Candy Blog

Farley’s and Sathers bought Brach’s, the iconic pick-a-mix candy manufacturer back in 2007 from Barry Callebaut. For a while it seemed that the candy quality was getting worse, not better for the attention. But Brach’s is being rebooted, it appears. They’re getting a new look plus a new focus on their target demographic, women - especially mothers. So they’re focusing on quality and traditional favorites. One of the selling points is that they’re using real milk chocolate. Their newest product is Brach’s Peanut Butter Poppins.

They’re described as creamy peanut butter center coated in 100% milk chocolate.

It’s hard to discuss any chocolate and peanut butter product without referencing the most popular version of the combination, the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup. There used to be a product called Reese’s Peanut Butter Bites. They weren’t extraordinary, but had the advantage of being a Reese’s product that didn’t have individual wrappers or fluted cups. Those were discontinued and replaced just recently with Reese’s Peanut Butter Minis, which are a molded product.

The new Peanut Butter Poppins are a panned chocolate. It’s a sphere of “peanut butter” covered in milk chocolate and then sealed with a little glaze to make them shiny and keep them from sticking together. I say peanut butter because I don’t think that’s what it actually is. While they’re boasting that they now have their best tasting chocolate ever, have a look at the ingredients for the peanut butter center:

Sugar, Palm Kernel Oil, Partially Defatted Peanut Flour, Peanuts, Nonfat Dry Milk Solids, Dextrose, Salt, Soy Lecithin, Modified Food Starch, Gum Arabic, Corn Syrup, Coconut Oil.

In my world, the first ingredient in peanut butter would be peanuts. This is not a whole peanut product, but instead it’s like juice from concentrate, they took out some of the natural peanut oils and replaced them with palm kernel oil.

They’re really lovely looking morsels. Though they vary a bit in size, they’re all spherical and shiny. Some are the size of a garden pea and a few were the size of a garbanzo. The smell sweet, milky and like roasted peanuts or freshly baked peanut butter cookies.

The waxy glaze on the outside is a little difficult to dissolve and leaves a little film in the mouth. Though they’re advertising this new milk chocolate, it’s not noteworthy. It’s not creamy and not even that chocolatey. It does its job of containing the peanut butter candy center. The center is smooth with little crunchy bits that I can only describe as sweet crunches, not peanuts. It’s like there’s a sugar crust in there that creates these little crystals that give it texture. It took me a long time to figure out if it was in the chocolate shell or the center. The center is very salty, in fact a serving of 25 pieces has 160 mg of salt, a lot for a confection.

The center tastes a lot like peanut butter cookie dough, it’s a well rounded flavor that includes salt, nuts and sweetness along with a rather smooth and cool mouthfeel. I found them extremely salty, but I recognize that my low salt lifestyle makes me more sensitive to those things. That, of course, didn’t stop me from eating the entire 5 ounce bag in two days - what can I say, there was a new Doctor Who on.

Poppins is a trademarked word for Brach’s, so maybe they have other plans for this line of candy. A creamy mint fondant might be a good next step or other fruit creams like strawberry, raspberry and orange and of course coffee.

I think they’re a great idea that’s well executed. Yes, they’re salty and no the chocolate is not fantastic, but I’d venture to say that it’s better than the stuff on the Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups these days. I’m looking forward to finding their Malted Milk Balls and seeing if they’ve successfully resurrected the classic real milk chocolate and crunchy malt center.

Related Candies

1. Brach’s Fiesta Malted Milk Eggs
2. Snyder’s Peanut Butter Pretzel Sandwich Dips
3. Trader Joe’s Soft Peanut Brittle
4. Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups Minis
5. Brach’s Indulge Almonds: Coconut & Caramel
6. Dove Peanut Butter Silky Smooth Milk Chocolate
7. Brach’s Robin Eggs (Solid Milk Chocolate)
8. M&M and Reese’s Pieces Peanut Butter Eggs

Last month I got a fun little treat from Santos of Scent of Green Bananas that I wasn’t expecting. It’s the Marmite Very Peculiar Milk Chocolate.

Marmite is a popular spread in the United Kingdom and other countries of the crown such as South Africa and New Zealand (though each has a different variation). It’s made from yeast extract and is rich in B vitamins. It was popular during the wars especially because it provided important vitamins and minerals for children that were otherwise scarce in their protein poor diets. In addition to the yeast extract there are some other flavorful vegetable additives such as onion, garlic and celery.

The idea of adding savory items and flavors to chocolate is not new. However, Marmite is probably one of the most savory of all ingredients as it’s pretty much pure umami with a little dash of salt. Umami is one of the five tastes that we can perceive with the tongue. The savory notes of food are made up of glutamates and nucleotides. Things can be savory even without salt, think of unsalted beef broth.

The peculiar part of this chocolate makes up very little of its bulk. The ingredients list that 98% of the bar is milk chocolate. The remaining 2% is Marmite.

