Candy

Today I’m solving all problems with chips. Don’t they say that foods that crunch relieve stress? I don’t know who “they” are and unfortunately they probably suggest eating a carrot to solve the issue, but I vote chips. All day, every day. Lately I’ve run across the predicament of developing recipes that solely revolve around tex-mex situations or burgers or sandwiches. I’m sure you’ve noticed. Just when I think I’ve got a handle on it, I deal with that full force and combine the two. I sit down and make these giant lists of recipes to make for my invisible internet friends and then instead decide that weirdly flavored enchiladas are appropriate or that I can attempt to turn anything – I mean, anything – into a taco and margarita fest. Today I’m just giving you something you can eat with your burgers. Or with your beer. Or your hot dogs! Or with your emotions. You know. Whatever works. Oh… and if we’re being reeeeeal honest… something to put on top of your burgers. Or inside your sandwiches. You know it’s the best. I’ve never been a giant chip eater unless salt ‘n vinegar or bbq kettle cooked chips were staring me in the face. Sometimes I love the crunch for a sandwich-type lunch but for once in my lifetime, one of those itty bitty single sized, fairly appropriate portioned bags often does the trick. So weird. The only place I really get wacky about chips is Target because they have omgthebestflavorsever and I just cannot get enough. I usually end up buying three or four bags and opening them all at once and having a chip tasting party in my car. So trashy. It happens. And the only time I get wacky about chips in restaurants is when they are freshly homemade and served with blue cheese. Like, lots of blue cheese. Ugh. Love that. The deal? Homemade potato chips are sort of high maintenance, especially of the sweet potato variety. They just take a while. In hindsight, they are still easy to make – you simply have to be willing to stand in front of a hot pot of oil for a long while, tossing and turning and draining and seasoning. It is 100% COMPLETELY WORTH IT. Say it with me. Worth it. Maybe not worth it for a giant group of people, like a gigantic gaggle of adolescent males who will eat you out of house and home. But for one person, like maybe a husband that does the same? Or a small group? These are so fun and delicious. Or just for yourself. You deserve it. This little seasoning mix I throw on top of the chips is my go-to “bbq flavor” that I’ve perfected to our liking since first making my crockpot bbq beer chicken. I encourage you to play around with it a little if you like – use regular paprika if you don’t want smoky or add a little extra cayenne for some kick – whatever you want. This is a spice rub that I use multiple times per week in our house and I have no qualms in saying that it has taken me a year to feel like I realllllly got it right. And we are talking about me: Miss No Patience. Anyhoo, go getcha some chips this weekend. Make ‘em! You will not regret it. Even when you eat them all in on sitting… you will not regret it. Homemade BBQ Sweet Potato Chips Yield: serves 4 appropriately, 2 obnoxiously Total Time: 1 hour Ingredients: 2 large sweet potatoes, ends chopped off canola oil for frying 1 tablespoon smoked paprika 1 tablespoon onion powder 1/2 tablespoon brown sugar 1/2 tablespoon garlic salt 1/2 teaspoon chili powder 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/2 teaspoon black pepper Directions: Add about 4 inches of canola oil to a large pot and heat over medium high heat, fitting the pot with a candy thermometer. You want the oil to be at 350 degrees F, so if it continues to rise, turn down the heat a bit underneath. Cover a large cutting board with paper towels. In a bowl, combine paprika, onion powder, brown sugar, garlic salt, chili powder, salt and pepper. Scrub

I’m a bit of a sucker for Rococo Chocolates, so despite not being a big white chocolate fan, I thought I’d give this a try. I do like a bit of cardamom in my chocolate, after all. One of the things that drew me to this bar was the packaging, something Rococo do so well. It’s actually just a simple paper and foil wrapper, but Chantal Coady’s designs are simple but eye catching. It feels like you’re unwrapping a quality product. As you might expect from a white chocolate, sugar is the main ingredient, but it’s a healthy 30% cocoa solids (cocoa butter), so it’s not overly sweet. The chocolate has a nice creamy edge to it, but as you might expect, the overwhelming flavour is from the cardamom. It’s deliciously warm and works surprisingly well with the white chocolate. In fact, it’s so good that it’s quite difficult to stop eating. You don’t notice yourself eating each individual piece, but before you know it the bar is almost gone and you feel just a little bit guilty. But you shouldn’t feel too guilty. This may be a sweet treat, but it’s a quality treat. It’s certified organic with no nasty additives, so if you’re into white chocolate and want to try something a little bit different, then this is certainly worth trying. Information Buy it online from: RococoChocolates.com Amazon.co.uk (UK) Contains white chocolate (30% cocoa solids). Filed under cardamom, organic, rococo, uk. Tweet This The post Rococo White Chocolate With Cardamom appeared first on Chocablog.

