Tag: Candy

REVIEW: Salted Caramel Milky Way

Mike 3 Comments

Milky Way Salted Caramel

What is Salted Caramel Milky Way?

I’m of two minds when it comes to salted caramel. On the one hand, “We added salt!” seems like the absolute bare minimum a company can do to differentiate its product. On the other, salt is a magic rock that makes everything taste better, and salted caramel demonstrates this particularly well.

Mars’ latest addition to its famed Milky Way line of products is the Salted Caramel Milky Way. According to the nutrition facts, a typical Milky Way 2 to Go bar has 75 milligrams of sodium, and this one has 170. Will adding 95 milligrams of rock be enough to rise above the competition?

How is it?

Unlike the more gourmet salted caramels that you might find, there are no salt flakes on the outside of these bars – they look like plain Milky Ways. As I bite into the bar, the saltiness is striking but not overwhelming. I’ve always found Milky Ways to be a bit too sweet, so it takes a fair bit of saltiness to balance it out.

Milky Way Salted Caramel 2

I take another bite and am surprised at the crunch. If this was a plain Milky Way, visions of insect endoskeletons and other foreign objects being ground into nougat would flash through my mind. In a salted caramel confection, it’s very pleasant. Context is everything. There may be not salt flakes on the outside, but they’re somewhere.

Is there anything else you need to know?

Given the vivid salty crunch, I expected to see some sizable flakes mixed in to the caramel, but close inspection doesn’t reveal any. This makes me think the caramel itself may not be the salted component in this bar.

But how to isolate the famously ooey-gooey bar into its constituent parts? The results of my freezer + meat mallet solution can be seen below.

Milky Way Salted Caramel Shattered

Picking through the shards of candy, I taste some bits that are mostly caramel and mostly nougat and am convinced that this is actually a “Salted Nougat Milky Way.” Salted Nougat sounds like the kind of weird old-fashioned candy that your grandfather ate at the 1904 World’s Fair, so it’s understandable that Mars went with the more popular Salted Caramel moniker.

Conclusion:

The Salted Caramel Milky Way bar is an excellent addition to the Milky Way line. It’s noticeably salty with crunchy bits, which may be off-putting for some, but if you’re a fan of salted caramel, you’ll love it.

Purchased Price: $1.48
Size: 3.16 oz.
Purchased at: Walmart
Rating: 8 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (1 bar) 210 calories, 8 grams of fat, 5 grams of saturated fat, less than 5 milligrams of cholesterol, 170 milligrams of sodium, 32 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of fiber, 27 grams of sugar (including 25 grams added sugar), and 2 gram of protein.

REVIEW: Hershey’s Milk Chocolate & Whoppers Bar

Meghan 1 Comment

Hershey s Milk Chocolate Whoppers Bar

What is the Hershey’s Milk Chocolate & Whoppers Bar?

This is the newest addition to Hershey’s flagship line of candy bars, and it features a milk chocolate brick studded with Whoppers malt-flavored cookie pieces.

How is it?

Hershey s Milk Chocolate Whoppers Bar Top

As to be expected from a company best known for its ubiquitous milk chocolate bars, this treat doesn’t disappoint on the cocoa front. Smooth, creamy, and only slightly-too-melty on the 95-degree day I was eating it, I found myself all too easily plowing through all 340 calories of the King Size bar I brought home with me.

Hershey s Milk Chocolate Whoppers Bar Bottom

In contrast to the chocolate’s velvety texture, the Whopper cookie pieces provide a pleasant hint of crunch. They are similar to the chocolate cookies pieces in Hershey’s Cookies ‘n Crème bars. Their small size seems to limit how malty they come across as, but I honestly didn’t find that to be a bad thing. In the context of the entire candy bar, they taste more like crunchy little cookie dough bits than they do miniature Whoppers.

Hershey s Milk Chocolate Whoppers Bar Cross section

And, you know, I’m pretty okay with that. Whoppers have always been one of those candies I only ever ate in the weeks following Halloween, after having already inhaled all the fun-sized Milky Way, mini Twix bars, and every other treat in a kid’s candy bucket that overshadows them. This is a candy bar that brings Whoppers back into the spotlight and causes people to realize, “Oh yeah, those are a thing.”

Is there anything else you should know?

I’d recommend having a couple of napkins on hand while you’re eating this. Maybe it was the unusually hot weather causing my bar to be so eager to liquefy, but I can’t imagine being able to eat one of these without getting it all over your hands. Even so, I wouldn’t recommend anyone to eat this on the road unless they want it to be all over them.

Conclusion:

Even though Hershey’s new Milk Chocolate & Whoppers Bar might not be as malty as one might expect, chocolate and cookie chunks are always a winning combo in my book. I’d advise those unafraid to get their hands a little dirty to pick one up on their next trip to the store.

Purchased Price: $1.49
Size: King Size 2.5 oz bar
Purchased at: Walmart
Rating: 8 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (1/2 pack) 170 calories, 9 grams of total fat, 6 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 5 milligrams of cholesterol, 35 milligrams of sodium, 22 grams of total carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of dietary fiber, 18 grams of total sugars, 16 grams of added sugars, and 3 grams of protein.

REVIEW: Snickers and Twix Chocolate Lowfat Milk

Louis 3 Comments

Snickers and Twix Chocolate Lowfat Milk

What are Snickers and Twix Chocolate Lowfat Milk?

Everyone loves the chocolate-based goodness of the well-known candy bars Snickers and Twix, right? Well, now the flavors of those beloved confections are mixed with low-fat milk to form a chocolate drink of sorts, because why not, this is America.

How are they?

