I have a few more Easter items I wanted to include before Sunday. They’re not extraordinary products, but I didn’t want to pass them up.

This year was, I felt, the best we’ve had so far this decade for Easter candy diversity. It was a nice mix of classic products, new flavor twists on existing items and then some exciting new diversions. The stores seemed well stocked, better than I saw them two years ago, for example. It’s an encouraging sign for the economy and for our tummies.

Just Born is celebrating 60 years of their iconic Peeps marshmallow candies. They’ve come a long way from the early years when they came in plain yellow. Now they’re available in all the colors of the rainbow and special flavors.

To mark the anniversary, they’ve created a 60th Anniversary version in Vanilla Creme flavor. They’re the individual Peeps (not a conjoined row) and feature little sparkly flecks of multi colored candies, like edible confetti.

I prefer an uncolored Peep, as I think the artificial colorings get in the way of the pure sugary flavor. (Ghost Peeps, for that reason, are the best.)

The Vanilla Creme is a soft flavor, artificial and lacking in the complexity of a nice Tahitian vanilla pod, but still it has a soft and comforting flavor that cuts a bit of the sugary sweetness. They’re bouncy and fluffy and grainy. The little confetti add a little bit of a crunch, but mostly they dissolve quickly on the tongue.

These would be a fun version available all year round. I also heard that they’re releasing Birthday Cake Peeps which are a turquoise blue and yellow cake flavored. (Which is also a great idea for a year-round Peep.)

Rating: 7 out of 10

I admit that I bought these because of the package.

They’re just egg shaped gumballs.

Smarties Bubble Gum Eggs are made by Ford Gum in the USA with real sugar, there are no artificial sweeteners in there. I bought them for $1.49 at Cost Plus World Market, but then I saw them at the 99 Cent Only Store for a dollar.

They’re passably good. They come in different colors, but I really didn’t get a sense that they were different flavors, all vaguely and pleasantly fruity. They were soft enough to bite but have a satisfyingly crunchy shell. Each piece is a good size for chewing, two make for a little too much. The sugar takes a while to be dissolved, so there’s no bubble blowing right away. Even after the sugar is gone, they’re a little too stiff and snappy to blow a good bubble with.

At other times of the year, they’re also available as plain old gumballs. I bought them before and feel the same way about them. They’re okay. Mostly I like them because they’re pretty. I just chew the sugar out, spit out the gum and start up with a new piece.

Rating: 5 out of 10

I noticed this new Hershey’s chocolate bunny introduced in 2011 called Snapsy Snap-Apart Bunny.

The concept is that the bunny is flat instead of dimensional, and pre-sectioned to break apart easily. The version I purchased, for a buck, is 2 ounces, or about the size of a King Size bar. It comes apart into five pieces. Each is a good size for dipping into peanut butter, which was always my favorite way to eat my Easter Rabbit.

This is one of those products that solves a problem you didn’t know you had. I’m sure if this were sold on infomercials, the first part would demonstrate all the frustrating things about a sumptuous solid chocolate bunny and how hard it is to eat, how children fight over it and what it should be named.

I don’t have much to say except that it’s a rabbit shaped Hershey’s bar. It’s made from Hershey’s marginally satisfying chocolate, the same stuff in Hershey’s Kisses, Hershey’s Miniatures and those addictive little Hershey’s Candy Coated Eggs. While I don’t think Hershey’s Milk Chocolate is good chocolate, it’s mighty fine candy. It’s fudgy, grainy and tangy and comforting.

It’s also made in Mexico. (The Candy Professor had a bit of a rant about Snapsy.)

Rating: 5 out of 10

Related Candies

1. Short and Sweet: Easter Bites
2. Easter Candy Spotting 2013
3. Twix Egg
4. Ferrero Eggs: Hazelnut & Cocoa
5. Wonka SweeTarts Chicks, Ducks & Bunnies (2012)
6. Milka L’il Scoops

Wrigley’s has quietly introduced a new Starburst flavor variety: Starburst Very Berry. The package features four flavors: Strawberry, Raspberry, Blackberry and Blueberry.

This isn’t Starburst’s first foray into the berry world, they used to make a version called Berries and Creme which had a creamy version in strawberry, raspberry, blueberry and mixed berry. This version is a bit more bold, dumping the creme for a more fruity intensity.

