Pumpkin and Elusive Childhood Memories

I have to say that Ben's comment on my last post shamed me into getting a real post done.  Ben - good for you!  I'm a slacker!!

As promised - pumpkin!

I found these at Target - Ghirardelli Squares in Milk & Pumpkin Spice Caramel:

What a great idea!  Love the creamy Ghirardelli milk chocolate, and they have a whisper of pumpkin.  But I like a stronger pumpkin flavor.  If you want a hint of pumpkin with your chocolate, this is for you.

Harry & David has these Pumpkin Spice Caramel Balls:

Gotta say I like them better!  Much more pumpkin flavor.  No chocolate, however.  But I just LOVE these!  Great texture, chewy caramel - yum!!

Harry & David also has these Pumpkin Spice Milk Chocolate Maltballs:

This is the perfect solution - a little chocolate and a LOT of pumpkin.  These are great too!  Harry & David rock the house on maltballs - TONS of flavors.  These are seasonal.

Chewy or crunchy?  Harry and David has your pumpkin balls covered!  Wait, that didn't sound quite right....

Pumpkin Delights by my girl Little D.  I'm so glad these are only available for a short period of time.  They are impossibly delicious:

Moist and cakey and chewy - sooooo good.  I really do love Little Debbie - these are awesome!!!

And they smile at you!  What more can you really ask for?

I found these Pumpkin Pie with Cream Cheese Topping cookies at World Market.  They are by Too Good Gourmet.

Great idea!  Love the cream cheese topping!  And the cookie is moist and has good pumpkin flavor as well as the delicious nutmeg and cinnamon of pumpkin pie.  Well done!!  So far I like everything I've tried by Too Good Gourmet.  Look for them in World Market and TJ Maxx.

I was over the moon when I heard about these - thanks to our other Ben who tipped me off several posts ago - PUMPKIN PIE POP-TARTS!  When Ben told me they existed, I searched for them.  I read online reviews gushing about how great they were.  I HAD to find some!  They became my holy grail.  When I finally saw then in Target, I was so excited; I bought up six boxes.   I snuck home from Target like a junkie who just scored a fix.

Okay, not really like the picture on the box, but we know how this goes:

Promising?

The result?  BOO!  Not nearly enough pumpkin filling.  These should be called Pumpkin Pie CRUST Pop-Tarts.  I mean, I'm down with pie crust, I like it, but I was expecting more here.  I was expecting some filling.  These were a heart breaker.

Pumpkin is one of my favorite flavors so I'm definitely biased in demanding more.  And it's only available seasonally, so I gotta get as much of it as I can! 

What have we learned?

Some flavors need more chocolate, some need less.  Pumpkin and chocolate is a tricky mix and should best be left to professionals.  I think there should always be more pumpkin.  I feel the same way about peanut butter - the more peanut butter, the better.  Although mixing it with chocolate isn't tricky at all - any combination is good - and complete amateurs can mix away with abandon.

Little Debbie remains a goddess (and the poor man's Paula Deen).

Childhood memories are tricky.  Pop-Tarts are not as good as I remember them.  Prolly because I was forbidden to have any.  I could only get the amazing sugary treats when at friends' houses. I remember more filling - strawberry was my fav.  

But you know how tricky those childhood memories can be!  Some of the things you thought were so amazing you have today and you're shocked.  The best example I can think of is the game Pong.  My brother and I used to play that for hours.  Kids today would be like, "Are you serious?  Do you have a wooden paddle and a ball on a rubber band too?"  Our reply?  "Yeah, to smack you with you little Xbox, Wii playing brat!  Let me get my wooden gun that shoots rubber bands and I'll teach you some respect!"

We've tried so many different foods from so many different countries over the course of our lives, how can a poor childhood favorite keep up?

Never fear, there's always Reese's my dears.  Always.

Teuscher Boston: Dark Chocolate Caramel Truffle

As with the dark chocolate buttercrunch, a dark chocolate caramel truffle found its way into my box at the Boston Teuscher shop because I’d been impressed with the milk chocolate version in my assortment from Chicago.

Given that this truffle was from Teuscher, the outside featured that full-flavored, smooth dark chocolate that is the signature of the dark chocolate Teuscher creations. Intriguingly, it seemed to also have a bit of a vanilla undertone.

