A Button Pushing Candy Thing Part 3 - What's Popin' Orville?

I think it would be ironic to use this Dash Button to order popcorn that you would then pop in a pot on your stove. It would be old and new school snacking together at last.

Every Wednesday this month we're featuring a snack themed Dash Button from Amazon. Dash Buttons allow you to order your snack fix with the push of a button.

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A New Episode Of Chris Why Would You Eat That?!!

We just posted a new episode of Chris, Why Would You Eat That?!! where Chris "enjoys" a candy coated nut of some kind... likely an almond.

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This Week In Candy

Good morning all.  It's another week of sweet tooth fun here at candycritic.org.  It's also another week of review-a-thon fun with our on going review-a-thon-a-thon.  A regular review-a-thon is a week were we'll post a new review every day for a week, a review-a-thon-a-thon is where we post new reviews every day for 4 weeks.  Last week was fun reviews of gummy treats, this week we're featuring a particular candy, Original Champion toffees.  These are toffees that we collected on our trip to Southern Africa, and we just haven't gotten around to posting these reviews since.  There are 5 different flavours of Champion Original Toffee, and we've reviewed each and every on of them.

This week we'll also be posting a new episode of our "hit" YouTube show, Chris, Why Would You Eat That?!!.  This week I sample a sugar coated nut that although weird, wasn't as gross as I thought it would be.  This is a problem I've thought about on this show.  Since everything I sample on Chris, Why Would You Eat That?!! is something I've never eaten before, what happens if I like it.  This week's treat I could hardly call something I "like", but it wasn't too bad.  We've got a few more treats, snacks, and general foods coming up, and we're also thinking about inviting special guests for future episodes.  Make sure to follow us on YouTube so you'll know exactly when we post a new episode, as well as new episodes of our podcast Junk Fud.

Allison and I are also planning another adventure, an adventure that might have an on the spot episode of Chris, Why Would You Eat That?!! I don't want to say where we're going yet, but I will tell you that it's a place with very polarizing foods.

This week on Snack Facts, our Instagram feed, we're looking at Japanese candy.  Probably one of the most popular nations for producing weird candy, Japan has changed the way we think about snacking.  Make sure to check back every day this week for a new fun Japanese candy fact.  You can follow Snack Facts on our Instagram feed, as well as our Facebook page and Twitter feed.

As mentioned above, this week's new review is the first in our Original Champion Toffee review-a-thon.  Today's flavour is pretty strange as toffees go, and it didn't really work out.  You can click here to read why this candy didn't really work, and follow us on any of our social media sites to keep up with this week's review-a-thon. (Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Google +, and Pinterest)

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Candy In The Media

I could watch people make candy all day long. This is one of the best videos I've seen on the subject.

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New Episode of Junk Fud History Is Online!!!

This week's episode of Junk Fud History takes a look back at an American classic, the Jolly Rancher candy.  It's probably one of the least fancy candies, yet it's a real classic.

Click here to check out the latest episode, as well as some of our past episodes.

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Candy Critic Dessert Club - Inventing a Cookie That I Call Frank.

Or at least I think I invented a cookie.  Yesterday I woke up with an idea, I wanted to invent a cookie.  Nothing ground breaking, but just something that I've never tried before.  You might read this and say "hey, I've made that cookie before it's called a "insert name of cookie here"".  The thing is, I haven't.  I've never eaten or heard of a cookie that is like the one I invented.  I took some cookie basics, switched a few things up (both in ingredients and in process) and baked my heart out.  I asked my friends what I should call this cookie, and only one person responded, so until I get a better idea this cookie will be known as "Frank".

Ingredients

2 1/4 Cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup of unsalted butter (soft and warm)
3/4 cup of white sugar
3/4 cup of maple syrup
1 teaspoon of vanilla
2 large eggs
1 cup whole walnuts
175 grams of dark chocolate (Lindt 70%)

You'll also need two average sized bowls, one mixing bowl, a mixer, a cookie sheet, several things to stir with, measuring cups, and tinfoil. There may be a few other things you'll need, but I'll cover those below.

