As a kid, whenever my friends and I had a loose tooth that we wanted to fall out so we could get a visit from the tooth fairy, we would eat Now and Laters. Those hard now, but soft later taffy squares were just the perfect thing to stick to your tooth and yank it right out when you chewed.
Maybe it’s because my youngest memories of these candies involved blood pouring from a crevice in mouth, but I never ate them too frequently. I didn’t mind them, but the standard three-flavor pack so bored me with the same regimen over and over that I found myself only consuming them once a year or so.
Every now and then, whenever I pop into a gas station, I can find individual packets of flavors not included in the larger size. I have always wondered about these flavors. Could the reason why these flavors never found themselves in the regular Now and Later lineup be that they’re just not very good? Amongst an assortment of possible candidates, I chose pineapple as the flavor best to conduct my research with.
Unwrapping the piece, the color is bright yellow, very reminiscent of freshly cut pineapple. I take and whiff, and it actually surprises me. A faint, but pleasurable aroma of crushed pineapple from a can wafts into my nostrils. Now for the real test: how does it taste?
Like the name of Now and Laters promises, they are hard as I take my first couple of chews, but not stale or tough in the way I remembered them being as a kid. Even the stickiness factor is pretty minimal.
The flavor is subtle, but very much that of pineapple, almost piña colada in nature. Shortly, the piece becomes incredibly soft, releasing its flavor as if I were squeezing pineapple juice from the candy.
I was so very pleased with these. They refrained from being overly sweet, they delivered an accurate and delicious representation of the flavor they promised, and I didn’t get stuck with two more rolls of other flavors I didn’t want to eat. On the quality of these alone, I am now willing to sample all the other versions I can find.
Buy Pineapple Now and Later Online:
- at Old Time Candy
- at Candy Direct
- at Amazon.com
your description actually made my mouth water. yum. i adore pineapple candy, and these sound delicious.
February 3rd, 2009 at 7:02 pmThe Strawberry Banana split flavor is my favorite. The blueberry is also very good.
February 4th, 2009 at 5:16 amI’ve been looking for these all week. I’m definitely going to keep this on my list.
February 6th, 2009 at 10:05 pm