Teenage Vampires and Werewolves

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

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

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

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

This is a chocolate truffle for Bella:

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

Caramel for the vampire Edward:

Like the design - very detailed - nice!

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

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

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

Got a little crushed on my travels:

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

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

Halloween and Peanut Butter - Yay!!

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

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

At least Nestle made a Butterfinger pumpkin:

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

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

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

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

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

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

Reese's next to Russell Stover:

My soul mate:

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Candy Corn Gone Wild

Halloween is fast approaching!!  And I have to say that, compared to last year, this year's Halloween candy is lame.  Thank God Just Born offered something new with their chocolate covered Peeps pumpkins.  The rest of the crew just served up the same old boring stuff.  I couldn't even find the mini Reese's peanut butter pumpkins this year.  Hershey, hast thou forsaken me?

Target, however, has a line of candy corn in flavors including green apple, strawberry and loads of others.  I picked a couple to try.  Pumpkin Pie:

These taste just like candy corn with a hint of pumpkin.  Not enough pumpkin as far as I'm concerned.  If you like candy corn, I think you'll like these.  If you're looking for pumpkin pie, look somewhere else.

Now this is a good idea - chocolate covered candy corn:

I like the way it looks better than the way it tastes.  Although chocolate covered candy corn is better than naked candy corn, it's too sweet for me.  But a great idea!

I thought I'd also try chocolate covered toffee candy corn:

YIKES!  This was just terrible.  I like toffee, but definitely not toffee candy corn.  Remember our old adage - just because you CAN do something, doesn't mean you SHOULD do it.  This was really terrible.  Yipes!

Whoa - look at this crazy marshmallow candy corn from Whitman's:

I have to admit - it's festive as hell. 

And, shockingly - it's pretty good!  Now - you have to consider that it's just marshmallow covered in a sugary candy shell, but the marshmallow was really creamy.  I am now diabetic.

These are some weird things I found in World Market - they are made in Ireland:

This might be one of the weirdest candies ever.  They have a really strange "tutti frutti" smell - so I was kind of scared of them.  But they were oddly good.  Weird green candy eyeballs from Ireland - what more could you want for Halloween?

Yahoo!!!!  The holidays are beginning!  Are you having fun?

NC State Fair 2010 - Food Fest

I approach the State Fair like I approach all things in life - all or nothing, take no prisoners, burn the boats, eat until you explode.  I've never been good with all that moderation, kumbayah stuff.

So in preparation for the attack - uh, I mean our visit - I went to the State Fair website to get a list of all the new food items http://www.ncstatefair.org/2010/General/FoodFinder.htm
I performed two dramatic readings of the list on the way to the fair.  There were two items I absolutely wanted to try - fried Chips Ahoy cookies and fried pumpkin pie.  I also decided I would try a Kool-Aid pickle.  I mean, you only live once, right?

My fellow warriors and I had already decided we would begin the attack by having lunch and decided we wanted to try deep fried bacon and cheese mashed potato bites.  Now, just think about that for a minute - cheese, bacon, mashed potato -sounds so good, right?

Would you believe we saw that booth first?  AND they had the fried chocolate chip cookies?  Score!!

As we got in the line, we noticed the sign:

Yes, that says "Chocalate Chip Cookies".  Almost as bad as the embroidery entry we saw in the arts and crafts section that read "Merry Chritmas."  Dear God....uh, I mean Jesus.

Here are the mashed potato bites:

These were horrible.  The "cheese" is on the side, the bacon is like Bacos, and the mashed potatoes were instant.  GLAACK!  A beautiful dream destroyed.

These odd shrimp shaped things are the deep fried chocalate cookies:

It was more like deep fried chocalate chip cookie dough and IT WAS AMAZING!

If you go, you have to get these - so damn good!!!!!!

A cute little candy booth:

The festive midway - we strolled this only in search of food.  No distractions until the mission was completed.  And the mission wouldn't be completed until they had to call EMS.

Then we saw this booth - it mentioned deep fried Chips Ahoy which I thought might be different than deep fried chocalate chip cookies.  I felt no risks could be taken and we should check this out.  They also had a deep fried Ho Ho and a deep fried honey bun which I still want to try.