The package says Great fruit taste! Real fruit juice! (That’s apple juice. They all have apple juice, and less than 2% of it, too.) They also have 20% of your RDA of vitamin C.

I picked these up in their Easter box, but they’re also available in the single serve package and bags. The hazard with the bags and box is that you’re never sure of the ratio you’ll get. My box had an inordinate amount of blueberry and only one raspberry.

Blackberry

This flavor sounded great, even though I’m never sure what the difference in artificially flavored candies is between raspberry and blackberry aside from the color.

The flavor is, well, good. It’s very floral and deep with a lot of black cherry, cranberry and raspberry notes. But overall there’s a sort of softness to it, it’s not a lack of intensity, it’s just not puckery or dry like pomegranate can be.

Blueberry

I had a lot of these and I was a little put off by the color. It’s not the color of food, it’s the color of a drug or a toy. The flavor is balanced and does a good job of being blueberry “flavored.” It’s a mix of tannins, like iced tea and a floral note that reminds me of ball point pen ink. It’s a little tangy, between the tartness level of a citrus and the blander strawberry.

Blueberry is hard and the most interesting thing about blueberries, to me, is the combination of textures. It’s a difficult thing to mimic in a chewy candy, like the fuzz on a peach or the layers of flavor and mouthfeel of a concord grape.

Strawberry

Well, it’s the strawberry Starburst. There’s not much else to say except, “Welcome!” It’s a softer flavor, more like cotton candy than a sour berry flavor. There’s a light tartness to it, but mostly it’s sweet with a little kiss of floral strawberry flavor.

The wrapper is a different color pink or at least it seemed brighter. I’m glad it’s in this mix.

Raspberry

This is very floral and deeply jammy. There’s a hint of pineapple tartness but overall it’s a well rounded flavor with some cherry notes as well. It’s not wholly raspberry, it lacks a “seed” flavor to it. I can’t say much more because I only had one.

Overall, it’s a nice mix. It’s less sour than some of the other varieties that include citrus flavors. I liked the colors, and if you’re going for something like a glass jar that would be on display on your desk or at a party, the look is quite striking.

Starburst contain gelatin, so they’re not for vegetarians and not Kosher/Halal. They are gluten free.

Related Candies

1. Starburst Sweet Fiesta
2. Starburst Flavor Morph
3. Starburst Sour & Sweet
4. Starburst Retro
5. Starburst Baja California & Tropical
6. Starburst Berries & Creme and Fruit & Creme
7. Starburst

There’s rarely anything new to report in the world of chocolate rabbits for Easter. There’s plenty of variation: They come in flat styles and three dimensional. Sitting and standing poses. Hollow and solid. Milk, white or dark chocolate (and sometimes flavored solid confection). The chocolate can also have some inclusions. Until recently this was rather rare, and mostly crispy rice. This year Russell Stover, which already makes a white confection Cookies ‘n’ Creme version, came out with the Russell Stover Kris P. Pretzel Bunny.

I learned of the existence of this tasty sounding bunny on Rebekah’s Obsessive Sweets blog. I did find it at CVS but it was a full 7 ounces and four dollars, I just wanted to taste it. So off to the Russell Stover’s website I go and found out that there’s a 1.5 ounce version out there, so I checked out the 99 Cent Only Store. Success ... and only a buck. (Though the large version is a better value.)

The bunny, at only 1.5 ounces, is not particularly large, but compact. It’s quite thick through the middle, and if it were solid (without the pretzel bits), it would probably be more difficult to bite.

Suspended within the milk chocolate are little bits of pretzel. They’re not chunks, they really are teensy bits. My guess is that they have to be in order to get the molding process to work.

The bite is wonderfully grainy, there are a lot of little bits in there. They don’t create the dry crunch that a whole pretzel piece would. Instead there’s more the malty and salty flavors in there and of course the slight grit of a pretzel dust. The chocolate is creamy and sweet, with a light smoky note. Sadly, it’s very salty. There are 240 mg of salt in there, which the package says is 10% of your RDA, but I think, for me, it’s more like 25% since I eat so little salt. So it could easily be cut in half and I think most people would find it still has that zap.

