Junk Fud in London

 In this episode Allison and Chris talk about a recent trip to London (and only London) where they bought some special tea and ate a lot of sandwiches.

I Both Love and Hate the M&M's Stores

 

On a recent trip to London, Allison and I decided to visit the M&M’s store near Piccadilly Circus. I’ve visited a few M&M’s stores in the past, but for some reason this visit made me think a little bit more about these stores. Who came up with the idea of building a store dedicated to one particular candy? Why do they sell more merchandise than candy itself? Are these stores even run by the candy company?

I’ve personally had love/hate relationship with these stores. I’ll be honest, I like M&M’s, but they’re nowhere near my favourite candy. One of the issues is I feel like there’s a great potential to offer a bunch of different versions of this simple treat. While they have a few different varieties, there are many other candies out in the world with many more varieties, like Kit Kat or Pocky. There was a short period where M&M’s did go a little crazy with alternate varieties, but they really only have a handful of standard flavours out there. All of this can also be considered unimportant since when you visit an M&M’s store you’re sure to notice that they don’t actually sell much candy.

This is where things get a little odd for me. I’m a little turned off by the lack of candy at most M&M’s stores. While they do offer some treats for sale, it’s not the main focus of the store. The main focus is candy themed merchandise. Strangely, I would argue that there’s a good percentage of merchandise at these stores that isn’t even really themed to the candy itself. At almost all of the M&M’s stores I’ve visited, I’ve found a lot of merchandise that’s themed to the store itself and its geographic location. I know that places like Hard Rock Cafe have built a brand based on shirts featuring the various locations of their stores, but I feel like there’s something more to them. Most of the tourist themed merchandise at the M&M’s stores just feels really disconnected from the namesake candy.

The part that’s odd for me is the fact that while I don’t like the fact that the M&M’s store sells more merchandise than candy, I personally own several pieces of merchandise. I’ve even been known to purchase some of the more tourist heavy stuff. While I wish there was more candy at these stores, I really like some of the merchandise that they sell. The great thing about M&M’s over other candy companies for merchandise is the fact that one of the key features of the candy is the colours. They’ve managed even to transfer the colours into characters. So this allows for some really fun merchandise.  I’ll also say that all (or at least most) of the merchandise I’ve ever purchased at an M&M’s store has lasted me a pretty long time.

I also don’t mind the decorations at many M&M’s stores. I think it follows the same rules as the merchandise in that the candy offers many colours, so it allows the store designers to be colourful as well. The pallet of colours and design of the candy are simple and kind of beautiful (just look at a bowl of M&M’s and tell me you’re not impressed).  The M&M’s mascots also give the store some appeal, creating fun little scenarios as well as photo opportunities.

I guess what I’m saying is, I don’t mind the M&M’s stores at all, but I wish they sold more candy. It would be great if the stores offered some limited or exclusive flavours of M&M’s. As it stands, many of the stores offer a variety of colours, but very limited flavours.

I also haven’t answered the question about who might actually be running these stores. I assume that it’s Mars (the manufacturers of M&M’s), but I also imagine that this is something that could be licensed to outside retailers. I could dig deeper, but honestly I don’t know if it’s that big a deal. I don’t feel like the people who run these stores are doing a particularly bad job, I just wish they could include a little more room for candy, and maybe work with the candy makers for exclusive products.

British Adventures, The Candy Critic's Travel Guide

Last week I posted the first entry in our three part series about a recent trip to Europe.  Part one was all about the French leg of our journey, full of pastries, crepes, and Disney stuff.  Today I'm going to write about the British leg of our journey.  Most of this journey took place in England, however we did spend one day in Wales, that provided us with an interesting sweet surprise.

This was by no means our first trip to the UK, in fact the UK tends to be a regular stop for us whenever we travel in Europe.  It might just be a stop over with a day or two in London, or it could be a grand adventure through the British countryside.  This particular trip was more about the grand road trip, and we managed to stop in a few places both in the north and in the south west.

