One of the advantages to being the only Candy Addict writer outside of North America is that people send me cool stuff to try - stuff which I would never find here in Australia. In this case an Arizona-based Candy Addict sent me a bunch of weird and wonderful Mexican candy to taste test. Having grown up in Southern California, I’m no stranger to the common flavors of Mexico - tamarind, chili, mango and so on - but this is my first experience with those flavors from a confectionery perspective.

Made by de la Rosa, Pulparindo is described as a “hot and salted tamarind pulp candy” and, to my palette, it was only mildly hot and not really salty. It’s basically a pressed rectangle of tamarind, mixed with some sugar and chili. The first listed ingredient is sugar, which is pretty obvious from a textural point of view. It’s a pretty sandy thing to eat - you can hear it grinding against your teeth as you chew. Flavor-wise it’s pretty nice - but you would definitely need to be a tamarind fan in the first place! Appearance wise it’s not all that appealing, but if you’ve eaten raw tamarind before then you’re no stranger to brown patties!

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Since I adore them so much, the flavors of Jolly Rancher candies often act as a benchmark for when I taste other fruit flavored candy. As a group they make no excuses for not tasting at all like the actual fruits they represent. Jolly Ranchers are fabulous in that they are so fantastically, gorgeously artificial and yummy. The advertising tag line is “bursting with BOLD fruit flavor” and when it comes to hard candies, no truer words were spoken. Here’s a quick review of the five classic flavors:

Apple: This is far and away my favorite Jolly Rancher flavor. Sweet and tart, green apple is a classic for which there is no substitute. It sits on the knife edge of being too sweet, but balances nicely with the amount of tartness in it. Added bonuses are the bright green it turns your tongue and the fact that you can use it to make Jolly Rancher beer.

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I know, I know, more jellybeans (I just reviewed the Starburst Sour Jellybeans), but can you blame me? When you find the right jellybean, it’s the perfect combination of crunch and chew and sugary goodness! So, when Candy Addict’s very own Brian professed that Nerds Bumpy Jellybeans are his favorite Easter candy this year, I knew I had to try them. First, if Brian says they are good, then the probability that this is true is extremely high. Second, I am a fan of Nerds, especially of Nerds rope, because you get that crunchy and chewy dual bang with the rope. Do you see where I am headed?

I won’t keep you in suspense - these Nerds Bumpy Jellybeans are keepers. They are kooky and bizarre and incredibly tasty! There are five flavors. The flavors aren’t listed on the packaging, but you can guess that they are the usual suspects: red (strawberry), yellow (lemon), orange (you guessed it, orange), green (watermelon), and purple (grape). As indicated by the descriptive title, these beans sport bumpy exteriors, which makes them a little odd looking and even a tad ugly, but who cares! They rock! The hard candy shell is crunchy but won’t break your teeth. The interior is chewy but smooth, and there’s a perfect balance between crunch and chew.

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I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but there is a plethora of jellybean offerings on the Easter candy shelves this year. I say the more, the merrier, but not all jellybeans are created equal. I like sour candies, so I tried to determine which package of jellybeans might be the most sour. I decided upon the Starburst Sour Jellybeans because a) it clearly states SOUR on the package, and b) Starburst reliably delivers what I consider to be some tasty candies.

I was not disappointed! There are six fruity flavors in Starburst Sour Jellybeans: green apple, lemon, watermelon, tangerine, cherry, and blue raspberry (why is this flavor everywhere? I for one have never seen a blue raspberry, but maybe I am sheltered). The beans are a nice, compact size, and each is bursting with ample flavor. The exterior has a satisfying crunch, and the inner jellybean is dense and chewy. You also get a lot of jellybeans in a package, so they are a good value.

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When the long school day was over, the afternoon bus seemed like a sanctuary. True, there were always spit balls to dodge, boys to avoid, and backpacks to trip over. Despite these hazards, I welcomed the world of the school bus for one particular reason: it was prime candy trading time.

Once we settled in for the drive home, my bus companions and I would whip out our respective stashes and embark on a journey through a smörgåsbord of sweets. The candies that would appear most frequently from our backpacks were Fireballs, Red Hots, Jolly Ranchers, Warheads and Blow Pops.

Blow Pops were always a favorite because they combined lollipops with gum, which was forbidden both in school and on the bus. We would consume the Blow Pops with gusto, giddy with our secret rebellion. It was with this same excitement that I approached a bag of Blow Pop Minis - the “Blow Pop with NO Stick.” How would my Blow Pop experience fare now that I was no longer encumbered with a stick?

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Most sour candies aren’t nearly sour enough for me. I am one of those weird people who will quite happily eat a fresh lemon wedge without flinching. When I happened upon this bag of Zours, which shows two aliens suffering from a serious case of Sour Eye*, I had to give these a try!

The Zours come in four flavors - sour blue raspberry, sour green apple, sour tangerine, and sour watermelon. Without even opening the packet I knew I was going to love these little babies.

A product from the Just Born company (makers of other treasures such as Peeps and Hot Tamales), Zours take almost a week to produce and over 100,000 of them are produced every single day. With that much sour power in one factory and such a rich candy pedigree, these little jelly delights were bound to be good.

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I was scouring a gas station candy aisle for some delicious chocolate confections when a bright red, happy, $.79 package of Twizzlers Rainbow Twists screamed “New!” and “A Low Fat Snack!” at me. Though I generally find plain red Twizzlers dull and rarely buy them, I jumped at the chance to try them in six different fruity flavors (and with only a gram of fat for the whole serving). My chocolate fix could wait.

And these do look delicious. The Twizzlers are brightly colored, opaque and shiny, and my 1.9 oz package contained one each of grape, blue raspberry, watermelon, lemonade, orange and strawberry flavors. I’m not sure how new this candy is, exactly - it’s not listed on the Hershey’s site, and I’ve seen reviews of it dating back to late 2006.

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• Looking for Slammers this weekend, I found Hershey’s Whoppers Milkshake milk instead and tried it. It really does taste like a malty milkshake only it’s not frozen, just cold. It is SUPER sweet - too sweet really. The 14 oz. bottle of thick milk serves two but who drinks half a bottle? Oh, and you don’t want to know how much fat and calories are in this thing.
• I also ran across a new Limited Edition candy I had not heard of before so I picked up a box: Chocolate-Covered Sugar Babies. Overall, I wasn’t impressed. The chocolate was waxy and just like the chocolate on Milk Duds. The chocolate slid off almost totally at the first bite and never really mixed with the caramel of the Sugar Babies. If you like Sugar Babies, stick to the original.
• I also tried a Milky Way Ice Cream Bar. Oh yeah. Just as good as the Snickers Ice Cream Bar. Fan-freakin’-tastic.
• I ate a Cadbury Twirl Friday that my wife picked up for me at the World Market. It’s a British chocolate candy that is very smooth and has lots of layers running the length of the roll. It has a bit of an odd taste to it at first but it ended up being pretty good. I recommend it if you like the distinctive taste of Cadbury chocolate.
• Wrigley’s Extra Watermelon Gum is really good. It has a great watermelon taste and really does last extra long.

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