The Grand Finale!

Happy Valentine's Day!!!


Sorry for my slackness in blogging. I have been doing a lot of dating since my recent relationship fiasco and it is sooooo time consuming! Those of you who are married, give your spouse a big kiss. The grass is definitely NOT greener out here. That's one of the big challenges in relationships - we always think there might be something better...... (we do the same thing with jobs, houses - lots of things). Us crazy humans are never satisfied, and therefore, never happy.

Well, here's something that really satisfies:

I love Snickers. I already showed you one of the terrific Valentine's Day assortments with the miniature Snickers bars, but look at these!! They taste delicious - and I love the design. I think this is one of the best looking Valentine's Day chocolates I've seen. Love it!! A+ for design and A+ for taste.

My first love (and at this rate, perhaps my last) is chocolate. Think of this entry as the grand finale, featuring a wild bombardment of all the Valentine's Day treats I have yet to review. (Feel free to say "Oooh" and "Ahh" just like you would at the fireworks finale on the 4th of July.)


Butterfinger and Crunch have the same packaging:

Notice the Spanish on the packaging. Much of our candy is now made in Mexico. More about that in an upcoming entry.



These are solid offerings if you like Crunch and Butterfinger. You can get the little foil wrapped guys or the larger single hearts. These are designed to compete with the Reese's Heart, I'm sure. (But they are no competition in my book. The Reese's Heart crushes there.) I also think the chocolate is sub par - kind of waxy. Of the two, I prefer the Butterfinger because I'm a sucker for peanut butter. But these are only average.

They aren't finished yet!





I like the Mini Butterfinger bars better. Solid blocks of peanut buttery crispness - yay! This assortment also has Mini Baby Ruth bars. I like the Baby Ruth - love the nuts and the chewy nougat. What about you all? What are your favorites?

Like the colors and the hearts:




Hershey's has another entry I found in the Hallmark store. I have completely given up on Russell Stover - glaack!! No mas!! Although Stover dominates in the boxed chocolate selection and they had some hilarious and gorgeous heart shaped boxes this year, I'm just not buying any more of that yucky chocolate.



If you like marshmallow - this is for you! It is simply a huge slab of marshmallow coated with Hershey's chocolate. Better than Russell Stover, but I really don't want this much marshmallow. Peanut better, yes! Marshmallow, no. I do, however, really like the package design. The touches of turquoise - very classy. I would totally buy this wrapper on a t-shirt.

Now here's a surprise out of left field:




This is Valentine Taffy from some random company called Sweet Time. I found it at Walgreens. It is completely addictive and I'm not even sure what the flavors were. (After eating the ENTIRE bag, I don't know what the flavors were. I know, I scare myself.) One tasted kind of like watermelon. All were REALLY good - I am NOT kidding! Low fat too! If you see these, they are totally cheap - buy them! I'm going to try to get some more. I think my dentist will love Sweet Time. Maybe it is run by dentists.





The clever packaging award goes to Toblerone:




Toblerone Bars are awesome. Great shape, great chocolate. This is the same old bar, but how perfect to make it look like a rose? GREAT job!! My picture doesn't do it justice - it really is a gorgeous looking rose. Oooh! Ahhh!


And my heroes at Vitalicious (of the 100 calorie, vitamin, protein, fiber packed treats) have a fantastic Valentine's Day offering:


Look at that gorgeous box! It contains a dozen, delicious 100 calorie heart-shaped cakes. How cute are these? And can you tell how moist they are? They are thick too - about 2.5 inches. The perfect, decadent but low cal treat. Oooh!!! Aaah!!!



I hope you had a great Valentine's Day and if you have someone in your life you love, you take a few minutes to really appreciate them. It is so easy to take your loved ones for granted. And I hope you all know how much you mean to me!!! This Valentine's Day would have been a lot harder without all your kind words and support! And thanks for taking the time to read this crazy blog!!

Chocolate, Cookies, and Choice

I love cookies. I really do. But not all cookies are created equal.

Some cookies break your heart.

These Chocolate Toffee Brittles look fabulous on the box:

But are not so good in real life. They actually might have been better without the chocolate. I think toffee shortbread would be delish, but with the chocolate, these didn't work for me. They weren't worth 100 calories each so I pitched them. I've been saving the box for a "somethings are better without chocolate" post. I do think that chocolate does not have to be added to everything. We'd get pretty sick of chocolate if it was all there was.