How many fish is too many fish? Turns out: 7!

Ritter Sport bars are a strangely named square chocolate bar made in Germany. Most people really don't understand why they're square, or what's with the strange name. As it turns out both of these questions are related. The creator of the Ritter Sport wanted to make a chocolate bar for football/soccer fans. The problem he noticed is that chocolate bars didn't fit into their pockets very well. The simple solution is to make a square bar that fits in your pocket, so you can enjoy a treat during sporting events. While a simple idea isn't enough to keep a chocolate bar company in business for so long, making sure these square bars were made with good quality German chocolate, and sometimes filled with tasty fillings, does. How popular are Ritter Sport bars in their home country? Popular enough to build a museum, and I decided to pay it a visit.The Ritter Sport Museum has two floors of chocolate fun. The first floor is the official Ritter Sport store, and the second floor is the main museum. The museum has three main sections, the first part is all about where their chocolate comes from. It looks at the cocoa bean, how it's harvested, and how all of this effects the environment.The second part of the museum looks at the manufacturing process that goes into each Ritter Sport bar. It's very basic chocolate making information, but I have a feeling that the folks at Ritter Sport go for quality of ingredients over fancy new technologies.The final section of the museum focuses on the history of the Ritter Sport bar, and is the source of the information I wrote about at the beginning of this post. It also talks about some pretty staggering statistics in the number of Ritter Sport bars made in a year.The ground floor of the Ritter Sport museum is purely dedicated to buying Ritter Sport products.As you can imagine they had every variety of Ritter Sport bars that they make.And say for example there was a flavour that you imagined, but they didn't have it on the shelves, you don't have to leave empty handed. They have that covered because they offer a "make your own Ritter Sport bar" section. Every day, for a pretty hefty cost, they have chocolatiers on hand to help you custom make your own Ritter Sport bar with hundreds of ingredients to choose from. They offer more ingredient choices than are even available in their line of chocolate bars including pepper corns, chili, and gummy bears.If you're happy with the flavours they offer on the shelves, you can pretty much get them in any size or quantity you want. How about an entire meter of Ritter Sport bars?A tiny little bar for a quick snack?Or a giant bar to fill you up for days.But how will you get these bars home on a warm summers day? Well why not pick up an official Ritter Sport bar cooler.Or if you're just going for bulk, and you need an extra piece of luggage to carry it all home in, why not pick up the stylish Ritter Sport carry on bag.It was a fun day at the Ritter Sport museum, but I have one piece of valuable advice. Don't eat the giant pile of Ritter Sport bars in the middle of the store, they're for display only.CC

One of my biggest peeves as a candy writer are candy companies that claim their treats have health benefits. In some cases candy companies will change their treats so they have health benefits, and that often ruins the enjoyment of eating the treat. Other times candy companies will make silly claims and lead people to believe that they can eat as much junk food as they want. In both of these cases it's never good, you should know that when you eat junk food and candy that you also have fill up on nutritious foods as well. That's why I love this ad on the side of an ice cream truck, it pulls no punches and tells me that I'm about to taste something really great, but that I should also eat my vegetables first.I found this ad here.CC

I usually have trouble writing gummy reviews, because frankly most gummies, taste and texture wise, are pretty much the same. I end up often writing about how the shape was pleasing, and or difficult to eat. However the folks at sugarfina.com have changed my mind a little. They sent me a package full of gummies that are each very different in taste and texture. I can't say I liked them all, but I was happy to sample them.Click here to read today's spicy gummy review.CC