The thing that always appeals to me when I travel to the UK is the fact that the treats are fairly recognizable.  Some British sweets and foods are very common in Canada, so when I travel to the UK it gives us a little taste of home.  Treats that aren't available in Canada are still fairly comfortable to our palettes.  I'm rarely shocked by any British foods, but instead I'm filled with a certain feeling of comfort.  The other great thing about the British palette is their love of sweets and pub food, two of my favorite things.

This trip started out at a friend of ours' wedding.  The great thing about this friend (and his family), is they have the traditional British love of sweets.  The dessert table at this wedding was filled with all kinds of amazing treats, many of them were even homemade.  I could go one for hours about how much I loved this food, but that's not really fair to you since many of treats aren't available to you unless you're friendly with a local British family.  I'll tell you this much, the meringues were fantastic.

The second part of our British experience was all about driving around exploring the countryside.  Food wise the two themes seemed to be cheese and Scones with clotted cream.  In some cases we were lucky enough to experience both at the same time.  One of our great stops was in the beautiful city of Cheddar.  There I learned that real cheddar is not about being orange, but instead it's about being aged in the caves of the Cheddar Gorge.  It's not only a beautiful place naturally, but there are plenty of places in the area to have a cheese sandwich (made with real cheddar) and some scones with clotted cream.

Our obsession with clotted cream comes from a past experience we had in Scotland where we sampled the best scones with clotted cream we've ever had in our entire lives.  It came from a fairly unlikely place, a cafeteria on the shores of Loch Ness.  Since then, every time we go out in the UK countryside, we always get a craving for scones with clotted cream.  This was no different, and I'm sure we managed to fill our cravings at least 6 or 7 times on this journey.

While Cheddar is a great all around place to enjoy some British food in a beautiful setting, on our second day we visited a large ice cream shop in a town with a really strange name, Mumbles, in Wales.  The place has a very simple name "Joe's", but it serves up what might be the best vanilla ice cream I've ever had in my entire life.  If you're not convinced by one Candy Critic's opinion, just check out the Tripadvisor page for this ice cream place.  You can ask just about anybody in the town what to visit, and before they suggest the seaside, or the castle, they'll ask if you've had ice cream at Joe's yet.

If you go, I recommend getting the plain vanilla, if you want you can ad some sprinkles or nuts, but don't go for the flavours.  It's not that the flavours are bad that I know of, it's just the vanilla is so good.  It's smooth, creamy, and has a beautiful texture.  This was one of the best food finds of this trip, and I can't recommend it any more.  After eating Cheddar in Cheddar, and with a belly filled with Joe's ice cream, we headed to London.  London is always a great place for anybody with a sweet tooth, however it's not really perfect.

I've noticed a trend in London of these places selling import candy, most of which is American, Canadian, and Australian.  While I love the fact that they're exposing candies from around the world to the folks in the UK, I do have a beef with their prices and policies.  The shop above in particular is a prime example of this problem.  When I went into this shop I found that the only person to even look my direction was the large security guard.  Most of the staff was either wondering or too busy to talk to anybody.  The prices were extremely high (I can kind of accept that because of shipping costs), but they had many policies about buying a minimal number of each candy.  When I travel I like to sample small amounts of each candy, but this place refused to sell me a candy that I was interested in and told me I had to buy a minimum of 4.  I don't mind big candy stores, and I accept the price increase because of the imports, but I don't accept stupid policies, and I hate it when I find local candies in these stores at jacked up prices (to get the tourists).  Worst of all, the woman I spoke to (who I assume was the manager or owner) was very rude to me, and wore a constant scowl.  There, rant over.

So I don't end this post on a bad note, I wanted to share with you guys something I noticed on one of the Tube trains in London.  It appears that the chair cover design, may have been inspired by one of the UKs more famous candies, Licorice Allsorts. You be the judge.

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Candy In The Media

All photos copyright the Museum of Brands, Packaging, and Advertising.