In one of the small bowl mix the flour with the salt and baking soda.  This is simple enough and requires a quick stir and nothing else.  Set that bowl aside. Then take your dark chocolate and put it in a Ziploc bag and beat the hell out of it with a meat tenderizer or hammer.  You want the chocolate to be as small as you can get it, and let out a little frustration while you're at it.  Second, take the walnuts and chop the heck out of them in your food processor.  You can chop them into dust, or if you get bored you can leave a few chunky surprises, but for the most part pulverize those nuts.  Empty the nuts into your second average bowl and put the pounded chocolate into the food processor and pulverize them as well.  Again you can leave a few chunky bits as surprises, but you want most of it to be very small bits.  Ad that chocolate to the bowl with the walnuts.

Next, take out your mixer on a low setting and ad the butter, start whipping it a little and slowly ad the white sugar.  Keep going until the butter and sugar are bonded well (creamed), and then add the maple syrup.  Keeping mixing with your mixer until the maple syrup is mixed in, then ad your vanilla.  Then ad one egg at a time, keeping the mixer at a fairly low speed.  Once everything is nicely mixed together, in other words once it becomes one mass as opposed to being made up of ingredients, start adding the flour mixture slowly.  Keep mixing until all of the flour has been added and is mixed in well.  You'll probably need a spatula to work the sides, unless you have an awesome mixer.

Once it's all one glob of cookie greatness we'll no longer need the mixer.  Remove the mixer from the equation and slowly stir in the nut and chocolate.  Simply stir in these bits using the spatula you used to clean the sides of the bowl while you were mixing.  If you have a really awesome mixer you'll have to dirty a spatula.  Once the chocolate and nuts are mixed you'll need a really small spoon.  I recommend something smaller than a teaspoon, but bigger than one of those coffee spoons they used to give you at McDonald's in the 80's.  For my cookies I used an egg spoon, and it worked perfectly.

Now spoon the mixture onto your tinfoil covered baking sheet.  Keep them small, because lots of little cookies are awesome.  Bake each batch of cookies at 375 degrees for 7 minutes.  Many people might argue that it would be simpler to make one giant cookie, and it would look so very cool.  I argue that little cookies are so much better, and here's why:

First of all they take a lot less time to cook, and the less time it takes from those cookies to go from being ingredients to going into my mouth the better.

Secondly, if you cook one giant cookie, people will know if you sampled a bit while you're cooking, because there will be bite marks.  Bake little cookies and you can sample a little from each batch, and there will be so many cookies that no one will notice that you ate 17 of them.

Finally, little cookies are cute.

Once the cookies are done, let them cool on the rack for a few minutes, and if possible serve immediately. They will last a few days, but they'll taste best right out of the oven.

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A Button Pushing Candy Thing Part 2 - Doritos Fix

If you regularly need Doritos, then you should pick yourself up a Doritos Dash Button from Amazon.

Every Wednesday this month we're featuring a snack themed Dash Button from Amazon. Dash Buttons allow you to order your snack fix with the push of a button.

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This Week In Candy

You may not know this, but we have a whole bunch of reviews written and ready to go online, we keep them for a rainy day.  By rainy day I mean we keep them for weeks when I'm sick or on vacation.  The problem is my archive of reviews to post has started to grow to well over one hundred reviews.  While it's nice to have a few reviews ready to go just in case, over one hundred is just way too many.  To help work this list down, we sometimes have a review-a-thon, where we review a candy every day of the week, instead of just Monday.  I've decided however that this list needs some quick extreme trimming, so prepare for the review-a-thon-a-thon.  For the next four weeks we're going to post a new review every weekday.  Some week's will have great themes (like this week), likely at least one's theme will be random candy.  You can follow our weekly review-a-thon-a-thon on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest, or Google +.

Just because we're posting a lot of reviews doesn't mean we're just taking the week off either.  This week we're continuing our podcast series Junk Fud, with the latest episode of Junk Fud History all about Jolly Ranchers.  But that's not all, we're also going to post a new episode of our YouTube show Chris, Why Would You Eat That?!!, where Chris (that's me) enjoys a really creepy looking candied... something or other.  We don't stop here because all this month on our regular Candy Thing blog segments (that goes online every Wednesday) we're posting snack related Amazon Dash Buttons, a thing that we're still not really sure isn't a joke.  We're not stopping here though, this Thursday we have our regular monthly post for the Candy Critic Dessert Club. This week we're making "Frank", a cookie invention that we made up ourselves, and we're giving you the recipe.

As you can tell there's a lot going on this week, so hopefully you'll still have time to keep up with Snack Facts, our Instagram feed.  This week Snack Facts is going with the gummy theme with a look at Gummy candies.  Check back every day this week for a fun fact about these stretchy treats.  You can follow Snack Facts on Instagram, our Twitter feed, and Facebook page as well.

