What Is Mint?

This is not the first time I've ever mentioned this, but I have a real fascination with the difference between mint flavoured candies and real mint. It's probably one of the most perplexing of fake flavours because it's actually not that far off from the original. I would even bet that many fake mint flavoured treats contain some real mint. The main difference I find between fake and real mint is an earthy flavour, which makes sense since it's actually an herb. Are there any people out there who like fake mint over the real thing, or the other way around?

Check out my latest minty review that caused me to think about this problem again.

Tropical Fruit and Chocolate

 

There are a few tropical fruit and chocolate treats out there in the world, but not as many as you'd think. I feel like most fruit and chocolate combinations are about raisins, but maybe there are a few other berry and definitely cherry and chocolate treats out there too. The thing about tropical fruits might be the fact that they're often very sweet already. When you dry them out they get even sweeter, so adding some sweet milk chocolate might just be too much. It could also be that most places that grow tropical fruit are already warm, and chocolate doesn't last very long on a warm store shelf.

Check out my latest tropical fruit covered in chocolate review.

So Weird, But In A Good Way

There are two kinds of unique candy out there. There's candy that's weird by design, constructed to make you wonder what's going on. Then there's candy that's unique because it's culturally different than what you might expect. I like both, but I find that few candy makers can construct weird or unique candies well. It takes years to perfect a candy, and trying to make it very different and good takes a lot of time. Unique because I'm not familiar with it culturally is different because it's very possible that it's been around for longer than I (or even my grandparents) have been alive. This means that it'll be new to me, but perfected over time.

Check out my latest unique candy review.

Is Yogurt Underrated?

While I've tasted a few yogurt flavoured treats in my day, it's not a flavour that you really see everywhere. I think it's mostly found in the Asian candy world, with maybe a few European treats participating as well. The thing about yogurt flavoured candy is, it's hard to simulate yogurt and be super sweet at the same time. While yogurt can have some sweetness in it to cut down the sour, the sour itself is really what makes yogurt great. Too much sweet just turns it into a sweet cream. This is exactly what happened here, but that doesn't mean I don't want to see more candy companies attempting this unique flavour.

Check out my latest yogurt themed candy review.

Unlikeliest Of Flavour Combinations

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that strawberry, chocolate and vanilla together is the most common flavour trio in the world. I can't think of many cultures that don't have at least one or two treats with this flavour combination. Oddly, I don't actually know where this flavour came from, other than possibly Italy (based on the name). I'm not sure if ice cream was the first time it was used. It's objectively an odd flavour combination, unless you break the flavours into pairs. Then you realize that in pairs these flavours are pretty common, but all together it just seems a little weird. The thing is, it works.

Check out my latest strawberry, chocolate and vanilla treat review.

Fake Chocolate Problem

One of the problems I have on candycritic.org is fake chocolate. More specifically I'm not really sure what the line is between fake and real chocolate. chocolate itself isn't technically an ingredient, it's a milk/sugar treat that's made with cocoa. The amount of cocoa can vary in chocolate creating different kinds of chocolate. Sometimes you take an entire portion of the cocoa bean out of the mix and it's still chocolate. By that definition, as long as there's some portion of a treat that contains even a small amount of cocoa, than it can be called chocolate. Now I know there are some countries where the amount of cocoa matters, but I would guess that most of the world does not have such regulations. Then we add to the mix the idea that some candies are chocolate flavoured, and may not contain any cocoa at all. It's all very complicated.

Check out my latest "chocolate" review.

Not Your Average Grape Lollipop

This might be one of the most unique lollipops I've eaten recently. As far as I can remember, no one has mixed grape with a creamy flavour. The possible exception might be raisins, but I feel like grapes and raisins are worlds apart when it comes to flavour and texture. While this is a unique flavour (to me), I recently realized that I actually enjoy real grapes with a certain type of cream on a regular basis. Grapes are one of my favourite fruits to add to yogurt. There's something very satisfying about this combination, particularly the fact that the flavours don't actually blend together until you take a bite. While this grape cream lollipop was pretty good, I'm wondering if anyone in the candy world might be able to simulate the joy of eating grapes in yogurt.