Around the world there are many museums and museum exhibits dedicated to candy.  Most of these museums focus on chocolate, but there are a few that diversify.  Many candy museums are also found at the end of factory tours at various candy factories, and those obviously focus on one particular brand.  It's rare to come across a museum, or even a museum exhibit, that shows off a diversity of brands and types of candy.  One of the best candy themed museum exhibit that I've ever come across can be found at the Museum of Brands, Packaging, and Advertising in London England.

All photos copyright the Museum of Brands, Packaging, and Advertising.

I've never seen such a huge collection of candy packages in my entire life. They have packages dating back to Victorian England, all the way to modern packages of today.  The museum is set out in chronological order and contains packages and branding for all kinds of products, but their candy collection is superb.  There are a few sections dedicated to candy, however there are a few candies also spread around in other sections as well.  Surprisingly some of the packages aren't empty, and while I wouldn't want to eat these ancient candies, it's pretty amazing to see.

All photos copyright the Museum of Brands, Packaging, and Advertising.

The only downfall is that that you don't really find a huge range of candy packages from outside of UK (and to some extent Europe).  It's not really that big a deal because the UK has been one of the biggest candy innovator's since the Victorian era, and this is a prime example of just how much they've given us.  I could not recommend a museum more than the Museum of Brands, Packaging, and Advertising.  It's a great place for any candy history buff, and even has plenty to see for those without a sweet tooth.

Click here to get more info on this awesome museum.

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Random London Snack Finds

Our trip to London wasn't all Queen's and M&M's, we came across so many other great treats as well.  Some were sweet, others savory, and some weren't even food at all.

The tourist shops at many of the sites where filled with great looking sweet treats.  One of my favorites was these chocolate Beef Eaters and Royal Guards.  I was also happy to note that the Beef Eater chocolate did not contain any beef at all.

While not officially a "food" stop, the Museum of Brands, Packaging and Advertising in Noting Hill is well worth a stop for any foodie.  It has a huge collection of items dating as far back to the Victorian era.  The theme is advertising and product packaging.  As you might have guessed, many of these items are in fact food related, many candy related.

Better yet (or maybe not better) some of the items in this museum still have products inside them.  I saw a box of Licorice Allsorts from the 1940's, still full to the brim.  There were also several chocolate bars, and other treat that someone decided not to eat.  It was really strange, but a great museum to check out.  Sadly they don't allow photography in the museum, so to see these gross examples, and cool packages you'll have to visit yourself.  You can click here for more info on the museum.

While enjoying breakfast one morning I came across this label on my orange juice.  It made me giggle.

This is a "Pasty"... Please note, it's pronounced "Past-e" not "Paste-e".  There are two reasons I wanted to try one of the British baked goods.  The first is because I thought it was pronounced "Paste-e" and that made me giggle.  The second reason is because of the Pasty tax that was recently lifted in the UK.  Yup, someone in the British government decided that it would be in the best interest of the country to have an additional tax added to this particular kind of baked good.  While both of these reasons are good enough to sample a Pasty, the fact that they're yummy will keep you coming back for more.

I saw this pillar of pizza and it actually made me hungry, is that strange?

London is full of strangely named streets, some are even food related.  People in London don't think twice about these strange names, but I found them to be very entertaining.

Pudding Lane actually has a very important role in London's history.  This is the street where the great fire of London started, at a bakery.  There are all kinds of plaques and monuments here dedicated to the great fire that started on Pudding Lane.

London is just chock full of great sweet (and other food related) finds.  Every time I visit I'm always suprised with something tasty. It has to be one of the best foodie vacation spots in the world, and I'm sure I'll be back for more.

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M&M's Store London - Part 3 - History?

Although not a "British" designed sweet, M&M's are very popular in the UK.  They're so popular that Mars decided to build a giant M&M's store in downtown London called M&M's World.  It's absolutely gigantic, and full of everything M&M's.  For the next few days, I'm going to post some of the highlights from my trip to this crazy candy mecca, this final post is all about the wall depicting the history of the "Ms".