Speaking of something that doesn't seem to be made better by adding chocolate, Vosges has a new mushroom and chocolate bar. I kid you not - Organic Enchanted Mushroom Candy Bar - Organic dark chocolate + reishi mushrooms + organic walnuts. Maybe things have gone too far. Do mushrooms need chocolate? Or more importantly, does chocolate need mushrooms? When will chocolate say, "Enough! These horrible experiments must end! I am not an animal!"

Speaking of horrible, look at these:

Hello Panda! How about Hell No Panda. These look like slightly charred Oyster crackers with cross-eyed pandas printed on them playing various sports. Why go to all this trouble? I counted 10 different designs in a box of 16. There is a panda playing golf, tennis, ping pong, soccer, baseball, doing gymnastics, kayaking, sailing, skiing and lifting weights. Is the panda really the animal for all this activity? Why not pick a sloth? Or maybe go with Hello Jaguar - an animal that might actually do something.

I'm not sure about the shape - some are shaped kind of like a panda head, some are round, all are half full of choco cream. I think the only reason they have the cream is so kids won't choke on the dry crumbs from the rest of the cookie. Kids will like these because kids like everything. I suggest you have 10,000 or so better options.

Well, we've heard from Japan. Let's go to England. Back in June 2008 the British voted on their favorite cookie (known as biscuits to the Brits) of all time. Now I don't know how the poll was conducted, but knowing the English, it was right on the money. They chose McVitie's Chocolate Digestive:

This is a cookie where chocolate DEFINITELY made a difference. The chocolate was added in 1925 and that's when sales skyrocketed. Of course, when I read the results of the poll, I had to get some. And, well, they are not so good. They are made from wheat flour (thus the digestive part, I guess) but they only have one gram of fiber each, so that is BS. Of course they taste like cardboard so maybe it's the placebo effect. English food is pretty bland and generally awful, so this falls right in line. Thank God for the Revolutionary War.

The chocolate chip cookie (biscuit) didn't even make the top three. No wonder the English look so dour.

So much for Japan and England, let's go down South! Where an RC Cola and a Moon Pie are tradition! I saw these in the grocery store and had to grab them. They are PEANUT BUTTER Moon Pies!!!

Well, actually, they are are only made by the Moon Pie people. They are not technically Moon Pies. Where a regular Moon Pie has marshmallow, this one has peanut butter. Where they have graham cracker, these have chocolate cookie. And the whole thing is coated in chocolate. And I gotta tell you, they are pretty damn good. Now don't get me wrong, these aren't like a homemade cookie, I'm not suggesting that. But for a mass produced cookie, they are good! And they kick the Digestives' butt! Once again, America wins the war!! Whoo hoo!

www.moonpie.com/hist_text.asp Made ONLY in Chattanooga, TN! Hmmm, I wonder if I can get a tour of the plant....

Now this isn't technically a cookie. It's a muffin top:

But I'm including it here to show you the choices you have. These are amazing - they taste like a brownie and they have chocolate chips. Vitalicious also makes some with peanut butter chips. They also have brownies with walnuts. These taste great! And here's the best part - they only have 100 calories!! They are loaded with vitamins and have 5 grams of fiber! (Digestives, you suck.)

And let's just see everybody together and naked:

See how big the Vitalicious muffin top is? 100 calories!!! 170 for the Peanut Butter Moon Pie cookie next to it, 168 for both Digestives (but why bother?), and about 20 calories for each HellNo Panda. This is how I don't get fat. When I really want a nice big chocolate fix - I eat these! I pop the frozen brownies into the microwave and top them with fat-free vanilla caramel Jell-O Pudding. For 170 calories I have an outrageous dessert.

Here's the website http://www.vitalicious.com/ and some grocery stores carry them too. I think chocolate, corn muffin and banana nut bread are the only ones worth getting. Sign up for their e-mail and they send out coupons from time to time.

Well, there you have it. I don't care what anyone says, America Rocks! We have everything from Peanut Butter Moon Pies to Vitalicious Muffin Tops AND we have the freedom to chose. Thank God for the Founding Fathers or we'd be stuck with those horrible Digestives. God save the Cookie!