I liked it and would probably buy this variety again. It’d be nice if it came in a dark variety, but the chocolate here was sufficiently strong enough to stand up for itself with the pretzel flavors and textures.

The packaging is excessive. It’s not a large rabbit, but the box is big and has a useless tray inside. I understand needing to box up hollow bunnies, but the solid variety shouldn’t need more than some foil and/or a box, not the tray as well.

Since this has pretzels in it, it’s not gluten free. The bunnies contain soy and dairy. It’s also made on shared equipment with peanuts, tree nuts and eggs. There’s no statement on the package or on Russell Stover’s website about the sourcing of their chocolate or other ingredients except that their chocolate sourcing partners are members of the World Cocoa Foundation.

Related Candies

1. Aldi Choceur Flame Egg & Chocolate Rabbit
2. Snyder’s Peanut Butter Pretzel Sandwich Dips
3. Pretzel M&Ms
4. The All American Chocolate Bunny Battle
5. Revisit: Take 5, Sunkist Fruit Gems & Snickers Almond
6. Asher’s Milk Chocolate Covered Things
7. Men’s Pocky

Here are a few Easter candies I bought but I’m not going to get around to doing a full review.

Ghirardelli Milk & Coconut Chocolate Eggs come in a little 3.5 ounce bag and like the other two versions available for Easter, they’re a bit on the pricey side. I paid $3.99 for this little bag.

I was actually out at CVS looking for the Cadbury Hollow Bunny that I noted in my roundup of products for 2013. (I was hoping it was on sale, because the first time I saw them, they were $4.79 for a 3.5 ounce bunny and I didn’t really want to fork that over for Cadbury chocolate.) While looking though I spotted this bag, which reader Kate mentioned was available last year.

They’re pretty and feature good quality milk chocolate. These were a little softer in texture and had a silky melt. The coconut mixed into the chocolate is crispy, though it does become chewy after a while. It’s a nice combination of textures and flavors. I found the coconut a little too, I don’t know, difficult to get out of my teeth. Still, I manged to finish the bag within 24 hours, so I must have liked them. I’ll still go for the Milk Crisp version over this.

Rating: 7 out of 10

I found Ferrero Tic Tac Bunny Burst at Target with all the other little Easter Basket stuffers. I didn’t see a press release on this, so I didn’t know it was coming out. Further, there’s no listing on the package or anywhere I can find on the internet that says what flavors are actually in the Bunny Burst.

The green is pretty easy to figure out. It was green apple. They’re sweet and tangy, with a very sweet, odd aftertaste. I didn’t care much for it and was hoping for better in the lilac colored ones.

The soft purple is a bit of a mystery flavor. The ingredients list dried apple, dried grape, dried acerola (West Indian Cherry) and dried lychee. So I’m going to call this one tropical. It has a light green grape note, I also tasted violets along with a floral melon and vague medicinal cherry note. At one point did think about lychees, as well. It’s interesting and unique. Not really what I’d call good or refreshing, but I didn’t notice the weird sweet and metallic aftertaste with this one.

They’re made in Canada and contain carmine, so they’re not suitable for vegetarians.

Rating: 6 out of 10

I bought this pair of Cemoi Classic Creamy Egg (Milk Chocolate) at Cost Plus World Market. I was actually hoping to find a dark chocolate version, perhaps more upscale, of the classic Cadbury Creme Egg.

This is not that. I can’t give it a full review because I didn’t actually eat it. Both were sticky and oozy under the foil wrap, though I made my choices from the box at the store very carefully. I opened both and found overly sweet, grainy fondant. The chocolate was marginal, it was all just very sweet and unappealing. So into the trash they went.

Rating: 3 out of 10

I reviewed the Snickers Peanut Butter Squared before when they came out. The Snickers Peanut Butter Egg is the same construction, only in hemispherical ovoid shape. It’s a little different because it’s molded instead of being enrobed. Of course the domed shape also means different bites have different ratios. But overall I noticed more caramel in it. The chocolate and caramel and peanut with peanut butter is a nice combination. The salty peanut butter keeps it from being too sweet. I enjoyed it more than the Square thing. I also reviewed the Santa version of this which also has different proportions because of the shape of the mold.