With a wonderfully sweet smell and a surprisingly thick consistency, the stomach growls for these dessert-like beverages as both are poured slowly into the cups of my choice.

Snickers Chocolate Lowfat Milk

The Snickers low-fat milk is undeniably sugary, with a taste very reminiscent of what you’d expect: chocolate, peanuts, and nougat. The slight difference here is the faint coffee-like aftertaste that sits in the back of your throat for minutes after drinking. That doesn’t make it a bad thing.

Twix Chocolate Lowfat Milk

The Twix low-fat milk, on the other hand, is far more subtle, almost like drinking non-dairy creamer straight from the bottle. As a rich river of chocolate and cookie flavoring bunch up in your stomach after each gulp, the remaining caramel surprising overpowers every taste bud you have left. To be honest, I felt a little woozy after polishing off my bottle.

Is there anything else you need to know?

Thinking about the coffee-friendly aftertaste, I poured a little remaining Snickers milk into my morning coffee over the past couple of days and, I gotta say, this low-fat treat works far better as an additive than a snack to drink all by its lonesome.

Conclusion:

The Snickers and Twix low-fat milks are novelty drinks that are worth trying at least once.

Purchased Price: $2.49 each
Size: 14 fl. oz.
Purchased at: 7-Eleven
Rating: 5 out of 10 (both)
Nutrition Facts: (per bottle) Snickers – 270 calories, 2.5 grams of fat, 1 grams of saturated fat, 10 milligrams of cholesterol, 210 milligrams of sodium, 27 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of dietary fiber, 24 grams of sugar, and 8 grams of protein. Twix – 270 calories, 2.5 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 10 milligrams of cholesterol, 200 milligrams of sodium, 26 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of dietary fiber, 24 grams of sugar, and 8 grams of protein.

REVIEW: Kool-Aid Ghoul-Aid Scary Berry Popping Candy

Mark 5 Comments

Kool Aid Ghoul Aid Scary Berry Popping Candy

What is Kool-Aid Ghoul-Aid Scary Berry Popping Candy?

Kool-Aid has added to the list of popping candies with its new “Scary Berry” candy, just in time for Halloween. (Wait, what?)

How is it?

Kool Aid Ghoul Aid Scary Berry Popping Candy Packet

When I opened the pack, I was surprised to see three different colors and textures. The big, aquamarine pieces are standard popping candy, and that’s all I was expecting. The pop factor is comparable to Pop Rocks.

But there are also blue pieces. It’s been a long time since I’ve made Kool-Aid, but I think the blue bits are just Kool-Aid powder, or something close to it. They provide most of the flavoring, a typical, artificial blue raspberry flavor.

Kool Aid Ghoul Aid Scary Berry Popping Candy Closeup

And then there are pure sugar crystals, presumably to balance the tartness of the powder. Or maybe it’s to resemble the actual ingredients of Kool-Aid, with the popping candy taking the place of water.

Together, it’s a somewhat tart popping candy. Popping candy usually has little flavor, so I’m glad they added the raspberry powder. But overall, it just feels like chemicals in my mouth.

Is there anything else you need to know?

Outside of the packaging and the name, I cannot possibly figure out what this candy has to do with Halloween. I associate popping candy with the Fourth of July, raspberry is likewise a summer flavor, and the greenish-blue color evokes images of mermaids, not vampires.

Conclusion:

If you want popping candy, this is as good as any. But it’s also not much better than any of the others.

Purchased Price: $1.00
Size: 3-pack (7 grams each)
Purchased at: Dollar Tree
Rating: 6 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (3 bags/21 grams) 80 calories, 0 grams of fat, 0 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 0 milligrams of sodium, 21 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of fiber, 14 grams of sugar (including 14 grams of added sugar), and 0 grams of protein.

REVIEW: Zombie Skittles

Mark 14 Comments

Zombie Skittles

What are Zombie Skittles?

This year’s new Halloween Skittles mix includes five fruit flavors: petrifying citrus punch (orange), mummified melon (green), chilling black cherry (purple), boogeyman blackberry (blue), and blood red berry (red). But lurking among all these colors is a “rotten zombie” flavor, so you can eat a zombie before it eats you. It’s like Russian roulette for your taste buds.

How are they?

Zombie Skittles Closeup

All the fruit flavors are lovely. Melon might be my new favorite Skittles flavor; black cherry is a nice alternative to typical cherry flavors; citrus, red berry, and blackberry are what you would expect.

But I know you came here for the zombie flavor.

It’s truly repulsive.

It starts out tasting like rotting fruit, and then it transitions to a somewhat meaty flavor, which is horrifying when you think about it. This flavor stops me in my tracks, and I almost want to laugh because it’s so bad.

Is there anything else you need to know?

Zombie Skittles Spoons

It’s easy enough to power through the zombie flavor (or spit it out), so it doesn’t entirely spoil the candy-eating experience. My educated estimate for the ratio of zombie to fruit is approximately 1:9, so most of them are safe.

That said, there is genuine relief when you get a fruity one.

Conclusion:

I probably will not buy these, nor will I be sad if they don’t come back next year. But they do exactly what they mean to do, and they’re a weirdly fun novelty candy. They would be great at a Halloween party.

DISCLOSURE: I received a free sample of the product. Doing so did not influence my review in any way.

Purchased Price: Free
Size: 3.6 oz. bag
Purchased at: Received from Mars
Rating: 7 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (1 oz/28 g/27 pieces) 110 calories, 1 gram of fat, 1 gram of saturated fat, 5 milligrams of sodium, 26 grams of carbohydrates, 21 grams of total sugar, 21 grams of added sugar, and 0 grams of protein.