Check out this unusual grape and cream lollipop review.

Mango Might Be The Perfect Gummy Flavour

If we're just talking authenticity to the original subject matter, I think mangoes might be the best gummy flavour of all. If you think about the other fruit flavours commonly used in gummies, the fruit's original texture and often colour almost never match their gummy flavoured treat. However, mangoes are pretty squishy, and when they're freshly cut they kind of look like they could be made of gummy too. It's not a perfect match, but it's remarkably close. The only problem you have is that most mango gummies don't actually taste like gummies, but when they do it's magical.

Check out my latest mango flavoured gummy candy review.

I Like Sour Candy... But...

 Probably my favourite extreme candy theme is sour. I love a good sour candy, I like subtle tart and a love knock your socks off sour. The thing is, I don't believe that sour works with every single flavour. I feel like there are some flavours that work well with sour, and some that don't work so well. You might say that fruit is always a safe place to have a sour treat, but I disagree. Sour watermelon, strawberry and raspberry never sit well with me. It's often a problem when sour is added to a fruit that either never comes sour in real life, or when it's not supposed to be eaten sour. Berries are a great example of this, particularly strawberries.

Check my latest sour strawberry review.

Not Sure About This Size Thing

In the last 10 years or so, there's been a trend about making very small versions of classic treats. By small I mean the perfect size to add to a trail mix. The kind of size that you could easily see it possible to buy these treats using a scoop. It seems like there's a trend to making treats where you can fit several in the palm of your hand. Now on paper, this is a completely fine idea, that may take some work, but should be pretty similar to the original. The problem is that the candy companies have to make some adjustments to ratios and ingredients to make these truly work, and often those adjustments don't make for a better tasting treat. For example, the chocolate on these Kit Kat Pops had to be adjusted so they wouldn't melt as easily, because they would stick together and also melt in your hands while you ate them. This adjustment did not favours to the classic Kit Kat flavour.

Check out the full review of these Kit Kat Pops, and find out exactly what went wrong.

Celebrating Canada

I'm not sure if you all know this, but I'm Canadian. I'm actually surprised at how many people assume I'm from whatever country they happen to be living in. I'll admit that most people assume I'm American, but I've also been mistaken for British and Australian too. In the same way it's amazing how many people assume that their favourite treat are actually available all over the world. It's probably the same reason that most people assume that there isn't enough candy in the world to sustain a website like candyciritc.org. The truth is, there are thousands and thousands of candies out there, and still many for me to try.

Check out my latest Canadian candy review.

Something Original

I've probably said this before on this blog hundreds of times before, "the best thing a candy can do is present something original". I've had thousands of candies that are basically the same, with the main difference being quality. Fruit and Nut bars are a great example of this, and a type of treat that could really be unique. The name is vague enough that you could easily make some really unique and possibly tasty flavour combinations, but all I seem to get is the same flavour combination over and over again. I go into this even more on this week's review, but it's worth mentioning again and again until some of these candy companies get the message. "Fruit and nut does not have to mean raisins and almonds all the time!"

Check out this version of a fruit and nut bar, and yes sadly it's the same old thing.

Kinder Is A Weird Company

Just to be clear, I think Kinder is a great candy company, and their treats are classics in my book. However, if you look at the treats they offer, there's some odd design choices. They're most well known for an egg that conceals a toy inside. They also make an egg that's half filled with cream and the other half filled with a toy. Then there's this new review, a chocolate/cookie hippo themed treat. There's a cake that requires refrigeration and several chocolate bars that are not regularly chocolate bar sizes or shapes. It's not that any one treat is weird, it's just a huge range of designs for a single candy company. I'm not putting them down for this either, in fact it's one of the things I love about Kinder, you never know what they're going to come out with next.

Check out my latest Kinder review.