Inside, I found a silky smooth ganache that was also dark chocolate based, and was unfortunately just a bit too soft for the outer shell, which snapped away from the interior. Another disappointing aspect of the filling was that the caramel taste was not very apparent, as the dark chocolate flavor dominated the entire truffle. While the dark chocolate of the shell and the ganache was flavorful and high-quality, the caramel flavor was too subtle for this truffle to be much more than a simple high-quality dark chocolate truffle. In this case, I think I like the milk chocolate version better.

Vosges Caramels: Tarte

One of the more intriguing-sounding caramels in the Vosges exotic caramel box I picked up was the Tarte caramel, which includes blood orange and hibiscus powder.

The caramel itself is coated with dark chocolate, and sprinkled with some very tart hibiscus powder that adds another delicious dimension to the treat.

Inside is a caramel with a bit of a tart kick that is just sweet enough to contrast the super-tart exterior dusting and dark chocolate coating. Texture-wise, the caramel is a bit chewier than I personally like, but not excessively so, and the dark chocolate is soft enough that the two meld together perfectly in each bite. The combination of tart, sweet, and chocolate is spot on, and the texture contrast is nearly perfect as well. By far my favorite caramel from this collection, which I regret to report I have polished off completely.

Vosges Caramels: Crema

Since I thoroughly enjoyed the Vosges Dulce de Leche truffle, I was very excited about trying out the Crèma caramel, which involved dulce de leche caramel. They had to be similar, no?

There are cashews on top of the milk chocolate, which was the first similarity with the truffle, so my anticipation grew before I bit in.

Sadly, the caramel inside was very chewy, which resulted in the milk chocolate crumbling away with every bite. Now the milk chocolate was the signature ultra-smooth Vosges milk chocolate, so this tells me that the caramel was super chewy. Though the texture was disappointing from my perspective, I did detect a pleasing cream flavor in the caramel, and thought that a dark chocolate might blend better with the sweet dulce de leche caramel. However, a dark chocolate would have certainly crumbled if molded against this ultra-chewy caramel, so the final product still would have been a tad disappointing. While I enjoyed the flavor of this caramel, I had a difficult time overcoming the chewy texture. Other caramels in the collection are better.

Vosges Caramels: Maple

Having enjoyed the Sunshine caramel, which incorporated honey into the caramel, I moved along to another Vosges caramel that utilized a non-traditional sweetening agent: the Maple, which used, well, maple syrup.

Before I got to that caramel, I found a sprinkling of sugar on top of some soft dark chocolate. While the sugar didn’t add much, it didn’t interfere with the taste or texture.

Inside, some walnuts give a nice crunch to contrast with the slightly chewy caramel, which imparts a definite maple aftertaste. The soft dark chocolate blends well with the caramel texture and doesn’t crumble at all. In terms of the overall texture, this caramel has diversity and harmony, but the taste doesn’t involve anything too notable aside from the hint of maple. It’s a neat idea, but it wasn’t my favorite from the collection.

Vosges Caramels: Sunshine

The final bit of loot I have to report on from my trip to Chicago is a box of exotic caramels from Vosges.

These caramels all sounded intriguing, but the most exotic-sounding of all was the Sunshine caramel, which included honey and bee pollen.

Bee pollen! Sprinkled right on top of that milk chocolate coating. The bee pollen itself was a little tart and added a nice zing to contrast with the sweet milk chocolate exterior.

Inside, the caramel itself was a little more standard, though there was certainly a distinct honey flavor that was noticeably different from standard sugar-based caramel. The caramel was nearly halfway between liquid and chewy, but did trend a bit towards chewy. Fortunately, the soft milk chocolate accommodated this so that each bite included chocolate and caramel, and there was no crumbling from mis-matched textures like there are in some less superb chocolate-covered caramels. I liked this caramel overall, and the bee pollen was a great touch.

Teenage Vampires and Werewolves, Oh My!

I don't pretend to understand middle aged women who are into teenage vampires.  I don't pretend to understand middle aged women who are in to middle aged vampires.  (I mean, do you know where those fangs have been?)  But, hey, to each her own.  Or to each her own undead.

I've never seen this show or read these books and I have no intention of doing so.  But I did want to try the candy.  (I'm telling you, pickin's were slim this year!)

This assortment had three different designs and flavors.  Peanut butter for the werewolf Jacob:

I like the howling wolf design, (but is that his tongue poking out?  Wha? You can't howl with your tongue poking out!  Try it if you don't believe me.), liked the taste the best of the three, but that's not saying much.  This is no Reese's peanut butter and no great chocolate.  Better than Palmer, but that's about it.  (And really, what chocolate is not better than Palmer?)