I’m having a bit of a… burger issue. I know, I know. Old news. It’s been going on for about six months or so and I won’t shut up about it and well I JUST WANT BURGERS ALL THE TIME. Really, I mean all the time. I want a burger multiple times every week. It’s all very odd to me since it’s somewhat new. I’m not even discriminating on my burger choice now. Well, wait – I really AM discriminating since the lowest I’ll go is a Five Guys burger but I have definitely drove past multiple fast food restaurants thinking burrrrgerrrrr. It’s nothing short of a miracle that my head hasn’t popped up in a drive thru window. A few weeks ago I split a taco burger from a local food truck. This was after we split a burger with aioli, a bacon grilled cheese and a hot dog, so don’t go getting disappointed about the whole “splitting” thing. The thing was… I wasn’t quite feeling it at first. I mean if I want a taco? I’ll eat a taco. I wasn’t quite sure about my burger tasting like a taco. It just seemed wrong. It actually seemed pointless. Especially when it came to ground beef. BUT. These burgers were covered in crushed tortilla chips. That alone sealed the deal for me – you know what a texture freak I am. At the time I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed the taco burger. It was completely different than what I was expecting and if you’re a burger/sandwich fiend like us, a random but nice change of pace. I can totally see this happening with some chicken and turkey burgers too, but first up? I am SO doing this with my double bean burgers. Yeah. Like downright obsessed with the idea. Can you even imagine a taco-rubbed black bean burger with tortilla chips and avocado? My brain just exploded. I’m also still seriously making the peanut butter bacon burger before the brain explosion. Thoughts? We may have two brain explosions on our hands then. The moral of this story is that if you eat a lot of burgers, you may adore this idea. If you’re a burger-once-every-three-months kind of fella, then you might miss the whole cheese and bacon and stuff. By the way, can I just say that I’ve always loathed things like lettuce and tomatoes (vegetables, of course) on my burgers but it wasn’t until recently that I figured out why? It’s because a burger is so warm and cheesy. Why add cold crunch to that little sandwiched slice of heaven? Annnnnd the only thing that I can think of that will make this taco burger better is adding a cheese quesadilla triangle on top. Perfect? Yeah. That’s definitely happening. Taco Rubbed Burgers Yield: makes 4 burgers Total Time: 45 minutes Ingredients: 1 pound ground beef (mine was 90% lean) 1 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon pepper 1 1/2 tablespoons ground cumin 1 tablespoon smoked paprika 1 tablespoon chili powder 1/2 tablespoons onion powder 1 teaspoon garlic powder 4 ounces white cheddar cheese, sliced 1 avocado, sliced 1/2 cup salsa verde 1/2 cup of your favorite salsa blue tortilla chips for topping 4 whole grain buns, toasted Directions: In a bowl, combine ground beef with salt and pepper, mixing to combine. Form beef into four equal patties. In a smaller bowl, combine, cumin, paprika, chili, garlic and onion powders together and stir well to mix. Pick up each burger and using your hands, rub both sides and the edges of the burger with the spice rub, gently patting the spice in. To cook, prepare the burger as you'd like - whether grilling it until your desired doneness or cooking it in a hot skillet for about 5 minutes per side. Add cheese on top 1-2 minutes before finished so it has time to melt. To serve, add salsa verde to the top of each bun bottom. Top with the burger then add avocado, salsa and crushed tortilla chips on top. Eat! I hope I never get a handle on this. ©2012 How Sweet It Is

I've decided to take down several old articles from the candycritic.org and re-post them here on the Candy Critic blog. This week I'm posting an article I wrote with some candy lessons I had just learned. Since then I've learned a few more.What's the appeal of eating something on a stick? What makes something on a stick better than just eating it? Who thought stick = fun? You could look at the history of food to find out that sticks and food have been around forever. As long as man has been cooking, food sticks have been an important part of life. The problem I have with the idea of putting food on sticks comes from the candy world.Why in the world do so many candies come on sticks? I think the only candy that has to be on a stick is a Popsicle. Why might you ask does the frozen treat deserve to be on a stick? Go into your freezer, put an ice cube in your mouth and don't take it out. Can't do it can you. You have to pull cold things out of your mouth or it hurts. Lollipops are okay with me, but not because I think the stick are necessary. If you think about it the idea of taking a candy out of your mouth half way through eating it is kind of gross. Try spitting out your chewing gum after a few minutes, hold it, and then put it back in your mouth, yuck. The lollipop was originally huge and impossible to stick in your mouth in one shot. So you can understand why a stick might help you keep your fingers clean. You can still find huge lollipops today, but for the most part lollipops fit comfortably in your mouth whole, so the basic principle doesn’t really make sense.The problem I have comes from the idea of putting things like chocolate, marshmallows, and gummies on sticks. Chocolate and marshmallows on a stick has been around for a while, but the gummy thing has become a new and very strange trend. Whenever I eat a gummy on a stick, all it does is get all gooey and stringy, and if they decorate it little bits of icing fall and sprinkles fall all over the place. The chocolate on a stick is very often cheap chocolate, I'm not saying it's all cheap but for the most part it is. The other problem is that chocolate cracks and when you’re trying to eat it on a stick, it falls all over the place.Let's face it; just putting something on a stick is not really that creative an idea. If you need the stick by all means use one, but if you’re doing it because you think it's clever to put something new on a stick, you’re wrong. Try something else, we as candy consumers are finished with the stick thing, I want something new and fun not something pointy and long.CC