As the sign says in this photo, the M&M store is 4 levels tall.  That's pretty impressive for a candy store that only sells one kind of candy.  This store is also very well decorated, and even offers a glimpse into the history of those M&M's characters.

As you walk down the stairs (the store is actually in the basement mostly) there's a continuing history of the M&M's guys painted on the walls.  I think I remember seeing a similar mural at the M&M's store in Vegas as well.

It starts off with the first version of the M&M's guys, and continues all the way to the present day incarnations of these crispy on the outside, melty on the inside characters.  It's pretty amazing to see the evolution.  The thing is, after seeing a few of these versions, I was left with some questions.  

First of all, why is the 1967 version so dam creepy.  Who thought it was a good idea to have a character remove his head to reveal his chocolate center.  The modern version of these characters still creep me out at the idea that they're filled with chocolate, but at least I'm not reminded of it.

The other question comes from this group of M&M's guys from 1976.  Who's the tall guy with the yellow M&M's overalls?  Was there a human component to this team at one point? If so, where did he go?

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M&M's Store London - Part 2 - Stuff You Can Buy

Although not a "British" designed sweet, M&M's are very popular in the UK.  They're so popular that Mars decided to build a giant M&M's store in downtown London called M&M's World.  It's absolutely gigantic, and full of everything M&M's.  For the next few days, I'm going to post some of the highlights from my trip to this crazy candy mecca, today we're going to look at what kind of crazy things you can buy, only at this store.

Visiting the M&M's store is about two things, seeing M&M's characters, and buying M&M's stuff.  I'm not sure which is more profitable for this store (the promotion or the actual revenue) but I can tell you that they have a lot of M&M's things available to buy.

Most importantly they have M&M's, and they have them in any colour you can imagine.  They even have some of the varieties that aren't yet available in stores (at least in Europe).  Best of all, you can mix and match any colours you like, which would be great for anybody that might be hosting a Van Halen concert in the near future.

As far as items go, you can get anything from T-shirts, tea pots, and many other items that have nothing to do with the letter "T".  Some of the items were brightly coloured, filled with logos, and something that you might not want to bring into a business meeting.  While other items, like these tea pots, actually looked fairly classy and sophisticated.  Some of these finer items really managed to hide the M&M's logos very well and created some good looking stuff with a clever M&M's twist.

The most exspensive item I found in the store was this jacket.  Apparently it's covered in Swarovski cristals,  and it will only cost you 2266,95 pounds(that's 3497.45 US dollars).  While I do enjoy wearing candy related clothing, I have a few pieces, I don't think I'm willing to invest that kind of money.  Most importantly I don't think I'd invest that kind of money into anything candy related and not actually get any candy.

If you happen to be looking for more than just candy, or candy related merchandice, they have you covered at this M&M's store as well.  Here fore example is the M&M's Mix Lab.

To use the mix lab, you go to a computer and answer a whole bunch of questions.  Then you get to choose a container, that is divided into several section.  You can then choose which colour of M&M's go into each part of your container.  It seems pretty fun, but the second part of the "Mix Lab" seemed a little lame.

Your choice of container and colour choices are then sent to the "Mix Lab" where a profesional  M&M's mixer makes your selection a reality.  While it's kind of neat that you can make up your own packaging, I think it would have been extra cool if they could have made the "Mix Lab" automated.

At the very least make it appear automated.  I stood at the window for a few minutes watching this girl dilagently filling containers with M&Ms, it's wasn't really that entertaining.

Just in case you didn't want to choose your own colours, the Mix Lab offered pre-made containers with basic coloured fillings.  I'm not sure if these were cheaper or anything, but frankly they suited any needs I would have perfectly well.

Not all of the interactive parts of the store lead to you having to buy a some M&M's.  There was also the "Discover Your M" display.  Here, you stand on a special spot while the M&M's computer scans you and your personality to find out what colour of M&M suits you best.  Apparently I'm a yellow.

