Monthly Archives: July 2008

Candy Review: Kai’s Campaign ’08 Candies

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Kai’s Campaign Candies - Obama

In our continuing coverage of the ’08 election (hey, everyone else is covering it, why shouldn’t we?), today we bring you Kai’s Campaign ’08 Candies. Kai’s makes traditional handmade Japanese rolled candy (kumi ame) in various cute and fun designs. For this election season, they’re offering both Lick Obama and Lick McCain candy sets. I got a chance to try the Obama set, and while I can’t claim the candies set new heights in confectionery deliciousness, I will admit that they’re pretty darn amusing!

The Obama set includes several lollipops with a cartoon Obama face, a bunch of little blue lozenge-shaped hard candies with the Democratic donkey, and similar candies in red, white and blue with the word “Vote.” For now the Obama set also includes a McCain pop, and the website says that they’re redoing the McCain face – in the meantime, only the Obama set is available.

The candies themselves taste fairly typical – the Obama ‘pop is mostly just sweet (the website says it’s lemon-lime flavored), while the lozenges have very slight flavors – lemon-lime for the donkeys and lemon for the vote candies (the lemon-lime of the lozenge tastes different than the lemon-lime of the Obama lollipop). McCain’s ‘pop sports a flavor that seems to be that of burnt sugar, though the website claims it’s strawberry. It’s not totally unpleasant, but I’m not sure I would ever have come up with strawberry if I hadn’t read it.

What’s cool about these is that the images go all the way through the pop, so even after you’ve sucked on them for a while, you can still take it out of your mouth and proudly display it for coworkers or admirers. And while the flavor may not be astounding, they’re certainly good in a general sugary kind of way. But really, we aren’t buying these for their flavors, are we?

Gum Review: Stride Always Mandarin

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Stride Mandarin Gum

All right, just finished lunch – a little Mexican (food, not person) – and I could use a little oral refreshing, if you know what I mean. I’m salivating for my all-time favorite and everyday afternoon go-to, Orbit Citrusmint gum. I’ll admit, I was skeptical of this flavor combo at first, fearing it might go the way of post-teeth-brushing orange juice, but how unfounded those fears were. Oh how I love its delicate balance, its burst of refreshing powers sans dental cleaning aftertaste. (I’m also a fan of orange-flavored toothpaste and Listerine, it should be noted, as means for washing away my sugary sins.) Yes, salsa be damned, I need some immediately! But wait… oh, that’s right, I have a box of Stride Always Mandarin waiting to be chewed and reviewed. Orbit will have to take a backseat for now… it’s Stride time. (And, as their somewhat perplexing name indicates, it’s always mandarin time.)

Okay, off the bat, the box flips down rather stealthily to expose two rows of gum and what appears to be some sort of word game, presumably to give you something to “do while you chew,” which could be a long time, apparently, as their tagline is “Ridiculously long lasting gum” and their website promises flavor that lasts “…for like… ever.” Really goin’ for that teen demo there, huh? Well time will tell, Stride, time will tell.

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Retro Candy Flashback: Boston Baked Beans

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Ferrara Pan Boston Baked Beans

I was promenading the candy aisle at Ralph’s. You know, the one with those bulk candy tubs proclaiming No Sampling!, but it’s un-American not to try some. Having “sampled” this or that from about every tub, the one candy I hadn’t tried was Boston Baked Beans.

All I remember about them as a kid was that I didn’t like them, but I hadn’t tried them in maybe a decade. I hesitantly reached in to satisfy my curiosity and was surprised by what I tasted. These beans were… pleasant. I quickly grabbed a small box of the beans packed in the convenient snack-size most Ferrara-Pan candy is sold in for 25 cents.

Boston Baked Beans were released in the 1930s, and the name derives from a generic term for any sugarcoated peanut candy. Its recipe is simple. Essentially, this candy is comprised of sucrose, peanuts, and corn syrup, with various waxes and food colors thrown in for fun, which yields a rather simple flavor indicative of most candies from that era. You can even check out the virtual tour of how they are made.

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Candy Review: Pomegranate Tootsie Pop

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Pomegranate Tootsie

I’m fairly certain that I have a condition known as Tootsie Pop Amnesia, where I can go for years forgetting how much I love the chocolaty chew of a Tootsie Pop before someone hands me one at random and all of my happy Tootsie memories come flooding on back.

In college, I ate about 9,009,209 Tootsie Pops. I kept the wrappers tacked to my wall. Whatever it is I thought I’d see, became a Tootsie Roll to me. But alas, after college I moved on to other treats, and left the Tootsie Pop behind. As always, I forgot all about the sweet, sticky, “what flavor is this in the center, I mean, it says chocolaty chew, but really?” delight of eating a Tootsie Pop. So when we hit the Tootsie booth at this year’s All Candy Expo, and I saw an unfamiliar color in the Tootsie Pop dish, I almost had to sit down, as my Tootsie Pop amnesia once again gave way to Tootsie Pop fever, and I was overcome with excitement trying to find out what flavor lay below the new, peach-colored Tootsie Pop wrapper.

On my way to the dish to fish out a pop, I imagined various flavor scenarios: dark chocolate? Cranberry? Tropical? Imagine my surprise when I discovered that the new Tootsie Pop flavor was the oh-so-trendy star of the All Candy Expo: Pomegranate.

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Candy Review: White Chocolate Passionfruit & Roasted Almond Rocky Road

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David Medlow White Chocolate Rocky Road

Rocky road is one of those candies whose parts I love individually. Marshmallows, chocolate, a jelly of some kind, nuts… these elements on their own are delicious. Put them together and voila! instant candy (or ice cream) hit. Rocky road, to me, is a bit like pizza… even when it’s bad, it’s good!

Holding this candy in such high esteem really only means that one day, I was bound to fall off my candy high horse, wasn’t I? Well, dear readers, that day has come. I initially picked up this box of David Medlow Rocky Road because it not only had all the right elements, it also had a bit of innovation. The whole delicious sounding combination of passion fruit, white chocolate and roasted almonds had me drooling just by thinking about it. There was also a dark chocolate and orange version, but this one’s flavor combinations seemed more purchase-worthy.

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