Double Dipped Sweets tweeted recently about something that made my ears perk up and made me go nuts for a couple minutes. No, it wasn’t Mary-Louise Parker or even circus peanuts, although those are good guesses. Look at that peanut butter chocolate caramel apple. I would say that it would be a good dessert but I suspect it might be an integral part of a meal if I had one and not just an add-on.
At $11, the price is a bit intimidating but when you get a great caramel apple it really is something special, so I am tempted to get one. Plus, this isn’t your average apple. According to the site, “Our apples weigh up to 1 1/2 pounds and serve 6-8 people!” So yeah, it’s $11 but if you split that 6-8 ways because you are sharing a dessert, it’s really not that much money.
The Double Dipped people look like they have some great stuff for sale. The one thing I couldn’t find, though, that would really round out their product offering, is a caramel apple hollowed out filled with circus peanuts. Of course, they would only need to make one of those, I suspect, as I would likely be the only customer.
Happy Canada Day! This photo by Flickr user Zorbs isn’t necessarily a spectacular photo in terms of composition or lighting but part of what makes a picture special has nothing to do with the technical aspects of photography. This photo is special because it captures the festivity of an important day. Red and white Smarties emblazoned with a maple leaf – it doesn’t get much more celebratory than that!
Smarties are candy-coated chocolates made by Nestle. My wife, a native of Canada, told me about them when we were first dating. “You mean like M&Ms?” I asked. “Not quite,” she said. She was right. They are similar but definitely different.
What led to further confusion was that what we call Smarties – those delicious sugar tablets in a plastic sleeve – are known as Rockets in Canada. It’s like they have a different word for everything. And they put the letter “u” in places I don’t understand.
I will be spending Friday driving up to Toronto to visit my in-laws and will be reporting next week from Canada’s candy capitol and home to Laura Secord chocolate company. I am assuming that’s Toronto. Wish me luck. I will try to bring home some souvenir extra “u”s for us all to share.
Do you want your candy photos featured here? Submit them to the Candy Dish Blog Flickr group. We want to see your candy photos and so does the rest of the world!
Many thanks to loyal reader Kristin, whom you can see in the picture at right, hiding behind the candy fortress and my coffee cup, for sending me an article about the world’s top ten best selling candies. It’s really a very interesting analysis about the global confectionery market and finishes with the list. When Kristin isn’t busy finding content for this blog, which is really my responsibility, I recruit her to help feed and hose down the oompa loompas and oil Jonny’s roller skates from time to time. She has her own duties too, like basically keeping the office running. We couldn’t do anything without her here.
The top ten is interesting in itself, but go read the article for more information.
M&Ms – Mars – USA
Cadbury’s Dairy Milk – Cadbury – UK
Milka – Kraft – Germany
Trident – Cadbury – Brazil
Meiji – Meiji Seika Kaisha – Japan
Orbit – Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co. – Russia
Trident – Cadbury – Mexico
Hollywood – Cadbury – France
Vivident – Perfetti Van Melle – Italy
Hsu Fu Chi – Hsu Fu Chi International – China
Thanks, Kristin, for this article. The whole office appreciates your hard work. You are a true gem in our office of gem-colored candies.
Does this surprise you? What would you have guessed was the world’s top selling candy?
Mary-Louise Parker was recently interviewed by WebMD and was quoted as saying the she would, “rather have candy than a classic French pastry.” Of course, this thrilled us and our office oompa loompas to no end. Think about it – the delicate, sublimely sweet, flaky crust of a French pastry is nothing in comparison to some of her favorites: Tootsie Rolls, Smarties, Bit-o-Honeys and Butterfingers.
This excites me because up until now the only movie stars we have featured have been Peeps and Hilary. Granted, they are some of our favorite people, but they don’t have the star power and name recognition of Mary-Louise Parker.
The Milton Hershey School, located, as you might guess, in Hershey, PA, is celebrating a very special anniversary this year. For 100 years, the school, originally an orphanage, has been providing children with educational and life opportunities that have made a huge difference in their lives. Today, the Milton Hershey School is much more than an orphanage.
A little bit of history of the founding of the school, in 1909, from the “Our Heritage” historical timeline:
Deed of Trust is signed in New York City to create Hershey Industrial School. Milton Hershey and his wife Catherine established a boarding school for orphan boys to be located at the Homestead, Milton Hershey’s birthplace. In 1918, Milton Hershey placed $60 million dollars (his entire fortune) in Trust for the School. In 1951 the Hershey Industrial School changed its name to the Milton Hershey School.
This is incredible. Think about the endowment you could establish today with that much money. But in today’s dollars, that $60 million is roughly equivalent to $858 million, according to the consumer price index. That amount of money is staggering, especially considering that it was his entire fortune he set aside for the school. That type of giving is something rare, something very special.
Today we are 52 days away from the official anniversary. In conjunction with the anniversary, the school is setting itself an ambitious goal. It plans to expand from 1800 students to 2100, which means adding or expanding facilities in a very dramatic way. In addition, Hershey is currently looking for students and staff as well!
You will see a few more posts on the Milton Hershey School as our countdown continues. In the meantime, go to the school’s site and read about the good work they do. Hershey is known for fun and games but there is another side to the company – a heritage of education and giving for the good of society.
I’m up in New York talking to magazine editors about some of the great new candy products that were launched at last month’s ALL CANDY EXPO. That means that I’m in a hotel room without access to TIVO and that means I have to watch live TV.
Ugh. Commercials.
Only tonight I was pretty excited to see this commercial. I love it when companies that have nothing to do with candy use candy to advertise their products.
It’s a real testament to how beloved candy is in our culture. It’s one of the first foods we eat purely for enjoyment and one of the foods we continue to eat for our whole lives (although our tastes in candy usually progress).
Given the special place candy occupies in our lives, it’s no wonder so many companies outside the industry use candy to sell products. This commercial actually features a song about candy AND imagery designed to replicate candy manufacturing – a double whammy!
As I was typing this post, I saw another advertisement featuring candy … it involved a piñata and 10 pieces of candy. Does anyone know what it was advertising?
What advertisements have you seen that use candy to sell a non-candy product?
Endangered Species Chocolate is giving away a year’s supply of chocolate to a lucky winner who completes their online survey. This all led me, as well as the fine folks over at Cacao Bug, to wonder what a year’s supply of chocolate would look like.
The actual prize is laid out in the contest rules:
“The winner of the Grand Prize will be awarded seventy two (72) chocolate bars at one time, one shipment. (ARV: $279.00) (Guaranteed “Enjoy by date” of 12 months). The shipment will consist of twelve (12) bars of the following flavors, Supreme Dark Chocolate, Extreme Dark Chocolate, Smooth Milk Chocolate, Dark Chocolate with Mint, Dark Chocolate with Cranberries and Almonds, and Dark Chocolate with Hazelnut Toffee.”
72 chocolate bars. That’s six bars per month or roughly 1.5 per week. I suppose that’s about enough to sustain me. What do you envision as being your ultimate year’s consumption of chocolate?
Double Dipped Sweets tweeted recently about something that made my ears perk up and made me go nuts for a couple minutes. No, it wasn’t Mary-Louise Parker or even circus peanuts, although those are good guesses. Look at that peanut butter chocolate caramel apple. I would say that it would be a good dessert but I suspect it might be an integral part of a meal if I had one and not just an add-on.
The 