I would have to say that the popularization of gummies in the 1980's might be the reason I'm writing this blog (and these reviews) right now. When I was a little kid, gummies hit the market with a huge bang, every kid wanted a bag of gummy bears. Gummies were the catalyst towards a time in candy when strange and gross treats started to really bloom. This meant that the world was being creative with the textures and flavours of candy available. At that very time, I started to really gain a respect for candy, I loved all of the candy variety that was around me. And now look at me, I'm writing a blog, traveling the world, and tasting flavours I could only imagine. Thanks gummies, you made my life pretty cool. And thanks sugarfina.com for reminding me how cool gummies actually still are.Click here to read the latest gummy review.CC

I have a serious question. Can you, a normal person, actually consider one muffin a full breakfast? Especially these… these, like, baby muffins. Well, they are of traditional muffin size and not fattened up, triple-pumped Americanized muffins covered in crumble and streusel, but really? One of these would be like the equivalent of drinking a glass of water for me. (Also if someone could make the caloric effect be equivalent to that of a glass of water… that would be great.) And now my day is going to revolve around how I’m irked at the lack of crumble and streusel on top. For an actual muffin to make it into my breakfast rotation, I need a few other things of substance on a plate next to it. Maybe some fruit. Peanut butter. Some eggs. BACON. Those kinds of things. That’s why I sort of prefer my muffins to be snack worthy foods. I’d never kick a muffin outta bed for breakfast but… I like them at other times of the day too. Like right now. At 10:30PM when I’m writing this post and eating my emotions because Psy makes me feel so uncomfortable as I watch him on Dancing with the Stars. If you haven’t noticed, I’ve been on a massive mascarpone kick the last few months. Putting it in EVERYTHING. Sweet, savory, using it as a spread… literally, all the things. I’ve always enjoyed it but maybe… just… never knew it’s true potential? All you italians just collectively rolled your eyes in my direction. I bet. So two weeks ago I attempted to make a lemon mascarpone loaf and it came out like… dense, unbaked cheesecake. I mean, it was SO dense. Crazy dense. Perhaps I should have measured stuffed out instead of just being a cocky brat and thinking ‘oh of course this will turn out!’ and throwing stuffed into a bowl???? Maybe, you know, figured out where things went wrong? And since I have no patience and just couldn’t handle waiting another 75 minutes while loaf cake #2 baked… muffins it was. Muffins are like the poor man’s cake. Errr… the lazy man’s cake? The impatience man’s cake? I think you get it. The good news is that I still covered that lemon loaf in one hell of a sugar bombed glaze and it made it’s way into multiple mouths. It’s just not perfect yet. So until then… muffins. Make-it-up-to-you muffins. Settle for now. Brown Sugar Lemon Mascarpone Muffins Yield: 12-16 muffins Total Time: 35 minutes Ingredients: 2 cups whole wheat pastry flour 1/2 cup loosely packed brown sugar 1 teaspoon baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda 1/4 teaspoon salt 4 lemons, zested 8 ounces cold mascarpone cheese 3/4 cups milk 1 large egg 1/3 cup greek yogurt 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled Directions: Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line a muffin tin with liners. In a large bowl, combine flour, brown sugar, baking powder, soda and salt. Stir to combine. Mix in lemon zest. Add mascarpone cheese and mix in with a fork, stirring until crumbly, evenly dispersed and covered in flour. In a small bowl, whisk together milk, yogurt, egg, vanilla extract and butter. Add the wet ingredients to the dry, stirring until just combined and wet. Use a 1/4 cup measure or ice cream scoop to fill the muffin liners 2/3 of the wall full. Bake for 15-17 minutes, until tops are set and golden. Remove and let cool slightly before serving. So fluffy! ©2012 How Sweet It Is