Chocolate Odds and Ends and Easter

I keep finding cherry!!! But I didn't even try these once I performed the autopsy.

Hmmm.....something doesn't look right - check out the close up:

Yikes!! See those little round balls? That's not sugar, baby! Some type of mold? Fungus? Ewwwww!!! Maybe it would help if these companies would use some EXPIRATION DATES!!!! Beware if you buy any food stuff at the Grove Park Inn gift shops - apparently they have been on the shelves for a long, long time. This is the third time (all different products and different companies) this has happened to me with Grove Park Inn purchases. Yucko!!!

Look at this - pineapple!!! A pineapple Bing!!! (Remember the ugly yet weirdly good Cherry Bing?)

While this is not terrible, it's not as good as the Cherry Bing. And it's actually called a Tropical Bing. I think the pineapple flavor works best with a high quality dark chocolate - this combo (with milk chocolate and peanuts) is not so good. Sigh. I'm have high hopes for pineapple and chocolate.

Since we talked about Raisinets in the last post, I thought I'd review these:

I found these in World Market - they are from the UK and are made by Fox's Confectionery. They are basically Raisinets, but I like the chocolate a little better. Is it worth going to World Market to hunt them down? No, not really. I mean, is any chocolate covered raisin really that exciting? But if they were next to the Raisinets, and I really was craving the whole chocolate/raisin thing, I would buy these.

I've never seen the Easter Junior Mints before:

Love those wildly colored boxes!!! They only have about seven Junior Mints in each, but they sure are festive!!

And since we looked at the Poppet Raisinets, let's look at the Poppet Junior Mints:

The Poppets (on the right) aren't bad - they have a different taste than the Junior Mints. What they lack is that awesome creamy Junior Mint texture. Who doesn't just adore that? They are just not as creamy - a little more to the chewy side. And they are inconsistent - some seem to have no mint at all and to be solid chocolate. Nope - the Junior Mint is much better. Go USA!! Tootsie Roll Industries makes the Junior Mint.

We are going to be hot and heavy on Easter from here on out. Here's a festive and delicious Frey Swiss Chocolate Bunny to kick us off:

Love the gorgeous metallic packaging.

Isn't he just the cutest rabbit ever? Look at his little rabbit muscles!

And his little cottontail!

Of course, I had to autopsy him for you - hollow:

Frey makes delicious, creamy milk chocolate that I swear only the Swiss can make. This rabbit is exquisitely designed and molded, and the chocolate is wonderful. Easter 2010 is looking pretty darn good!!! Hoppy Spring!!

The 2.5 Pound Box of Chocolate

Today was the most gorgeous day I have seen in months. As a result, I felt compelled to abandon my office and go in search of chocolate.

I looked for the Cherry Raisinets, but found these:

I didn't even know Raisinets came in dark chocolate. These are the ones I'm used to:

And you know what? I didn't think they were very good. The dark chocolate ones had a funky aftertaste and the milk chocolate ones were nothing special. There are so many chocolatiers covering fruit in really great chocolate that these aren't worth the calories. Zzzzz......

The box has antioxidants printed in giant letters and says again "30% less fat than the leading chocolate brands." Does that mean in comparison to the leading chocolate brands' chocolate covered raisins? Or in comparison to the leading chocolate brands other candy bars? Which are the leading chocolate brands? What the does this statement MEAN?

I say they have 80% less taste than other chocolate covered raisins.

Remember this? I bet you thought I forgot!! This was the amazing 2.5 pound box of chocolate I got at Walmart for a whopping $11. In the dog food aisle. Nice.

The miniature Butterfinger is there for scale:

I opened it and look!!!! Yay!!!! A diagram for the chocolates!

There are TWO levels:

Are you getting an idea of how enormous this is?

I decided to try some. This is coconut:

As you can see it's creamy. No chunks of coconut like an Almond Joy. This was WAY too sweet and way too creamy. Yuck.

Now this one was interesting - dark chocolate pineapple:

This wasn't done well - all the creams in the box are just too sweet and sugary. But I LOVE the idea of combining these flavors!! Someone needs to do this right - great idea! Great potential!

This is a peanut cluster:

I actually liked this one - packed with peanuts and I LOVE peanuts.

I soon learned that the labels were not always right (it says in the small print at the bottom that from time to time it may be necessary to substitute). This one was labeled maple cream:

Hmmmm......doesn't look very mapley, I thought. Didn't taste very mapley either. Had to be a way too sweet vanilla cream.

THIS is a maple cream:

Can you see the grains of sugar? All these creams are just way too sweet, way too sugary. They are the equivalent of Palmer chocolate.

This one was is the coconut slot, but is clearly not coconut and correlated to none of the listings - it has nuts and cherry in it and wasn't horrible, but was still too sugary sweet. Not sure what it is.

Apparently, I can now not escape from - cherry:

Like the fact that there is actually a bit of fruit here, but still too sugary and too sweet. The box also had lots of caramels, but they were not so great. Too hard, nothing special.

What have we learned?

Sometimes you really do get what you pay for. Cheap chocolate can be crappy.

BUT - look at the great idea for pineapple and the packed-with-peanuts peanut cluster.

And who expected a label that doesn't really label? There's a twist! Forrest Gump would be happy.

The biggest takeaway for me, however, is that it takes not so great chocolate to really make you appreciate great chocolate. They same way reading the work of a bad writer makes you REALLY appreciate a good writer. (I didn't know how amazing many of my favorite writers were till I branched out. Oh dear God.) And we've all come to appreciate good people more when exposed to bad ones. And hasn't all the bad weather made us celebrate the spring more than ever?

Oh, the things we take for granted.

Here's to what might be the best $11 I ever spent!