For the first week of our review-a-thon-a-thon we're going to look at gummies as well.  So every day this week we'll be posting a new review of a fun gummy treat.  Today's review is a strange one, so strange that you might not even be able to call it a real gummy.  Click here to find out why.

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Candy In The Media

Baby Metal makes their American television debut on Colbert with Gimme Chocolate.  If I ever meet them I shall give them chocolate.

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A Button Pushing Candy Thing Part 1 - Bite Into A Slim Jim

Are you familiar with Dash Buttons? At first I thought they were some kind of prank put on by Amazon, but now I've learned that they're a real thing.  A Dash Button is a small button that when pushed will automatically order a particular product from Amazon and send it to you within a couple of days.  I'm not sure how I feel about them yet, but I have to admit, I am curious.

Today's example of a Dash Button is the perfect choice for anybody who needs regular Slim Jim fixes.

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This Week In Candy

This weekend I went to a local festival and I had the opportunity to sample some sugarcane juice.  I haven't had sugarcane in such a long time I forgot how sweet it is and how hard it is to finish a whole cup.  My favorite part of the process was watching this amazingly decorated machine spin as it crushed the cane into a fine green juice.  They added a dash of lemon to the juice to balance out the super sweet flavour. Snacking at local festivals is always great.

This week on the Candy Critic YouTube channel we released episode two of our series Chris, Why Would You Eat That?!!  We've got a few questionable treats lined up for future episodes, including a twist on a very popular chocolate spread.  We're also posting all of the episodes of Junk Fud (our almost weekly podcast) on YouTube as well.  Make sure to check later this week as we'll be posting the 4th installment of Junk Fud On the Road, all about France.

Speaking of Junk Fud On The Road, we're currently planning a few travel adventures right now.  We're thinking about India, and the USA.  Two very different places, but both really well known for food.  We're still working out the details, but as usual we'll be posting all about the trip during and when we come back home.  Stay tuned for more details.

This week on Snack Facts, our Instagram feed, we're looking at Snickers bars.  Probably one of the most well known candy bars in the world, and likely the most well represented candy (behind Doritos) in Superbowl advertising.  Make sure to check back every day to learn something new about this meal in a bar.  You can follow Snack facts on our Instagram feed, Facebook page, and Twitter feed.

This week's review is a result of last week's episode of Chris, Why Would You Eat That?!!  You can watch the video to see our initial response to the Cambodian Banana Candies, then read this week's review to get a more detailed look at this very strange chewy treat. Click here to read the review.

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Candy In The Media

This is making me re-think the way I should write candy reviews.

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A Scary Candy Cookie Thing

This Alien cookie jar might be a good way to keep your kids hands out of the candy jar.

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Twisted Gummy Bear Card...

Gummy Bear Love Card by candycritic
Find more note cards online at zazzle.com

For the one you love.

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This Week In Candy (A Little Late Because Of Easter)

The days after Easter are always the same, it starts with a little regret after you realize you've eaten a huge chocolate Easter bunny in one day.  Then you're filled with hope, that starts when you go shopping for something to help your stomach ache and you see discounted Easter candy.  The next move is to buy that same chocolate Easter bunny on sale, and this time take it slow.  That works for a few days, until you binge on the chocolate Easter bunny while watching Walking Dead in one night.  Fortunately, by then all of the good discounted Easter treats are gone, and you're left two weeks after Easter debating if it's worth buying that case of Peeps.

This week at Candy Critic, it's a bit of a work week.  We'll be recording the latest episode of the Junk Fud podcast featuring all of the junk food news that we came across in the month of March (it should go online later this week).  We're also working on some of our new Youtube content, including a new intro for our soon to be regular segment known as "Chris, Why Would You Eat That!??". We're also going to be working on a new segment that we hope to have going soon where we'll look back at some of the candy we've reviewed in the past, and see if it's still the same.  Finally we're writing a few articles that will be coming online in the future, and possibly starting an art project related to the candy we've reviewed.

This week on Snack Facts, our Instagram feed, we're looking at when certain chocolate bars came out. It's amazing how long some of the classic bars have been around.  Most would say that they don't remember these bars not existing, but chances are your grandparents may not have known a world without a Hershey Bar either. Check back every day this week to find out when some of the classic bars came out, you can follow Snack Facts on Instagram, our Twitter feed, and our Facebook page.