Milk Chocolate (Sugar, Whole Milk Powder, Cocoa Butter, Cocoa Mass, Emulsifier, Natural Vanilla), Marmite Flavouring (Yeast Extract, Lactose, Salt, Sugar, Citric Acid, Vegetable Oil, Onion Powder, Garlic Powder, Flavouring (contains Celery), Marmite Extract).

My desire to eat this bar is very low. I’ve never had Marmite, but I have tried Vegemite, a similar product from Australia. It’s quite salty and has a strong savory flavor with a hint of vegetable broth. It was very smooth, almost like a jelly. After photographing this bar I left these little pieces pictured here on the shooting table but sealed up the rest of the package for later sampling. I intended to return and put the chocolate away after dinner, but didn’t get around to it for several days. When I returned to the room (which I keep shut up, because I have a dog), I feared that I had an insulation fire. It smelled strange, there was a hot, burnt plastic smell in the room. So I felt the walls and inspected the outlets and turned all the lights on and off. I went outside and looked at the house and sniffed around in the closets above the chocolate studio. Later I came back into the room and realized that it was the little pile of chocolate pieces.

I admit my mind is not open.

Opening the package again, it’s not really a burnt smell that I was greeted with. It was the smell of vitamins. You know, that vaguely yeasty smell that comes with those horsepills that are fortified with B vitamins and maybe even a few minerals. It’s not bad and maybe there’s a little hint of milk in the background. I’m trying to adjust my head to think that it’s molasses and other earthy flavors that I enjoy.

The snap is good and the initial bite gave me a mild salty note along with the milky chocolate. It’s a little malty and yes, there’s a savory and peppery sort of taste to it, kind of like cheese. But there’s also a little hint of the sulfurish onion and garlic. There’s also a little mineral note towards the end that reminds me of dried milk, sweat and that weird flavor in the back of my throat when I have a sinus infection. There’s also a lot of salt, about 300 mg per bar, which is about 100 mg per serving.

I’d say that it’s okay. I think the idea of a yeast extract infusion to add flavor and vitamins to chocolate isn’t a bad one, but the fact that there are those more vegetable flavors in there does not create a pleasant combination.

I admit I only had about four bites of this stuff. While it is peculiar, it’s not enough to keep me interested enough to continue eating it.

Related Candies

1. HiCHEW World Fruit: Dragonfruit, CamuCamu, Durian & White Peach
2. Beechies Force Chewy Candy
3. Butterfinger Buzz (Caffeinated)
4. Adora Calcium Tabs

These are Trolli Gummi Bear-Rings. Yeah, just like the name says.

It’s hard to find a good gum these days. I was looking for sugarless gum, something to clean my mouth between meals. But I also didn’t want something filled with artificial sweeteners. I detest things like aspartame (NutraSweet), sucralose (Splenda), acesulfame potassium (AceK) and saccharine. The other option for sugarless is Xylitol, which is a sugar alcohol which has a light, and very sweet flavor profile and a cooling effect which is ideal for gum. Xylitol is also show to be helpful in reducing plaque build up in the mouth between brushing that can lead to tooth decay.

PUR Gum is made with xylitol and is gluten free, nut free, dairy free, vegan and free of GMO ingredients. The gum comes in three flavors: Peppermint, Spearmint and Pomegranate Mint. It’s sold by Action Candy Company, based in Canada. I picked up these samples from the Frey company at the candy fair ISM Cologne earlier this year. It’s available in Canada and via online stores from Canada, though I expect it to be more widely available in the US soon.

The Peppermint pieces are nicely sized. They’re 3/4” long and 1/2” wide. They’re smooth and softly shiny. Two pieces are a good portion as suggested by the package. The mint is strong and quite cool as a result of the xylitol sweetener. As I’ll mention here quite a bit, the chew at first is a little tough, but it does mellow out.

The peppermint is clear and strong, there’s a light burn to it that continues for at least fifteen minutes into the chew. The sweetness doesn’t last long, but I’m fine with that.

Spearmint (in green) is racy. The chew is cool and fresh, but really strong. It’s Altoids strong. I find it burns a bit. The chew is soft at first but gets a bit stiffer as the coolness fades.

Even towards the later part of the chew, the minty flavor stays strong and the texture of the gum does loosen up quite a bit. The mint is green and penetrating without that grassy flavor that fresh muddled spearmint laves have.

The blister packs are nicely made. I understand the necessity for certain kinds of candy being sealed up like this, even though it takes up a lot of space. The pieces were easy to get out and the little paperboard sleeve was light and spare (and recyclable).