Rating: 7 out of 10

Related Candies

1. Ghirardelli Milk & Crisp Chocolate Eggs
2. Snickers Pumpkin
3. 3 Musketeers Coconut
4. Zitrone Honig Tic Tac
5. Tic Tac Pink Grapefruit
6. House Brand Creme Eggs
7. Dove Truffle and Snickers Eggs

Russell Stover is a fixture at American drug stores at Easter with their large variety of single serving Easter eggs. New this year is the Russell Stover Cookie Dough Egg.

This new egg follows the same sort of construction as the Red Velvet Santa first spotted for Christmas (also available as an egg). The center is an actual flour-based dough. Unlike other fondant centers which are just whipped up sugars, this one is a bit more complex. Here’s the ingredient list (forgive me for any transcription errors, it’s green printing on a cream background):

Milk chocolate (sugar, whole milk, cocoa butter, chocolate, soy lecithin, vanillin), Sugar, Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough (Wheat flour, brown sugar, partially hydrogenated palm kernel oil, sugar, chocolate morsels (sugar, chocolate, cocoa butter, soy lecithin), glycerine, high fructose corn syrup, palm oil, natural flavors (milk), salt, soy lecthin, xanthan gum, sodium bicarbonate), corn syurp, dairy cream, condensed milk, partially hydrogenated palm kernel oil, chocolate cookies (enriched wheat flour [contains niacin, reduced iron, thiamin mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), sugar, cocoa (processed with alkalai) vegetable shortening (partially hydrogenated soybean and/or cottonseed oils) high fructose corn syrup, cornflour, chocolate, salt, diglycerides with citric acid, invertase and tocopherols.

So, instead of a short list, this is long and includes lots of flour, so it’s not gluten free. It also contains high fructose corn syrup a few times, which is disappointing because Russell Stover, while not being top of the line, is usually filled with plain old sugar and corn syrup. This is what happens when candy makers start adding bakery items. Unlike actually cookie dough, this has no egg products.

The egg looks like many of the other milk chocolate Russell Stover varieties. It’s on the flat side, and has two rows of glossy ripples. It’s about two inches long and one and a quarter inches wide.

The bite is soft and the center is, well, doughy. It’s not dry but not quite as moist as I expect. It has a grain to it, with the sugar being noticeable and I might have detected a little salt as well. The flour taste is not noticeable (sometimes real cookie dough can taste like raw flour).

Unlike cookie dough nugget products, this has more of the satisfaction of eating a spoonful of dough. The chocolate chips didn’t do much for me, but the milk chocolate coating was smooth, creamy and a sweet complement to the dough. I’d prefer a dark chocolate version, as I put dark chips in my cookies. It’s similar to their Brownie Egg (which it turns out, I’ve never reviewed), but naturally less chocolatey.

It’s a good rendition of cookie dough as a candy. I don’t know if I’d grab this over something like their marshmallows or the Pecan Delight, but I know there are some folks who will really appreciate this.

Related Candies

1. Russell Stover Red Velvet Santa
2. Russell Stover Big Bite Pecan Delight Egg
3. Russell Stover Eggs (2009 edition)
4. Russell Stover Eggs
5. Cookie Dough Bites
6. Russell Stover Eggs (2007 edition)
7. Russell Stover Cream Eggs

Nestle NestEgg Creamy Caramel come in a lovely purple bag with little flowers and butterflies on it. It’s all quite charming.

The idea of caramel filled milk chocolate eggs is pretty appealing, too. There’s no dearth of choices at Easter, as I think that Cadbury may have the corner on that market with their mini version of the Cadbury Mini Caramel Egg that comes in a little egg carton. But the Nestle version, though not quite as charmingly packaged, were far less expensive. (The Cadbury’s were actually the same price, but only had 4.8 ounces in them, instead of 10 ounces in the Nestle bag.)

The little foil wrapped eggs come in two different colors: purple and a sort of pastel green. They helpfully have the candy contents printed on the foil; if you’re like me and like to mix your foil covered sweets, this is extremely helpful. Inside the foil the little eggs are nicely molded with the Nestle logo on two sides.