This week's new review is a classic treat, it's a classic treat that everyone loves to hate.  I'm still looking for anybody to make the Circus Peanut fan page (that's not affiliated with any company that makes them).  So click here to read why I loved and hated reviewing this bright orange peanut.

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I Want Easter Candy Variety, And I Have Suggestions

Easter is a very simple holiday candy wise.  There are really only a few candies that dominate the market, Easter eggs, jellybeans, and chocolate bunnies.  Don't get me wrong, I love all of those treats, in fact I think we should have these treats (or versions of them) available throughout the year.  I am however a lover of creativity, and seeing the same Easter candy year after year gets me down.  Several times on this blog I've spent the time designing specific new candy treats for holidays, but not this time.

Rather than be specific about the design of treats, I want candy makers out there to be a little bit more creative.  I'm going to suggest types of candies that I think would work for Easter, and let the candy companies’ work out the details.  These are fairly broad candy categories that I've never seen Easter candy touch, but I think with a little creativity you could have some new classic Easter treats. Right now Easter treats are really limited in creativity, so I think there's just so many places you could go.

The first category is one that might seem like the worst Easter treat idea ever, but I think it would work is potato chips.  Instantly I'm sure your mind is thinking, how do chocolate eggs and potato chips go together, but you have to think a little more broadly.  Recently Lay's has had several contests to vote for a new flavour of chip, and in almost all of these contests there was a "sweet" flavour.  Why not take this sweet flavour and work in an Easter spin, how about hot cross buns flavoured chips (hot cross buns are a traditional Easter dessert in the UK).  You could also go with Easter ham flavoured chips, that would be far less strange but still in the spirit.  Best of all you could limit these chips for the holiday, and therefore not wear out the novelty.

The second category for Easter expansion is gummies.  I feel like a broken record when I tell people that gummies should be expanded into a holiday treat, because frankly I believe gummies are the most versatile candy in the world.  There have been a few Easter gummies (pictured above), however I feel like there could be thousands more.  This is also something you could merge into the chocolate bunny and chocolate egg world. Why not make chocolate flavoured gummy eggs and bunnies.  Even fruity gummy Easter eggs would work, and you could make them super decorated.

Probably the most obvious treat that seems to have missed out on Easter is lollipops.  The round shape of a lollipop would be perfect to link up with an Easter egg.  You could make all kinds of fun flavours and decorate them just like fancy Easter eggs.  If you're really creative you could go with super detailed Easter egg lollipops and decorate them like Ukrainian Easter eggs.  A lollipop of that calibre could be the first edible museum piece ever.

There are three simple candy ideas that I've never seen (or seen very little of), that we already know are popular in the snack food world. So come on candy companies, let’s stretch out the Easter candy lines and make something a little out of the ordinary.

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Candy In The Media

I don't know if I've ever tried a Whoopie Pie, although I really appreciate the fact that the word "pie" is in the name of this treat twice.

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Easter Greeting Cards From Candy Critic

Chocolate Line Greeting Card by bewarethecheese
See other greeting card templates on zazzle.com

Hey gang, why not pick up a fun greeting card for that special someone this Easter.  Candy Critic has a whole bunch of designs for you to check out including this snazzy one.

Click here to check out the store to see a few more of our cards, t-shirts, and posters.

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A S'mores Foot Warming Candy Thing

Not only do these slippers look really cool, but they're heated as well. I'd have a hard time not eating them.

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Easter Greeting Cards From Candy Critic

Easter Bunny Greeting Card by bewarethecheese
Shop for more greeting cards online at Zazzle.

Hey gang, why not pick up a fun greeting card for that special someone this Easter.  Candy Critic has a whole bunch of designs for you to check out including this snazzy one.

Click here to check out the store to see a few more of our cards, t-shirts, and posters.

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This Week In Candy

Spring is here, and that means so is Easter.  With spring in the air, and chocolate bunnies on our mind, we're going to celebrate the chocolatiest holiday of the year.  We've got a few plans for this holiday, some which will be revealed later this week, other's we'll talk about right now.

You may have noticed that we've been posting a lot of Easter themed greeting cards lately.  It's not too late to pick up a special Easter themed card for that special someone.  I'm sure it would decorate that Easter basket perfectly.  You can check out all of our cards right here.

