When I arrived home from work a few days ago, I had a giant box waiting for me on the table. It turned out to contain a Dale & Thomas Popcorn sampler. I unpacked the carton, (which included an ice pack to protect the popcorn) and pulled out the inner package wondering what exactly they had sent me. The sampler contained six different varieties of their popcorn and is actually their “Combo Number 1″ (not to be confused with Mambo #5). While we are, in fact, Candy Addict and not Popcorn Addict, it should be noted that these were so far removed from regular popcorn that I would indeed classify them in the candy category.
The flavors they sent me could be broken up into 2 categories: berry-flavored and a variety that they called DrizzleCorn. The berry-flavored ones are coated in a thick berry-flavored candy syrup, while the DrizzleCorn are swirled with their respective “drizzles”.
Sun-Drenched Strawberry: The flavored variety of their popcorn is not that different from Caramel coated popcorn, except that they are colored a very deep red, which can be startling at first, if you’re expecting run of the mill popcorn. The kernels aren’t “kind of red” or “light red” they’re very red. The flavor on these, and the other “syrup” flavors is quiet strong. Out of the three, I’d say that Strawberry was my favorite, not overpoweringly strong, but fairly sweet.
Blueberry Bushel: Again, very heavily coated with dark colored syrup, but this time, the popcorn has bits of real blueberries on them to provide some real blueberry flavor. Even though I’m not a huge blueberry fan, I appreciate that they included real blueberrues and that these are overwhlemingly blueberry. Again, these were quiet sweet, and heavily flavored. I honestly don’t think I would be able to sit down and eat an entire bowl of these or the Raspberry flavor, but I could see these working great when set out for a party or shared among many people.
Really Really Raspberry: I was looking forward to Raspberry the most, as it is one of my favorite flavors, but I was disappointed in these. The flavoring on these is WAY too sweet, and they leave a weird aftertaste in your mouth even after only eating a few pieces. The Raspberry flavoring was very strong as well, to an almost extreme level. No way could I eat more than a handful at a time.
The chocolate drizzled popcorn, which they call DrizzleCorn, is by far the stand-outs of the sampler, more along the lines of caramel corn mixed with a splash of chocolate. These 3 flavors win hands-down over the fruity flavors. All the people I shared the popcorn with agreed.
Chocolate Chunk N’Caramel DrizzleCorn:This was the first flavor that I tried out of the 6, and I thought that it was pretty good. I’d say the 3rd best out of the 6. While the other chocolated drizzled popcorns are plain popcorn, this one was Caramel Popcorn like a Cracker Jack, and then dripped with chocolate. Pretty excellent, I’d definitely get this over buttered popcorn if they offered it at the movies.
Twice As Nice Chocolate DrizzleCorn: Obviously, as the name implies, this popcorn contains twice as much chocolate, in the form of white chocolate and milk chocolate. It clearly has more chocolate than the others, and all but eliminated the popcorn flavor and consistency. Luckily, I didn’t mind because the chocolate tastes excellent.
Peanut Butter & White Chocolate DrizzleCorn: This flavor seemed more salty than all the others, probbaly due to the peanut butter, but it didn’t really get in the way of the deliciousness. I was surprised that chocolate and salt didn’t totally clash flavor wise. The combination of the Peanut Butter and the chocolate with the popcorn goes together very well.
Overall, I was very impressed with all of the Dale And Thomas popcorn, though as I stated above, the DrizzleCorn is by far the stand-out of the products I tasted. They have 14 flavors in all, including such interesting combinations as Pineapple Coconut Breeze and Southwest Cheddar Chipotle. Definitely check them out if you’re into delicious popcorn.
Chocolate and salt clash? Chocolate and popcorn is my favorite movie treat!!!!
–Brian
August 21st, 2006 at 1:25 pmIs there a more overrated popcorn? We craze popcorn and had a disappointing experience with a few of the flavors reviewed here. Better to stick with Oogie’s or Lesserevil for great corn treats.
June 6th, 2007 at 5:44 amTry Fisher’s Popcorn…
December 5th, 2007 at 1:34 pmThey have the best caramel popcorn I have ever tasted. THey also have great peanut brittle and taffy if you like that also. I think they ship their popcorn also from their website.
I placed an order for 23 3.5 gallon tins in October 2007 to be shipped on Dec 3, 2007 for my company office Holiday presents. As of December 21th 2007, they have not been shipped and they have no record of my over $1000 payment. This company has absolutely the worst customer service and business practice of any company I have ever heard of. They have told me numerous times they were overnighting the orders, however they neglected to do this as well. I hope this information saves other people time.
December 21st, 2007 at 1:25 pmI have to second the above blog–I also ordered about 100 gifts for my referrals. They fired my representative and never told me, then charged me $8,000 for an order for $2,000. They never shipped the order and then at the last minute shipped cases of tins that made me look ridiculous. No phone support, no nothin… Buyer Beware!
January 8th, 2008 at 3:16 pmAgreed – worst customer service. I would not use this company again.
February 7th, 2008 at 12:57 pmEven if they had good customer service, the popcorn sucks.
February 21st, 2008 at 10:25 pm