The eggs smell sweet and a little like cereal. The size is nice, I like to gently press along the seam to pull the eggs apart into little dishes of caramel. The chocolate is exceptionally sweet, a little grainy and on the fudgy side. The caramel is smooth and has a little bit of a salty and dark note to it, keeping it from being equally sweet. On the whole, they’re, well, cloying. I can have a couple, but then I’m done. They make my throat hurt. I’m still drawn to the look of them.

I’m hoping that someday Ghiradelli will do a dark chocolate salted caramel version (their new Easter eggs here) ... I’d definitely pay the premium for that.

Nestle also makes several other versions of their NestEggs. There’s a classic Nestle Crunch and a version of the Butterfinger that has milk chocolate mixed with Butterfinger peanut butter pieces. I’ve had the Jingle (Christmas bell) version, and they’re pretty good. Again, there are better versions if you’re willing to pay a premium.

Nestle has not given any information about the sourcing of the ingredients, though they are on track for more sustainable targets for the future.

Related Candies

1. Dove Sea Salt Caramel Dark Chocolate Promises
2. Ghirardelli Intense Dark Sea Salt Soiree
3. Nestle Butterfinger Pumpkin
4. Nestle Creme Eggs
5. Russell Stover Eggs
6. Wonka Golden Creme Egg
7. Cadbury Eggs: Creme & Caramel

Zitner’s Butter Krak Eggs are a local favorite in Philadelphia. Their Easter egg selections have been made since 1922. Like many candy companies, it started with a family recipe, sold to friends and neighbors at the holidays and expanded from there.

I don’t remember eating them when I lived in Pennsylvania, and I’ve never seen them in stores anywhere else. One of my fellow candy bloggers did send me a couple about five years ago (but it was after Easter, so I didn’t post a review) so I have had them recently.

I was looking forward to trying them again, so I put in an order from a webstore called PA General Store that sells Philadelphia favorites. I ordered a mixed box of 24, which included a selection of their four single serving sized eggs: Butter Krak, Peanut Butter, Double Cocoanut & Butter Cream Eggs.

Zitners Butter Krak Egg is one of those names that sticks with you. The odd thing is that the actual description of the egg was a mystery to me.

They’re a coconut butter cream covered in dark chocolate, but the chocolate also has toasted coconut in it. (Well, they call it cocoanut. More on that later.)

All of the eggs are about the same size, about 2.5 inches long, about 1 inch in diameter and weigh 1 and 1/8 of an ounce. So they’re nice portions, about double the size of a boxed chocolate.

The dark chocolate has a lot of the crispy toasted coconut in it, it gives it a nice texture and is actually toasted and crispy (which is hard to balance without them becoming too hard and difficult to chew). The center is soft and creamy, like a buttercream frosting. It’s sugary but has an overall smooth texture. There’s a lot of coconut in there, though it’s shorter minced bits, so not too chewy.

The dark chocolate isn’t bitter but still balances the sweetness of the center well. This is one of those candies that I would like once or twice a year and I can see why it’s a local favorite. I’m not sure if I’ve had another version quite like it.

Zitners Double Cocoanut Egg is interesting for two reasons. First, the spelling of cocoanut. It’s the less used spelling of coconut, but it always makes me think of the Cocoanut Grove, the nightclub once located here in Los Angeles at the Ambassador Hotel.

Now, if no one told me the names of these eggs, I would have thought the Butter Krak was double the coconut, because it has coconut in the center and the chocolate. But the reality is that the cream center of the Double Cocoanut Egg actually has twice the coconut than, well, I guess the Butter Krak center.

It is dense. It’s not as buttery, sweet or moist as the Butter Krak. But it is coconutty. The center barely holds together. I liked how it was so much less sweet than all the other eggs I’d tried, it was far more satisfying. Still, it was just a chocolate covered coconut egg, though it was fresh and I generally like them, this one didn’t blow me away.

Zitners Milk Chocolate Peanut Butter Egg was my favorite. It’s not really that hard to make a good peanut butter egg and they’ve done a great job. The peanut butter center isn’t too dry and not too sticky smooth either. The texture is very similar to a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup with a noticeable grain and fair amount of peanut butter oils. The tops of my eggs were a little soft, a hazard when coating peanut butter with chocolate. But they held together well. The peanut butter has just the right hint of salt and has a peanut butter cookie dough texture.