This week we're also going to keep you very informed about this candy fun holiday on Snack Facts, our Instagram feed.  Every day this week we'll post a new fun fact about Easter, and the treats we're all hopping to get in our basket (pun intended).  You can check out our daily Snack Facts on our Instagram feed, Facebook page, and Twitter feed as well.

What would be an Easter week without a special Easter review.  This week's review takes one of the modern classic Easter candies, and gives it a little twist.  Click here to find out if Cadbury Creme Eggs translated well into cookie form.

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Easter Greeting Cards From Candy Critic

Nesting Chocolates Greeting Card by bewarethecheese
Shop for a greeting card on zazzle.com

Hey gang, why not pick up a fun greeting card for that special someone this Easter.  Candy Critic has a whole bunch of designs for you to check out including this snazzy one.

Click here to check out the store to see a few more of our cards, t-shirts, and posters.

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The First Episode of "Chris, Why Would You Eat That?!!"

Earlier this week I mentioned that I'd be posting a video about eating Galamay. It was a horrible success, and it's inspired something new.  We're going to start posting quick little videos of me eating strange and either wonderful or horrible candies whenever we get our hands on something.  In some cases it might be associated with a review, in other cases it'll just me eating something that seems really strange.  We're calling the segment "Chris, Why Would You Eat That?!!", and the name pretty much sums it up.

Make sure to subscribe to us on You Tube to get all the updates as they happen, along with the latest episodes of the Junk Fud podcast.

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Candy In The Media

Seinfeld crushes it on Late Night with a great set about snacks.

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Candy Critic Dessert Club – Allison's Special - Pancakes!

I love Allison's pancakes, there I said it.  I love Allison too, even more than her pancakes, but as long as I can have both, I'm in a pretty good place.  Allison only makes her pancakes if we have at least 2 guests visiting for brunch.  Because of this rule, we've had more brunches at our house than any other meal combined.  People always tell Allison that she shouldn't "fuss" over these pancakes for them, but frankly, some of these people would never be invited if pancakes weren't on the line.

Allison claims that her pancakes are simple, but I disagree, while the ingredients are simple, the finesse to make them just right is something that must be practiced.  If you happen to make this recipe, screw it up, please send pictures as I'd like to prove that to Allison how awesome she is.

The ingredients (Think 2s):

2 cups all purpose flour

2 table spoons white sugar
2 tea spoons baking powder
2 teaspoons salt

2 cups milk

2 table spoons oil

2 eggs (optional you can separate the egg yolks and beat whites to fold into mixture)

This first thing you can do is mix all of the dry ingredients together, that means the flour, white sugar, baking powder, and salt.  The great thing about this is that you can do this part well in advance.  Since you want to have pancakes that came fresh off the pan, and often this means getting up early to make these pancakes, why not get through part of the recipe the night before.  Sleep in a few minutes before your guests arrive.

Next mix in the milk, but do it slowly.  If you mix the milk in too quickly you'll get lumps, and you don't want lumps.  This is also the part that requires a bit of practice, depending on the flour and the milk  you use, sometimes 2 cups is a little too much or no exactly enough.  You want a slightly thick batter, but again, NOT LUMPY!  You might have to practice this a few times because unfortunately you don't really know if your mixture is  too runny until you put it on the hot pan, and by that time it's way too late to add more flour.

This is a point where you can mix in any extra ingredients you might want.  In our house chocolate chips are acceptable, fruit is not.  These are not my rules as I love blueberry or raspberry pancakes, but since she's making them, I'm not complaining.

Once you have the unlumpy batter mixed, stir in the oil and the eggs... sort of.

This is also the time where you can decide if you want to be lazy, or if you want to have the fluffiest pancakes in the world.  If you want to be lazy, mix in the eggs and oil and you're done. You will have slightly fluffy pancakes using this method, but they could be fluffier.  If you want to go the extra mile, add your oil, and separate the eggs and just add the egg yolks.  Then, beat the egg whites in a separate bowl until they're stiff (or can hold their shape).  Then fold in the egg white into the batter, but don't mix it too much.