Here's the display of their wares - the red things are the Kool-Aid pickles, the fried thing is a honey bun? (who the hell knows) and this is one version of the Krispy Cream doughnut hamburger.  None of us wanted to try that.

When I saw the Kool-Aid pickles, I wanted to retreat.  Those things looked heinous!  But my fellow warrior Larry tried to convince me that the pickles looked so yucky because they had been sitting out in the sun on display.  I said if they were $3 I would try them, but not if they were $6.  They were $3:

And they looked just like the ones on display.   Oh well - I tried one:

And it was horrible:

Think cherry and pickle.  Gross.

But there was still the fried Chips Ahoy!  This is what Chips Ahoy look like when you put them in a fryer.  FDA?  EPA?  CIA?  Where are you guys?

There's the finished product:

We tried to eat them but they were WAY too hot.  So we strolled along for a bit.  It was kind of like being in Heaven.

This was the big new thing this year:

Go ponytail man!!!!  (Love the looks on their faces.)

Really?

The Chips Ahoy finally cooled down enough to eat.  See how they are nowhere near as gooey as the chocalate chip ones?

They were pretty damn good.  Not as good as the chocalate chip ones, but damn good nonetheless.  We strolled some more.  I bought some pumpkin fudge which was amazing and delicious and I already ate it so no pictures.  It was like pumpkin frosting.  Yummmm!

I like this ride - it looks like candy:

Ah-ha!  Deep fried pumpkin pie!!  Pineapple lemonade!  And chocolate batter funnel cakes!

Here's the pumpkin pie with caramel drizzle and the required confectioner's sugar (which I was covered in from head to toe.  I kid you not - it was on my shoes when I got home.)

This may not look good - but I thought it was awesome!  It had real pumpkin pie filling.  Yay! Yay! Yay!

I couldn't eat these - just no room, but I really wanted to.  This is a turtle brownie funnel cake with chocolate batter, chocolate chips, caramel - if only my stomach wasn't so full and funnel cakes weren't so big!

And they had loads of other great flavors - chocolate obsession, black forest funnel cake, pecan praline, blueberry, apple..... So much food, so little space in my stomach.

 I did get the pineapple lemonade:

Didn't like it - too sweet.  Ha, ha, ha - did you read that?  I thought it was too sweet!  A woman covered in confectioner's sugar!

This man (who I found very creepy) was selling the world's largest gummy bear - which I had to touch:

And the world's largest gummy worm, which I did not touch.  See what I mean?  Kinda creepy.

Speaking of creepy, you could (in theory) win this:

Or this Rastafarian Simpson banana:

We had pretty much conquered the food list and decided to go see the award winning cakes (I love these things).   Intricate holly leaves (Merry Chritmas!):

My fav - so colorful and festive:

Cake sushi!

This is way too frilly and sappy for me, but the detail is amazing!  See the pacifier, the bottle and the shoes?

I like this one too:

And how damn funny is this wedding cake?  A pumpkin and a squash!  Love the veil and the bow tie.

Then we saw this and angles flew down from heaven and I could hear harps playing:

I think they got a little carried away with the confectioner's sugar (this is when it got on my shoes):

I knew my warriors were tough when one of them said, "What?  Only three?"

I wish this picture were clearer - there was probably confectioner's sugar on the lens.  But you can see that delicious Reese's peanut butter cup in there.  We decided this was a tie for the best of the day.  Deep fried Reese's Peanut Butter Cups are just so over the top, decadent and delicious.  But that deep fried chocalate chip cookie dough was to die for!!!  (Of course, at this rate I will be dying for it.)

On the way out we cruised through this really great show of NC flower power.  I thought I was taking a picture of these pretty mums, but apparently I was taking a picture of that blockhead waving. 

Festive candy land!!!

Do painted rocks count as flowers?

Pretty!!!

This is a random (but pretty) CD clothespin butterfly:

This is the whole CD display - which actually looked pretty cool with the sun hitting those babies:

We spent some time people watching before we left (which was very scary) and overall, had a blast.  It was a gorgeous day and a celebration of food, fun and friendship.  And maybe fall, frosting and freaks.  Possibly flowers, frying and felons - but I'm not sure about the last one.



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