They don’t quite top the Reese’s Peanut Butter Eggs but if you want to go for something locally made (if you are on the Eastern Seaboard) this is a nice option. (Though I don’t know where their milk chocolate comes from.)

Zitners Butter Cream Egg was my least favorite of the bunch. It’s extremely sweet. The center is pure mushy sweetness. I was hoping it was going to have a defined butter flavor, or perhaps a brown sugar note. Instead it’s like a log of frosting covered in dark chocolate. The dark chocolate, though thin, does moderate the overt sweetness (as does a little bit of salt) but it’s still too insanely sweet with no other flavors or textures to provide a respite.

On the other hand, Easter is always the most insanely sweet season, the time of year when I yearn for white chocolate, so I know there must be plenty of people out there who must have these.

If I lived in an area where I had a choice between these and Russell Stover, I’d probably go for these in Peanut Butter or the Butter Krak over any of the Russell Stover varieties. (Except for the Pecan Delight.) But I live in a See’s area, and though they don’t offer them at the drug store in individually wrapped pieces, I would make the trip to get their Scotchmallow Eggs or mix of Egg Quartet (though they cost about 25% more).

Related Candies

1. See’s Orange Cream Lollypops, Mayfair Egg & Pecan Butterscotch Bar
2. Russell Stover Eggs (2009 edition)
3. Russell Stover Eggs
4. Russell Stover Eggs (2007 edition)
5. See’s Egg Quartet
6. See’s Scotchmallow Eggs
7. Reese’s Eggs

Elmer Chocolate has been making candy since 1855. They’re based in Louisiana, but I usually only see their candy in California around Valentine’s Day as they have some very popular boxed chocolate assortments that are sold at drug stores and discounters all over the counter. However, they do make some insanely popular Easter products that seem much harder to find: Heavenly Hash Eggs and Gold Brick Eggs.

I was surprised to see these Cotton Candy Marshmallow Eggs at Cost Plus World Market instead of those more well known eggs, but at $1.49 and for something that was a little different from the traditional Easter fare, I was willing to take the plunge.

The packaging is simple, a very light plastic try has four sections to hold the domed marshmallow eggs. It does its job, as they were all pretty much flawless right out of the wrapper.

Each piece is rather small, they’re .45 ounces each. They’re about 2 inches long. They smell sweet, a little like cherry and milky chocolate. They’re a “light” candy, in that they’re not caloricly dense, so you can eat the whole package and it’s only 190 calories (105 per ounce).

I can’t really put my finger on what went wrong with these. The chocolate is passable, thought sweet is does a nice job of sealing in the soft, moist marshmallow. The marshmallow itself, well, it’s filled with bad air. It’s probably one of those flavors that not everyone can detect (like the fact that Red 40 tastes bitter to me and very few other people). It tastes like molten plastic. Styrofoam. It tastes like new Crocs. It’s not the marshmallow itself, as far as I can tell, it’s not the packaging ... it’s the stuff that was whipped into it.

It’s a great idea, to have a softly strawberry flavored marshmallow center. But in this case, I can’t recommend it. Everything I saw at the Cost Plus looks like it’s from the same case so would probably have the same issue. I haven’t seen them at any other store. I did try their Toasted Marshmallow Eggs a few years ago and didn’t note this issue.

My big question to you, readers, is this: Do you taste this kind of stuff? I notice similar problems at times with whipped items, like meringues or marshmallows. But other candies that have delicate flavors can also take on this plastic note (especially ones without a strong flavor of their own).

Does anyone else notice this from time to time? Do you know what it is? (Is it dangerous?)

UPDATE: As some here have noted and an inside source in the confectionery industry as also pointed out, it is likely from the packaging. The tray is likely polystyrene and it outgasses ... delicate and airy confections like marshmallows can easily absorb that “flavor”. Styrene is not a healthy item to consume, though in a seasonal treat in this small quantity is likely to be trivial. But it still doesn’t taste good.

Related Candies

1. Hilco Mallow Pals Strawberry Squeezable Marshmallow
2. Limited Edition 3 Musketeers Marshmallow
3. CVS Marshmallow Pop
4. Elmer’s Dark Chocolate Heavenly Hash & Gold Brick Eggs
5. Elmer’s Toasted Marshmallow Eggs
6. Elmer’s Chocolate