Once you have the batter mixed, and any other ingredients mixed in as well, it's time to cook these bad boys.  Allison uses a standard ladle as her measurement, and in a large pan can fit 3.  There's also a bit of oil in the pan to keep them from sticking.  She cooks the pancakes until she can see the brown around the  edges and carefully flips them.  This can take a different amount of time depending on how thick the batter is, how big the pancakes are, and how hot the pan is.  Keep in mind that when you start making the pancakes the pan will be cool, so it might take a little longer than the 2nd or 3rd batch.  All I can say is that pancake cooking takes a bit of practice and chances are you'll ruin a few.

I could get into flipping pancakes, but frankly I think it's magical.  The first flip is always the most dangerous because at this point the top of your pancake is still batter, and it can be messy.  One quick motion and a little bit of nerve seems to be the way to go.  One thing to keep note is that under doing your pancakes is better than burning them, so error on the side of caution.

To keep your pancakes warm, put your stove on to about 190 degrees.  Put a tin foil covered cookie sheet in the oven, and as you finish each batch put them on the cookie sheet.  It's also a good idea to drape another sheet of tin foil on top of your pancakes in the oven to keep the moisture in.  Once all your pancakes are done, top them with whatever you want (except Vermont  maple syrup, after all we're Canadian), and serve.

A great deal of our relationship hovers around the making of pancakes.  I know that making them is a lot of work for Allison, and I appreciate it.  I tend to make her a ridiculous amount of bacon  when we have pancakes (often burning my arms in the process), so there is some mutual cooking going on.  I'm also in charge of many of the other toppings, while Allison doesn't go for them, our guests are often keen, and happy guests means we gain a reputation for having these meals, which means we have more of these meals, which means I get more pancakes.

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Easter Greeting Cards From Candy Critic

Easter Chocolates Greeting Card by bewarethecheese
Create a greeting card online

Hey gang, why not pick up a fun greeting card for that special someone this Easter.  Candy Critic has a whole bunch of designs for you to check out including this snazzy one.

Click here to check out the store to see a few more of our cards, t-shirts, and posters.

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St Patrick's Day Candy Ideas... That Aren't Green

Green, green, and even more green. That's pretty much the theme for St Patrick's Day. This is one holiday that really doesn't do candy very well either. There aren't that many St Patrick's Day candies, and of the small amount that there is, it all seems to be green. This green candy is often not very creative, and not Irish at all.

I've decided to take on the challenge of designing St Patrick's Day candy that's both creative and not green. Keep in mind that I've never actually been to Ireland, or studied Irish culture in any way. I certainly don't want to offend anybody, but I also want to be sure that even someone with no knowledge of Irish culture will know what these are representing.

I'm told that one of the prides of Ireland is their beer. If we think of Ireland and beer one word comes up on top all of the time, Guinness. St Patrick's Day is often a time that many adults take up a pint of Guinness to celebrate the fine people of Ireland, but what about those that do not drink and prefer sweets instead. Why not have a gummy Guinness? It's a strong flavoured beer that would translate really well into gummy form. You could even fill the gummy with a liquid Guinness centre to make it more authentic. Best of all, it represents something very Irish, and it’s not green.

Probably one of the most famous expressions from Ireland is to "kiss the Blarney Stone". You may or may not know that the Blarney Stone is a real stone that with some difficulty you can kiss. Legend has it that if you kiss the stone you’ll be given the gift of gab and flattery. The thing is, most people won't have the opportunity to kiss this stone and gain all of the magic that comes with it. So why not bring some of this magic home, in candy form with a Blarney lollipop. A reproduction of the famous stone made of rock candy is easy to kiss or lick till your heart's content. Why not give yourself some sweet Irish magic on St Patrick's Day. The trick here is to make it look as much like real stone as possible, the only green you might find is a bit of moss growing on the bottom.

It seems that almost every holiday has some kind of hollow chocolate treat available, except St Patrick's Day. It's a no brainer that a chocolate leprechaun would be perfect for the kids to celebrate this Irish holiday. The leprechaun could be size appreciate, and you could have smaller ones as well. Best of all, like many holiday hollow chocolate treats, this one could be filled with more treats. The best, and most obvious filling could be gold coins, however Lucky Charms would be cool too. The fun of breaking open a small Irish fictional character, to reveal a whole bunch of chocolate coins would be great. It would also answer the question as to where they hide their pot of gold. My only hope is that they make it out of tasty milk chocolate; white chocolate coloured green would not be great.

As usual these candy ideas are free for the taking for any candy maker out there. All I ask is if you make them please send me some to try. It's about time that kids were brought into the St Patrick's Day fun. By the end of the day parents will be drunk and kids (myself included) can enjoy a wonderful sugar buzz. Most importantly, they're not green.