This is a chocolate truffle for Bella:

Bleech.  Crappy chocolate.  Not even the truffle part was good.

Caramel for the vampire Edward:

Like the design - very detailed - nice!

While this looks like a good caramel, it's not that flavorful.  These are just not that great.  Mediocre. Zzzzzz...

I got this prototype bar at Candy Expo - before the final packaging was done - cool, huh?  These are made by the New England Confectionery Company (yep, Necco).  I hate almost everything else they make (Necco wafers, Sweethearts) - so I shouldn't be surprised these don't rock my world:

Here's the final - the new Sky Bar with the Twilight design:

Got a little crushed on my travels:

This is repackaged in the individual servings for Halloween.  I like the flavors even less in the bar because there's more cheap chocolate.  I like having the variety of flavors in one bar, like the creative artwork, don't care for the taste.  Sorry, Necco.  But hopefully those vampire/werewolf lovers out there will sustain you - I like your creativity. 

But next up are the real artists in chocolate, the super creative chocolate makers!  Stay tuned!

Halloween and Peanut Butter - Yay!!

I love peanut butter.  I love Halloween.  I was so excited when the Halloween candy starting hitting the shelves.  I kept going back to all my favorite candy haunts (heh, heh, heh - get it, haunts?) looking for the new, the exciting, the different.  And was so disappointed this year.

Sure there were the usual miniature candy bars, but that's the same every year.  We need new, exciting candy - simple pleasures to take our minds off foreclosure rates and unemployment figures.

At least Nestle made a Butterfinger pumpkin:

I like the design - a bit creepy and a bit friendly all at once.  Pretty impressive.

This guy is chocolate with Butterfinger pieces mixed in.  It's okay.  I prefer the mini Butterfingers taste.  Nestle's chocolate isn't as good as their Butterfinger filling.  I'd really like this if it were all Butterfinger filling.  I don't think it would hold together very well, but damn, it would be good!  And it would be orange.  Nestle candy makers - read my blog and make us a Butterfinger (no chocolate) pumpkin!  Crunchy!  Peanut buttery!  Yum!

This is new fall packing for the Reese's Peanut Butter Pumpkins.  I'm still bitter they didn't make the mini ones this year.  But I still think these are the best peanut butter treats on the market.  They still have the old Halloween themed purple packaging from last year (you can see it in last year's post if you really care that much).  Maybe this is so they can keep the Reese's pumpkins on the shelf a little longer - making them a fall treat?  These could stay out through Thanksgiving.

I think we should be giving thanks for these all year long!

This is the only Russell Stover candy I bought this year.  I didn't see anything else new and I hate Russell Stover anyway.  I think they own Whitman's so the marshmallow candy corn was one of theirs too.  I did like it.  But I still hate Russell Stover.  Not as much as the Naked Cowboy, but close.

I was intrigued by this because the wrapper says it's solid peanut butter and it's flat as a pancake.  I wanted to see what it was:

Reese's next to Russell Stover:

My soul mate:

You have got to be kidding!  Why even bother with this? 

No creaminess, the peanut butter taste is too sugary and fake.  It's just a travesty.  Gross.  See why I hate Russell Stover?

I reviewed these last year, but they are so random and weird, I threw them in again this year:

Palmer's Creepy Peepers peanut butter filled eyeballs.  Made with the world's cheapest chocolate but at least they have decent peanut butter filling.  I like the peanut butter but that chocolate is just so waxy and bad.  But they are creepy (in a good Halloweeny way) and the packaging is a riot - "Eye love it, You'll Love it!"  "Another eye-catching idea from Palmer"  Campy!!  Love it!

These are another of my favorites - Hallowscream Caramel Balls from Harry and David:

Oh yes, babies - that is peanut butter wrapped around that caramel center.  These are the best EVAH!  Totally addictive, totally great.  Very peanut buttery and the mix of textures - crunchy candy coating, creamy peanut butter, chewy caramel - genius!!!!!  Get thee to a Harry and David and grab some of these - they are sooooo good!!!!!

I don't know about you, but I'm having fun!!!  I love Halloween and getting to see all the cute kiddies in their costumes!  And what better excuse for a middle aged woman to be stalking the candy aisle? 

Hope you're doing some fun things this week!  I'm gving my "Motivation by Chocolate" session for the hospital staff at Roanoke-Chowan  Hospital.  How much fun are we going to have?    Join in the fun - take some candy to work, wear a costume, or visit a corn maze or haunted house.  Life is short - celebrate!