic scenes in great detail and color:

But I was convinced they would taste terrible. Yet again, I was wrong! The chocolate is much better than you would expect. The label says they are made with Belgian chocolate and that they are made for CVS, so I don't know who really made them, but they are unique as hell, very pretty, and they taste pretty damn good! Shut my mouth!

I saw this in The Chocolate Bear and when I read the sign - "Bunnies on the Half Shell" - I had to buy it. How hilarious is that?

The bunnies are dark, milk, white, pink and tan:

Dark is my favorite. White, pink and tan did nothing for me and after having the dark chocolate, I wasn't as excited about the milk chocolate. The half shell was festive but that horrible hard decorative edge (technically edible) is vile. But funny - damn funny! And great dark chocolate.

How cute is this delicate mini Easter basket?

A "big" milk chocolate bunny (maybe three inches tall - these guys are little), and a baby dark, white, and pink. Adorable - and all resting on Easter grass!

The milk chocolate one was delish - a nice milk chocolate with some depth - not too sugary. Dark was great - the other two - bleech. But adorable!

How's this for a creative combo also from The Chocolate Bear?

A painted cookie background (Easter egg) with a chocolate bunny on top. And you know what? It works! The cookie is good, but bland enough to suit the chocolate. Creative and delicious - the winning combination!

So what are the final thoughts?

Candy tastes better when you buy it on sale.

But glamour candy (L.A. Burdick) ROCKS!

I still can't be sure what will be good and what will be terrible from looking at it. Meaning I still can't judge the interior by the exterior.

Creative and funny (bunnies on the half shell) will always win my heart.

All those who experiment in chocolate, I salute you!!

A Billion Almonds Died for You

I hope everyone had a great Easter! (I really hope you all had some good candy!) I still have some Easter treats to blog about, so just think of them as spring candies.

At Valentine's Day I found these marzipan hearts (if you didn't know, marzipan is made mostly of sugar and almond meal which sounds kind of creepy, but I like almonds and sugar, so...):



I really liked the "white" hearts (these are the color of plain marzipan), didn't like the red hearts. They had some kind of funky flavor that wasn't so good. But the white ones were really good, so at Easter I thought I'd get some more marzipan.

These look pretty festive and they are by the same company - Biermann Marzipan. You can see their website http://www.marzipancandies.com/:

See how brightly colored they can be but still be the marzipan color on the inside?

The verdict? Bleech. Not so good. I don't know if it's the coloring or the lack of chocolate. But these were not so good. Don't waste your time or your calories.

These are by Bissinger's:

Pretty gorgeous, huh?

These were better, but I still don't really like them. I mean, they are okay, but I would soooooo much rather have about 1 million other candies. Hell, I'd rather have just plain ol' almonds.

These were in the L.A. Burdick Kids Box:

Marzipan eggs and a carrot! These were tiny and were very good. But I just have to admit that marzipan is not really my favorite.

I like its texture, it seems to hold shapes and colors well, but eh....

How adorable is this?

Look how beautiful and delicate this is! I bought it at The Chocolate Bear but it's made by Blue Ridge Chocolates:

Those are marzipan eggs:

and they are good! Maybe because the ingredients are just almonds, honey and sugar. And the chocolate was delicious too! Can you see that it's both dark (the base and vertical twigs) and milk? This is a beautiful and delicious creation. Bravo!!!!

Niederegger, a German company, makes some great looking chocolate covered marzipan treats. These eggs come in assorted flavors: pineapple, apple, orange, espresso, caramel croquant, and pistachio.

Here's a milk chocolate and a dark chocolate egg:

This is milk chocolate and apple:

Yucko! I'm just not an apple and chocolate fan. Unless it's a real, fresh apple.

This is dark chocolate and pineapple (pineapple again!):

This one was good!!

As far as the other flavors - dark chocolate and orange was bad, dark chocolate and pistachio was okay, dark chocolate and espresso was yucky, and milk chocolate and caramel croquant was FABULOUS!!!!!! Croquant is French for crisp and there are some nice little crispy bits in this one. If I could get only the caramel ones, I would buy these again. But all the other flavors weren't worth the calories, with the possible exception of pineapple.

These are just adorable:

So, so cute!!!! And coated in chocolate!!

But - eh, not so great. I'm really bummed about the whole marzipan experience.

I hoped this bar by Niederegger would be good, since the chocolate to marzipan ratio is so high:

I can tell the chocolate is good, but the marzipan didn't really add anything. I would have rather had just a chocolate bar. Or a peanut butter bar! Or caramel or nuts or......well, just about anything other than marzipan. Except apple - no apple.

The Milka bar is better:

Of all the marzipan bars, this is by far my favorite. I love the creamy, delicious dark chocolate. YUMMY!!!

I had high hopes for the Ritter Sport dark chocolate with marzipan bar:

It also comes in this baby version:

Disappointing - a funky aftertaste with this marzipan. The Milka bar destroys this one!!

This bar looked really good:

Until I opened it:

Um....cream? I don't think so. Maybe back in the 30s. Another argument for EXPIRATION DATES!!!!

So we have no idea if this might have been a good bar or not. Grrrr.........

This Lindt bar has pistachio with almond cream:

While I LOVE Lindt's creamy delicious chocolate, I found it overwhelmed the pistachio and the almond cream. I could hardly taste their flavors. So while this bar was good, it wasn't extraordinary.

These, however, ARE:

There's amaretto (almond flavored liqueur):

So creamy and flavorful with little bits of nuts - AMAZING!!

And pistacchio:

See the nuts? This was my least fav - but that's because I love almonds more than pistachios. These little eggs are FABULOUS!!

This is mandorla (almond):

Also creamy and nutty and delicious! These are just so, so good!!!

Godiva's assortment of eggs - milk, dark, almond butter and coconut:

Pretty! Shiny!

This is Godiva's almond butter egg. I still don't know why Godiva has to have all that space in the middle of their confections (and you all know how hard I am on them):

But these are actually pretty damn good! I really do love almonds. I'm so sad so many were turned into marzipan. I think we should have a moment of silence.

Godiva also filled this gorgeous egg with their little eggs:





Isn't that a beautiful thing? I love that - I'll keep the pretty egg for next year and eat all the chocolate eggs this year. YAY!!! So you can actually have your egg and eat it too!

Bwah, ha, ha!!!!