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A Chip Eating Candy Thing

While these look like they'd keep my fingers clean, they do look fairly complicated to lick clean.

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A New Butter Friendly T-Shirt

Butter Not Margarine Shirt by Bewareshirts
Browse Butter T-Shirts online at Zazzle.com

We just finished designing this awesome new t-shirt that will allow anyone to proclaim their love for the tastiest fat in the world, butter.

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Easter Greeting Cards From Candy Critic

Ducky Chocolate Greeting Card by bewarethecheese
Browse Easter Cards

Hey gang, why not pick up a fun greeting card for that special someone this Easter.  Candy Critic has a whole bunch of designs for you to check out including this snazzy one.

Click here to check out the store to see a few more of our cards, t-shirts, and posters.

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This Week In Candy

Holy cow we have a busy week here at Candy Critic! As you may have noticed, over the last few weeks’ we've been posting new candy themed Easter cards available from our sister site bewarethecheese.com.  Make sure to check out their store, and pick up a card for the one you love.  Also this week, we'll be recording and posting another episode of the Junk Fud Podcast, this week we'll be looking at the history of a fairly famous candy company.  This week we're also going to be revealing the secret to Allison's famous pancakes, in our regularly monthly installment of the Candy Critic Dessert Club.

Our big project this week we’re going to look at Galamay.  Galamay is a traditional Thai candy that has stumped us.  We bought a bag of them on our recent trip to Thailand, but we couldn't figure out what to do with them, particularly since there are so many flavour varieties.  We've decided that we're going to review the classic version (check this week's new review), and we're going to write an article about the other flavours.  Included with this article will be a short video (on our new and improved You Tube channel) that will feature my reaction to biting into each flavour of Galamay, one at a time.  This may not seem that interesting, however one of the flavours is durian (the grossest fruit in the world), and I'm not sure which one is the durian flavoured Galamay.

St Patrick's Day is also coming up this week. While thinking up ideas of how to celebrate, we realized that St Patrick's Day is really lacking in the candy department.  Sure there's a million places to get green beer, but how can someone with a sweet tooth celebrate this day?  There are a very few candy options, and all of them are just so green.  We put our minds to the test, and later this week we'll be posting some candy creation ideas for St Patrick's Day, that aren't green.

This week on Snack Facts, our Instagram feed, we're going a little out of the box.  This week we're looking at famous Internet food memes.  Being on the Internet almost all of the time, and constantly looking at food websites, we come across all kinds of food related Internet memes.  So this week on Snack Facts, we're going to drop a few facts about some of the more famous ones.  Make sure to check our Instagram feed, Facebook page, or Twitter feed every day for a new fact about internet famous food stuffs.

As you've read above, this week we're dealing with a huge variety of strange Thai candies known as Galamay.  We thought it would make sense to review the most traditional of all the flavours, whatever that flavour happens to be.  We knew it was the traditional flavour because it was the only one to come wrapped in a banana leaf.  Click here to read about our first experience with this strange Thai sweet.

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Easter Greeting Cards From Candy Critic

Ten Hut Greeting Card by bewarethecheese
Create custom greeting cards at Zazzle.

Hey gang, why not pick up a fun greeting card for that special someone this Easter.  Candy Critic has a whole bunch of designs for you to check out including this snazzy one.

Click here to check out the store to see a few more of our cards, t-shirts, and posters.

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Candy In The Media

Apparently animal instinct and candy don't always work together, particularly when you're a raccoon trying to wash your cotton candy.

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A New Episode of Junk Fud On The Road Is Online

We've just posted the latest episode of Junk Fud on the Road where Allison and Chris talk about their recent food adventures in Thailand.  Click here to listen or download this latest episode.

Also, if you want to follow Junk Fud, and possibly some future Candy Critic adventures, you can follow our You Tube channel here.

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Easter Greeting Cards From Candy Critic

One Up Gummy Bear Greeting Card by bewarethecheese
View Gummy Cards online at zazzle

Hey gang, why not pick up a fun greeting card for that special someone this Easter.  Candy Critic has a whole bunch of designs for you to check out including this snazzy one.

Click here to check out the store to see a few more of our cards, t-shirts, and posters.

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A Frozen Banana Candy Thing

I'd love to have a set of these and fill them with my new favorite homemade ice cream recipe, bananas and Nutella.