Pomegranate Mint in the pink accented package is different. The first note is a woodsy tangy thing that’s a bit floral and a bit minty. Then it’s very cool on the tongue, which is the xylitol. It’s all very busy. It’s not that the flavors or textures or temperatures are incompatible, it’s that they’re just not integrated. So it’s noisy, like three radio stations bleeding through on the stereo at once. But after a while with the chew it calms down and things start working a little better. The coolness fades and it’s just a mellow sweetness, the woodsy notes of the pomegranate and a light dryness comes out and then a fresh mint flavor. The texture of the gum base varies. At first it’s soft and mushy, then it seizes up and is quite tough for a while ... then towards the end (as in, maybe ten minutes, which is about the limit for a piece of gum for me) it softens up again. At the very end it still retains its minty notes but all the sweetness is gone.

Xylitol is an excellent substitute for sugar in specific applications like gum or mints and is good for folks who can’t have sugar, like diabetics. It’s not a calorie-free food though, two pieces of gum have 10 calories. There are also some white tea extracts in there, which may be added for flavor or perhaps for antioxidants. They don’t seem to make it worse but probably make it more expensive.

Some people are sensitive to the effects of xylitol. Such effects include abdominal gas and diarrhea. These effects are reported with larger portions than are found in chewing gum though, there is one gram of xylitol in each piece of gum and tests were showing effects when consuming over 65 grams per day. Also note that dogs are especially sensitive to xylitol which can cause seizures and liver damage, so please don’t let your dog have gum or mints made with any sugar alcohol - in fact, just don’t give you dog any candy at all.

I know that chewing gum with xylitol is probably really good for me as a between meal pick me up and substitute for candy snacking, and this version is already tops on my list. I didn’t care for the pomegranate at all, but the other two mint flavors are great. Now if I could just find someplace to actually buy it.

Related Candies

1. Maple Ice Mints
2. Newman’s Own Ginger Mints
3. Classic Gums: Black Jack, Clove, Beemans & Teaberry
4. SparX
5. XyliChew
6. Mentos Xtrm: Mint & Spearmint

Nabisco Oreos were one of my favorite cookies. Most of what I like though is the crispy and crumbly dark chocolate cookie. Their initial form, the Oreo Biscuit, was introduced in 1912 and later became the format we know today with the molded sandwich cookie in 1952. One of the best mashups ever invented using Oreos was Cookies ‘n’ Cream Ice Cream. There are so many things you can do with Oreos, so it seems a little odd that Nabisco never came out with their own Oreo chocolate bar in the United States. Perhaps it’s their complacency that they’re the most popular cookie in the country. In Asia though, Nabisco tries harder. They have Oreo Chocolate Bars.

I picked up the Nabisco Oreo Bitter Bar at the Japanese market. The standard Oreo Bar has a cream filling with bits of chocolate cookies embedded in it, then the whole thing is covered in chocolate. When I looked at the ingredients on this bitter bar, I was pleased to see the intensity of the chocolate ingredients and decided that maybe this could be the ideal marriage of the Oreo Cookie and the candy bar.

The wrapper is in the familiar Oreo Blue color but decorated with a cacao pod and a little gold ribbon that says bitter in the center. The back of the wrapper is in Japanese though my imported one has a little English sticker on it with the ingredients & nutritional panel.

The bar isn’t that big, it’s only 1.35 ounces, so it weighs less than a pair of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups (1.5 ounces) but still manages to contain 216 calories. The wrapper is 6.5” long but the actual bar is only 4.5”. I can’t complain since the bars I bought were pretty flawless looking, so it must have done a nice job of protecting the contents.

The bar smells toasty and sweet, like a cup of hot chocolate. The bite is firm, the center isn’t a soft truffle, instead it’s kind of like a firm cream, like the center of a Frango. There are cookie bits mixed into the dark chocolate center, so the melt isn’t quite smooth because of the crumbs. There is a distinct bitter note of charcoal and deep cocoa

The chocolate coating outside is not terribly dark but is really creamy and smooth.

The ingredients impressed me for the most part, no tropical oils, no partially hydrogenated fats. It’s all milk and cocoa butter. Sure there’s sugar in there and even a small amount of high fructose corn syrup (in the cookie part, I believe), but I overlooked that.

I loved this bar. Absolutely loved it. I bought one while shopping with my sister in Little Tokyo with no intention of reviewing it, then after eating it I went back and bought three more. They were $2.19 each, and I’m pretty price conscious, so that alone is an endorsement. However, most other reviews I saw of it online were underwhelming. I can see their point, it is a little dry and kind of single note with the bitter chocolate cookie dominating.

The bars come in other versions. Aside from the Cookies ‘n’ Cream classic style, they’ve also been available in caramel coffee, strawberry, matcha, banana and macadamia nut.

Related Candies

1. Nestle KitKat SemiSweet & Bitter Almond
2. Hershey’s Drops: Milk Chocolate & Cookies n Creme
3. Cookies ‘n’ Creme Showdown
4. Trader Joe’s Mint Joe Joe’s versus Mint Oreos
5. Cookie Dough Bites
6. Take 5 Chocolate Cookie
7. Head to Head: Cookie Joys vs Cookies n Mint