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I've long made no secret of the very prominent role sugar plays in my daily diet, particularly during the daylight hours (I stop caffeine at 1:00 p.m. and sugar by 6:00 p.m., or at least try to). I led a piece on high-fructose corn syrup as an unsatisfactory soda and iced-tea sweetener by saying,
Even someone who ingests indecent quantities of sugar on a daily basis, as I do, understands that certain things can be too sweet.And my column this month in the print magazine--no link! subscribe!--is on the laudable effort to substitute the harsh, synthetic flavors and colors of decorate, sugary Necco wafers with natural flavors and dyes--something the Associated Press seems to have noticed only yesterday. (Yes, a monthly magazine can still get the jump on a 24-hour news gatherer, especially on stories of great moment.)
Candy is candy, and should dare speak its name.A New York Times story today on Paul Rudnick's nearly all-sugar diet recapitulates a story my dinner guests brought up just a few nights ago. The context was the shocking-to-us refusal by the Asian-themed restaurant where we had torn through a very long parade of dishes--many of them so good we ordered doubles--to serve dessert. What a cheat! No green-tea ice cream, even. A consolation demitasse of chocolate melted with cream didn't console us much.
The subject of Rudnick and his nearly all-sugar diet then came up, as it often does among his friends. He is thin, strong, and perfectly healthy, as everyone including the Times writer notices with (I would say envious) surprise. As he was the very first person I met at the college I wound up going to (in the theater's green room, though he was memorably all in black and on a black sofa), I've long taken an admiring interest in his refusal to compromise--as I do every night, at full and sugar-free dinners. And now he has a new book, I Shudder, that will provide scary reading for parents and funny reading for all the rest of us fans, longtime and new.
This is the week to buy "junk" candy, preferably locally made ones like the Charleston Chews and Tootsie Rolls that are still made in a factory near me (the company's headquarters is in Chicago) that sends out marvelous chocolate smells in a new restaurant row in Cambridge. Not gourmet candy, which is wasted on trick-or-treaters and, as Rudnick I think rightly points out, on most adults. What's the point, really? Candy is candy, and should dare speak its name. But nicer flavors in the same familiar template--that's something worth tasting for yourself, as you do your supposedly-for-the-kids Halloween shopping.
What's your favorite candy? Share in the comments.
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Twix has long been my favorite; it's a candy of my generation, as I recall when it was first introduced. I'm partial to the peanut butter variant, but they're all good. I find that I enjoy candy bars with a bit of crunch to them, as though the tactile sensation of cookie, wafer or crispy rice adds to my enjoyment of gooey caramel, chocolate or nougat.
Honorable mention to anything with coconut....
Twix is a respectable choice.
When I was younger, Snickers was my favorite. Well, second only to Whatchamacallit.
These days, I find that nothing satisfies more than a fun size Almond Joy. The regular bars are OK, but the fun size have perfected the chocolate:almond:coconut ratio.
Coconut Longboys and Chick-O-Stick sold at the Economy Candy store on Rivington.
Tough question, there are childhood favorites:
chocolate "sponge candy"
b b bats, to
kits
Adult favorites:
dark chocolate coated pretzels
Mounds bars
Reese's crispy crunch.....though if they made it with dark chocolat it would be tough to resist.
I think anybody who believes in peace and human rights has to admit that Reese's peanut butter cups are the best mass market candy in existence.
I love peanut butter cups! And Sweet Tarts. But my all-time favorite has to be Kraft caramels -- I just wish they would still put a few fudge ones in the bag, like they used to years ago. My brother and I used to fight over those fudge ones.
I've got to agree on Reese's peanut butter cups, though I would specify Reese's peanut butter cup miniatures. There's some kind of surface area to volume ratio thing going on with the interaction between the peanut butter and the chocolate that I think makes the miniatures better. I don't know how it works, exactly, but man does it.
M&Ms. I like simple.
"Junk" candy for the trick-or-treaters is great so I'm not tempted to eat it all.
But you have to try Dark Chocolate with a touch of Sea Salt (Lindt is one company that carries it). Dark chocolate is my indulgence of choice now :)Hey, it's got anti-oxidants, right?!
Mounds and Almond Joys. Heaven!!!
Close second: English KitKat bars.
I lived in London for a year where there were Cadbury machines on almost every Tube platform, as well as highly efficient trains arriving almost the moment I entered the station.
I made up a game of trying to get the 20p (or whatever it was--long, long ago) into the machine to buy a Fruit & Nut Bar before the train came. Sometimes I won, sometimes the train won. I have taught this game to everyone I have ever visited London with and everyone loves it. I hope London Transport never remove the candy machines in the name of health.
There is but one candy bar, and Baby Ruth is its prophet.
There is but one chocolate, and the Trader Joe's Pound Plus 72% Dark is its prophet.
Of course, that does not keep me from straying from my faiths to consume KitKat, Reece's, Snickers, M&M's and the like. I guess that is why I am raising my kids from a candy agnostic point of view so they can make their own decisions once they are old enough. Of course I reserve the right of any pride lion, to take the best cuts of the Halloween Haul - all in the name of protecting the children of course :)
So many memories brought back! When I'm in the States, I always try to buy a packet of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, and a Twin Bing Bar. I was always partial to Jr. Mints, too, but my all-time favorite candy was the "stix" in the "Lik'm'aid" packets. The citrus-y dipping powder I could take or leave, but there was something nearing perfection in those sweet, velvety sticks.
As a responsible adult, I prefer home-made chocolate-covered almond toffee. Almonds are good for you (-:.