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Thailand Food Adventure

Thailand really is a food loving culture.  They love their own food, and they embrace foods from other parts of the world.  Their own food is uniquely theirs, and found just about everywhere.  There doesn't seem to be a huge range within the country, as you pretty much find the same foods in the north, south, near or far away from the water.  That's not to say that there isn't variety, the smallest towns and the large cities all offer huge varieties of Thai food in just about every form.

As far as international foods go, there is certainly some that are more preferred by the Thai people. American, Japanese, and some European foods are all over the place.  The European foods seem to be French, British, and some Mediterranean foods, but there are a few others as well.  You also find a lot of Chinese foods in parts of Thailand, but I'm assuming that's because there are also many Chinese tourists in this area.  The surprising thing is the number of Japanese and American restaurants in this country.  Some are restaurants that you don't normally see around, like MOS Burger and Japanese Curry houses from Japan, and Swenson’s ice cream from the US.  There are also many Japanese convenience stores in Thailand as well including 7-11 (Japanese style) and Family Mart.

When it comes to Thai food, the most obvious style of food is street food. There is not a market, or even street corner that doesn't have some kind of street food available.  The street food is far more sophisticated than what you would find in North American as well.  These street food restaurants offer complicated fish dishes, tasty skewered meat varieties, and even some tasty desserts. Each vendor generally specializes in one particular type of food, however several vendors are often crowded together so a group of people can really get whatever they want.  The mango sticky rice was certainly a highlight of our street food eating, but I'm a sucker for sweet treats.

Fruit is a big part of the Thai diet, both with the street food and in the grocery stores.  Just about every collection of street food vendors will have at least one juice maker in the group.  A few others offer fruits with crepes, or even on their own.  Grocery stores and markets also have a huge selection of tropical fruits, and it's easy to walk away with a juicy treat while you wander around town. Mangos, pineapples, and dragon fruit seem to be very popular. However the most popular fruit appears to be durian.

I'm not sure if durian is actually popular amongst the locals, or if it's some kind of silly tourist scam.  You find many durian stands all over tourist areas, but you don't really see locals lining up to eat the stuff.  If you've never tried durian before, the taste is smooth and creamy, but the smell is like an old sweat sock filled with rotting onions.  The smell is also fairly potent, so strong that the airport has warnings about not allowing you to bring durians onto the airplanes.  So these stalls all over town must be selling to someone, either Thai people that somehow have built a tolerance for this very smelly fruit, or tourists that try it as a dare.

One of the unique things I noticed about eating in Thailand is the choice of utensils.  You might assume that since it's an East Asian country, chopsticks would be the tools of choice, but that's not really true.  Chopsticks are around, but the eating tools of choice are forks and spoons, but not in the way you might be using them yourself.  In North American you generally use a fork to stab some foods, and a spoon to eat liquids.  In Thailand however they have a really unique way of eating their food.  They use a fork to collect the food onto the spoons.  Once the spoon is loaded up with a nice balance of all of the elements from the plate, you're left with a nice organized perfect bite of everything on your spoon.  You enjoy that perfect bite, and then start to collect the food with your fork to make another.

It seems like a strange way to eat, but it really makes for a very pleasant meal.  Each bite is a perfect balance of all of the flavours that you enjoy from your plate.  It's delicate, intricate, and really improves the way you eat.  It does slow things down a bit, but it's really worth it.  I may start eating like this more often myself at home.

I think if you're a foodie person Thailand has a lot to offer you. I also think if you're a picky eater there's plenty of simple western cooking available as well.  You may have to walk by a stall with squids hanging on a bar, or watch a person eat a deep fried fish head, but there's certainly something for the weak stomached and the food adventurer.

My only complaint about the food is the abundance of American and Japanese places.  Not that I don't like a few now and then no matter where I travel, just in some cases it was overwhelming.  There seemed to be some areas of Bangkok where the only Thai food available was the street food, and if you wanted to eat at a restaurant you had to either eat Japanese or American.

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Easter Greeting Cards From Candy Critic

Crunch Bears Greeting Card by bewarethecheese
Check out more Gummy Cards at Zazzle

Hey gang, why not pick up a fun greeting card for that special someone this Easter.  Candy Critic has a whole bunch of designs for you to check out including this snazzy one.

Click here to check out the store to see a few more of our cards, t-shirts, and posters.

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