The after-Christmas candy sale is currently at its zenith for bargains. Everything is 50, 75, even 90 percent off the original price.

Often, there are candies that catch my eye, but for which I don’t feel like shelling out a few bucks. Brach’s Cherry Cordial Nougats are one such confection. But after Walgreens had them on sale for thirty-three cents, it seemed ridiculous not to buy them.

I was taken slightly aback by what these were made of. A cordial, by definition, is a chocolate shell with a fruit filling. The only thing these had even remotely in common with a cordial was that they used cocoa. Well, Brach’s, I hate to break it to you, but you can make a cookie with cocoa powder; that doesn’t mean it’s a cordial cookie!

Aside from my cocoa issues, I wasn’t exactly sure how nougat would fare in the presence of both cherry and cocoa. Reading the ingredients list, I also discovered there are no nuts in this, which is actually a component of a real nougat (if you’re going to get technical).

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As I strolled down the River Walk of San Antonio, I had some unexpected surprises. It began when I bumped into a teacher from my high school days, an oddity since we are both Californians. The second was a surprise of the tastier variety.

Popping into one of the candy shops along the river, I found a collection of Schooner Pete’s Salt Water Taffy. Like my former American Government teacher, this taffy was a rare find in Texas, much less San Antonio, since it’s manufactured in Oregon, and I don’t usually find stores that stock it outside that region.

Because it was around Christmas when this all occurred, I purchased a bag of the peppermint taffy. I figured I hadn’t gotten around to consuming all that much peppermint this time of year in my attempt to try out different types of candy canes.

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For many Candy Addicts, the most wonderful time of the year isn’t Christmas – it’s the post-Christmas sale season (what businesses here in Canada refer to as “Boxing Week,” the natural extension of the traditional Boxing Day sale). Boxing Week is an excellent opportunity to compensate for a disappointing Christmas by buying what you really wanted at crazy-low sale prices – and that goes for candy as well. Stale candy canes? Mockolate Santa that might just be left over from last Christmas? Make up for it by buying yourself a nice box of Ferrero Rochers or Lindors at 50% off.

I actually had a very good candy Christmas (which you will see the evidence of in future reviews), but like many people, I can’t resist a bargain, even when I’ve already got a heap of Christmas chocolates at home. And so, I couldn’t resist grabbing a couple of these Hershey’s Cherry Cream Bells – 31 cents each at my local Wal-Mart (yeah, yeah, I know).

Usually chocolate items like this are filled with marshmallow, but in the case of the similar Whipped Creme Santa I just reviewed, “creme” meant a smooth, sticky marshmallow creme. (Hershey’s managed to get away with the proper spelling of “cream” for this item, perhaps due to the presence of actual milk ingredients.) I was expecting something similar from this item – with, of course, cherry flavor, but wasn’t overlooking the possibility that it was one big chocolate-covered fondant cherry cluster either. I like chocolate-covered cherries – but not necessarily ones as big as my palm.

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The holidays are made for candy indulgence – but does indulgence have to break the bank? We’ve attempted to discover just that in the first two parts of It Came from the Dollar Store: The Cheapo Holiday Candy Special. In Parts 1 and 2, we reviewed the tasty Whipped Creme Santa and the not-so-tasty Marshmallow Treats Santa. Now, I bring you the third and final Christmas candy from the fine folks at Dollarama: the Sugar House.

The concept behind the Sugar House is a simple one. It’s a house… made out of sugar. Lots and lots of sugar. It’s then given a gummy “occupant” – in this case, a strange little orange gumdrop man with a Santa hat and Popeye arms who seems to be radiating red icing “heat waves” – perhaps he’s an anthropomorphic flame? Is the Sucrose Shack meant to appear as if it’s in imminent danger of melting into a Caramel House? (In the company’s defense, they also do versions with a pretty decent-looking Santa and snowman.)

As if that weren’t already enough pure sugar to send anyone into diabetic shock, the house and occupant are then liberally decorated with icing. The icing detailing is actually surprisingly nice, with rainbow-colored Christmas lights and a brown chimney on the roof, blue icing “windows” on the sides, and even blue snowflakes (two shades of blue!) and white squiggles on the back of the house where they could easily have gotten away with skimping.

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We may be in the midst of a recession, but that doesn’t mean you have to abandon the pursuit of true Candy Addictedness. Welcome to Part 2 of It Came From The Dollar Store: The Cheapo Holiday Candy Special. In Part 1, we reviewed the surprisingly not-terrible Whipped Creme Santa. This second item also features the jolly old elf in candy form – this time in real marshmallow rather than gooey marshmallow creme.

The Marshmallow Treats Santa (no brand name other than “Imported by Dollarama”) is made of that dense, industrial-grade marshmallow that’s also used in those life-sized marshmallow hamburgers you used to see all over the place. It has a generic, but not unpleasant, fruity smell, reminding me of the Leftovers Gummies I reviewed at Halloween. (Seeing as those were kind of terrible, that might not be a good sign.)

Marshmallow Santa’s actually a really good-looking guy – his facial features are well-formed, not blobby, with very good color separation. With his red nose and black eyes, he bears a striking resemblance to the Santa from the old stop-motion Rudolph special. A coating of sugar adds an attractive sparkly effect.

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