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M&M's Store London - Part 1 - Characters I Met

Although not a "British" designed sweet, M&Ms are very popular in the UK.  They're so popular that Mars decided to build a giant M&M's store in downtown London called M&M's World.  It's absolutely gigantic, and full of everything M&M's.  For the next few days, I'm going to post some of the highlights from my trip to this crazy candy mecca, starting with today's post all about meeting a few "Ms".

To say that this M&M's store is decorated would be a huge understatement.  It's littered, covered, and jam packed with just about anything you could possibly theme with M&M's.  While there are lots of candy themed decorations, the majority of the decor is all about those M&M's characters.  

The largest of these decorations can be found on the bottom floor.  There you can get your picture taken with 4 of these fellows reenacting the cover of the Beatles Abbey Road record. While I must say it was impressive, it really didn't allow for a great photo opportunity.  First of all there was a rope around the whole thing, so you couldn't actually immerse yourself into the shot.  Secondly, with four M&M's characters lined up, there wasn't really any room for you to blend in.  I think a better layout would have been to only have three of the M&M's characters in this set up, and a designated spot for you to walk with them.  That way you could be a part of the display, instead of just looking at it.

If you wanted to be "a part of the action" these two characters, with back up dancers, were getting down on the main staircase.  They welcomed anybody to join in, although most people just watched.  They also stood for photos afterwards.

Throughout the store there were all kinds of other displays including this one with a soccer playing Orange.

My favorite decorations had to be these paintings of the M&M's characters depicting famous works of art.  It was just cheesy enough, but also kind of clever.

Allison was really excited about this red guy dressed up as one of the Queens guards.  As cool as this is, I'd give anything to see this guy in front of Buckingham Palace.

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This Week In Candy

Candy News - Spring time really is the season of new foods.  All kinds of food shows (not just candy related) and all kinds of new treats (many of them candy related) are coming out this time of year.  I'll try and keep up, but it's not easy, unless the candy companies producing these treats want me to review them, and send me a few, then it'll be a lot easier.

What's Happening At Candy Critic - Just got back from a quick visit to London to celebrate the Queen's Jubilee.  I've never seen so many snacks and treats dedicated to one person in my life.  Every shop window and every store shelf had something dedicated to the Queen.  All this week I'll post my adventures and all of the cool things I found.

Rant - Tim Horton's, a donut chain in Canada has a great business model.  One of the highlights of this business model is their prices.  Every single Tim Horton's, all over the world, have the same prices.  Including the Tim Horton's located in Airports.  I love this idea, and I want to know, why are things in airports so freaking expensive?  Every time I travel I wonder around airports (because I have to show up hours before my flight for a reason I can't figure out, but don't get me started on that) and I find all kinds of things I'd normally buy, but at almost double the price.  Why do I have to pay a premium because I'm in an airport?

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Got Some Free Stuff This Week

 Let it never be said that we at Candy Critic don't appreciate free swag.  Let it also never be said that we don't tell the world whenever we get this free swag, even if we don't have to.  I got these two M&M's buttons this week in London, and I'll have more about where I got them next week.

I also got two bags of Luden's cough drops in the mail.  I'm pumped to review the Wild Berry, and I have an idea for a future article with the Sugar Free Wild Cherry cough drops.  Thanks gang at Luden's!

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Thursday's Candy Links

How old is old, how about a candy company, in the United States, that started in 1891.

Planning a trip to London (I am), here's a list of places any candy fanatic must check out.(Thanks Jonathan)

Many people say that sugar is the key to the obesity problems in the United States and even the whole world, I can't say that I agree.

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Don't Steal From Candy Stores

In particular don't steal from candy stores when they're giving part of their proceeds to charity.  Even worse, don't steal from a candy store, that's giving part of their proceeds to charity, twice.  Some people are just scum.

Click here to read more.

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M&M's Store In London

The folks at M&M's have released a few snapshots of their new store in London.  It looks great and I can't wait to check it out.

Click here to see more photos of the new store. (it's on Facebook)

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