The Size and Shape Matter

I feel like there's one feature about lollipops that many candy companies ignore, size and shape. It's not that they don't think about this feature, I just don't think some candy companies think about how nice it is to eat a lollipop that fits perfectly in your mouth. So many are either too small or too big, some are also rather oddly shaped, so their not comfortable. I think there are certain lollipops out there that I might enjoy more if they just made the shape more pleasing for my mouth.

Check out my latest lollipop review, because they got it right.

Cookie, Bar or survival ration?

Marketing for a treat is so important. I find it particularly important because it helps me categories the treats that I review on candycritic.org. Some treats are easy to label, some treat like this cookie/bar/war ration is a little more complicated. I do have a "unique treats" category, where I put treats that are just too hard to categories. However, with the treat I'm reviewing today, it's not that it doesn't fit into any category, it fits into several. Although I don't actually have a category for war rations... yet.

Check out the review for this odd treat.

Just A Gummy Worm?!!

It's funny how worms have become so connected to gummy candy. I guess it makes sense since worms are kind of squishy, and the idea of eating them is a little gross, but cool. I used to believe that all gummy worms where basically the same design, and at most had a different flavour (good or bad). However, as I taste more and more candies in this world, I'm learning that there are actually some very different interpretations of gummy worms out there. Some are better than others, but I really appreciate the effort in making something new with a classic treat.

Check out my latest gummy worm review.

Chocolate Gimmicks?

Whenever I travel I always seem to discover odd treats in airports. The theme of these odd treats is often "a popular snack found in this country, covered in chocolate". If you're in a place known for bananas, you'll find dried bananas covered in chocolate, if you're in a place known for apples, apples covered in chocolate. The weird thing about these chocolate covered treats is that often they're only found in airports. It's not like these chocolate covered delights are found in actual local stores, just overpriced airport gift shops. Honestly, I don't often buy them, but on a few occasions they're just so weird that I can't resist.

Check out a recent airport find that was a chocolate covered treat worth sampling... kind of.

Spices and Herbs

I want to suggest something that many of you have probably never given much thought to. I suggest that herbs and spices are greatly underappreciated in milk and dark chocolate. I think the reason you don't see very many herbs and spices in chocolate is that it's a really hard thing to balance flavour wise. Herbs and spices can be subtle or super strong flavour wise, and getting them to balance with the flavour of chocolate is super challenging. I am suggesting however that when it's done well it can be some of the most amazing flavour creations ever. It also opens the door for chocolate flavour wise to so many other possibilities. I'm not just suggesting people use common spices and herbs that you find in sweet baking, I'm also suggesting that candy companies start exploring more spices and herbs used for savoury dishes as well.

Check out my latest chocolate review featuring a very popular spice that could work really well.

Does Your Gummy Have A Peel

The latest trend in gummy candy seems to be the idea that you can peel them. The concept is that each gummy candy is made with two different textures of gummy. The outside is a more chewy, durable gummy, while the inside is a soft a squishy gummy. Each of these gummies (so far) are shaped like different fruit that one might peel, like grapes or bananas. As a concept I'm a huge fan of this trend, it's not only clever, but thematically correct (so far). The actual peeling of these candies have proven to be a bit more challenging than I originally expected, but that could improve as technology gets better. The thing I'm looking forward to is the first creative gummy candy company that takes this trend and moves it out of peeling fruit. I feel like there's great promise for a really creepy Halloween candy here.

Check out my latest peel-able candy review.

Feeling the Peeling

I really have mixed feelings about the peeling gummy trend. For those out of the loop, over the last few years there's been a trend of making gummy candy that you can peel. The concept is that you get a piece of fruit that often (but not always) has a peel, and make it using two different textures of gummy candy. The outside is often a fairly durable gummy while the centre is often very soft. I've often found that the soft gummy centre is a little too squishy and can make peeling difficult. In the case of these passion fruit gummies it was even worse, but it's slightly possible that it's supposed to be that way.

Check out my latest peelable gummy review.