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!!

Snow, Ice and Chocolate!

We've got ice and snow in North Carolina and the capital city is shut down! Whoohoo! Of course, it's Saturday, so it's no big deal. Come Monday, we might have some issues.

In honor of the snow, we'll talk Snowflake Pretzels. My Sorbet Sistah Tracy said these were awesome, so when I saw them on sale at Crate and Barrel, that was a good enough excuse to buy them. And I love the cute tin they are in:

Here they are :

The tin says these are "wintry snowflake pretzels dipped in white confection and white nonpareils."

Now let's analyze that statement. I think all snowflakes are wintery (both spellings of wintry are okay BTW) so that's just hyperbole. (Not that I'm opposed to hyperbole in the least, mind you.) Where we run into trouble is white CONFECTION - i.e. - these don't involve anything remotely close to chocolate. Well at least they're honest. And nonpareils are just tiny sugar balls. Closely related to sprinkles.

Bottom line - these things are delicious!! Once you start eating them it's almost impossible to stop. Those lame pretzel M & Ms have nothing - I mean NOTHING on these. I hope I get invited to a Super Bowl Party so I can take these and save myself from them. A+++

Since we have more sleet right now than snow, let's talk ice. Or at least the candy equivalent of ice - mint.

Andes has a Valentine's Day offering:

It's the same old Andes mint, but I like the inner wrappers (although the outer package looks awful - I say go red or go pink, but not - what - mauve? Ugh.):

The best part is they did some different designs, not just slapping the same old mints in new wrappers:

I still am not a fan. I think these taste kinda like toothpaste.

These aren't chocolate, but they are my favorite peppermint:

Nice and chewy! LOVE these! And look at those adorable hearts:

All I have to do today to "get the sensation" is stick my head out a window, but just in case you'd prefer a more pleasant method:

Love the cute hearts on the wrappers:

And you know I'm thrilled with the heart shaped patties as well as the slightly pink mint filling. Go York! Same solid taste, but a nice holiday touch! YAY!!

Ah - love is in the air! Well, at least today, snow is in the air here in North Carolina. We don't get it much so it's something really nice to see. It's so quiet outside and it gives the landscape a gorgeous clean and pure look. We often take for granted the things we see all the time, but the unusual is easier to appreciate. I'm watching the birds hopping on the white background where I can really see their coloring. Just saw a cardinal - gorgeous!

If you're in the snow - take some time to enjoy it - and be thankful that you're warm. And try not to take the usual for granted. I mean, those white confection pretzels are unusual, but they will never replace Reese's. Ever. Not even if Raleigh and Hell DO freeze over.

Chocolate Hearts Don't Break!

I went back to work this week! (Actually I've been working for weeks, but this was the first week I had speaking engagements.) And so far, they've gone great! Yahoo!

Tuesday I spoke for independent grocers courtesy of MDI (Merchants Distributors Inc.). MDI does training for their clients and I've been lucky enough to be one of their speakers for several years. This year I got to go by the food show they put on to showcase their wares. And they had a section called Candy Carnival! There was a lot of good candy, but look at these:

I've never seen the giant VANILLA Tootsie Roll! Look how big it is compared to the standard Midgee. (It looks kind of like a tapeworm which is a little creepy.) The vanilla Tootsie Roll is good, but it's not as good as chocolate (in my humble opinion).

I've reviewed these before - the Valentine Tootsie Roll. Solid choice, low fat, like 'em.

I haven't seen these either - PRETZEL M & M's:

I like M & Ms. I like pretzels. I like these. BUT I'd rather have regular M & M's. Or peanut M & Ms. Or chocolate covered pretzels. Or about 1,000 other things. Maybe these are good as a lower calorie option (only 140 calories) but nothing to write home about. I predict failure.

I stopped by Cracker Barrel on the way home and they have new chocolate merchandise!!!

Cute, cute, cute!! And expresses how I feel perfectly.

I love seeing the new and creative ideas of candy makers - so fun!

Now there's creative and there's Walmart:

These hearts are by Palmer - very cute - look at that little tuxedo! (At the rate I'm going, the best man for me IS a chocolate one.)

Would you believe I heard from Afghanistan Man again? Just in time for Valentine's Day - he friended me on Facebook, which I ignored - I told him it was better for me if I let him go completely (i.e. after waiting all those months for him to come back from Afghanistan and then have him lie to me, I don't think I'm going to be Facebook friends with him). He said that saddened him, that I was a great woman, believing in him when he doubted himself, blah, blah, blah. Too bad I wasn't great enough for him to believe in me.

That's okay - I can buy my own Valentine's Day chocolate, I have friends who love me, and I believe in me. At the end of the day, that's what really matters - that you believe in yourself. (And that you have chocolate. Lots of chocolate.)