In my last post I wrote about Tubi’s Black Tire Tread, and I’m happy to inform you that Tubi makes a Tire Tread Red too. I didn’t know of the red variety for some time, and it wasn’t until I discovered it at a rest stop on the way home to my parent’s place. My boyfriend is the one who I pointed it out to, and since he loves good red licorice, we decided to try it. We immediately loved it and wished we had bought more.

The Red is made the same way as the Black, of a row of ribbons, piled three layers high and cut into squares.

The red flavor has the same wet, thick, chewy texture. The flavor is indeed “red” but I mean that in the best way possible. It’s sweet, and has nice notes of berries, mainly strawberry and cherry. It’s very juicy, with an edge of tartness.

This is a very well crafted and well flavored red licorice. It really tastes of something, as opposed to the likes of Twizzlers and most other main stream licorice chews. I like my candy to taste like

Rating: Hoard

The new limited edition See’s flavor has arrived! Yay! I am super excited about this month’s free sample of the See’s Black Forest Truffle. Who doesn’t love chocolate delivered to your doorstep? I digress. I get excited about all candy, but when I heard these were headed my way it made me happy because I love sampling See’s Candies’ products.

The bonbons arrived halfway melted, by no fault of the company, simply because the heat where I am was oppressive that day. I popped them right in the fridge to cool some, which made it hard for me to wait to sample my first one. Also, because of the melting, the bonbons in the photo may not be the most attractive, but I did my best. I’m sure if you got them in store they’d look as impeccable as ever.

Once they were cool and solid enough to handle, I went in for my first taste!

The dark chocolate is rich and smooth with notes of berries and coffee.The richness of the chocolate with it’s full flavors blend into an intense fudgey sweetness that’s crowned with the fresh flavor of black cherries. The cherry flavor is very complex, as it’s tart, sweet, has a wonderful depth to it. It its a nice mix of jam and cordial. It’s lovely. The chocolate’s “red” notes allow for it to blend beautifully with the cherry flavors. The texture is soft and fudgey and incredible luxurious. This is an incredible pieces of chocolate art.

I know I enjoyed the past two Limited Edition flavors, but this one they’re really outdone themselves. I hope they bring one one back as a regular addition to the See’s lines of incredible candies.

CONTEST: I have another a gift certificate from See’s to give away! It’s for one pound of these chocolate, and can be used in their stores or by phone at (800-895-7337). So how do you enter? Please comment on this post by Friday at noon, EST and share your favorite See’s flavor if you have one. I’ll choose a winner randomly from those who enter. Best of luck!

Rating:

Links See’s Candies Website

This candy find was exciting to me for three reasons: the first, was it’s currant flavored. Second, it’s made by Katjes. Third, they’re gummis. Three things I really, really like. So it was a no brainer that I nabbed them up. Since I was at a Cost Plus World Market, a store not in my area, it was either buy them now or risk never seeing them again.

The bag is a nice size, and very eye-catching with it’s brilliant green and red color scheme. The colors are extremely saturated and it’s almost blinding to look at, yet attracts the eye at the same time.

The gummis themselves are really cute. They’re little nubbins, with the base maybe the diameter of a dime. They’re brilliantly red with a nice coating of granulated sugar.

The flavor right away is very fruity. It has a rich jammy flavor that’s a little like raspberries, a little like cherries, and a little like cranberries. It’s very nice. They’re not so much sour, as they are tart, which is the sour level I tend to prefer anyways. The have a nice chew that reminds me of gum drops, slightly soft but still very chewy. They’re not as hard as DOTS or as soft as gummi bears.

Overall, I liked these, but I’m not sure I’d buy them again. I think my flavor preference sits more with black currants, but that’s just me. These are still and awesome candy and I’d recommend them to you if any of my flavor descriptions appealed to you.

Rating: Will Eat Again

Links Katjes Website

I find candies that are “store originals”, as so to speak, are quite interesting. We all recognize candies that are knock-offs of their mainstream counterparts. But ones that are ideas and styles all their own? I like the unpredictability of them. These Trader Joe’s Dark Chocolate Powerberries are just that. I saw them on the shelf, knew they were candy, but didn’t know exactly what they were. So I had to find out.

The package shows them to be little round chocolate covered nuggets. They reminded me right away of Raisinets, so in a way, that’s what I was expecting. The bag has a resealable top, which I really appreciate, since the package is way too much to eat in one sitting. The bag smells sweet and very much like blueberries.

Pouring some of these Powerberries into my hand, I find that the size varies. Some are small others much larger. They’re irregular, but that’s part of what makes them fun.

I take a bite and am surprised to not find an actual berry in the center. Instead, there’s a thick, jelly like texture. Almost like those fruit pate candies I adore so much. After a few experiments to see what made these up, I find that the center is two of these semi domed jelly discs smooshed together, and then covered in chocolate.

The flavor is very complex, as you really taste the rich dark chocolate at first. Soon follows the intense flavor of the berries, which is very blackberry/blueberry/strawberry. The two flavors compliment each other beautifully: the sweetness of the chocolate balances out the tartness of the berries, and the fruitiness of the berries calms the earthiness of the chocolate. It’s really excellent.

The bag got finished off pretty quickly, as they were really yummy. Funny thing is, these aren’t something I’d crave, for reasons I can’t explain. Still, they’re something I appreciate since there’s nothing else like it that I know of, and they’re fun to try and eat when I do have some around. 

Rating: Will Eat Again

Links Trader Joe’s Website

There’s certain flavors that call to me from the shelves at stores. For instance, I’m a sucker for anything labeled with “Pumpkin”, so I’ve had many impulse purchases with such products. When it comes to candy, citrus flavors call to me more than say, berry ones, like strawberry or grape. Add grapefruit as one of the citrus flavors in there and you have a deal. This is exactly the case when I saw these Citrus Gum Drops at Trader Joe’s. Knowing my boyfriend’s love for jelly/gummi, I saw these as a fun reviewing opportunity, without eating the whole bag myself if they ended up being really good. Trust me, it is better to share such things.

The flavors are listed as Pink Grapefruit, Tangerine, Lemon and Key Lime. There’s a window on the package that lets you see the gumdrops, and they come in pleasant citrusy colors. I like surmising which flavors are which before actually tasting them, and these proved very easy to guess.

The gum drops are the size of a thimble and are firm to the touch. Only a slight amount of give, so I can tell they aren’t going to be very squishy to chew. The granulated sugar coating isn’t as coarse as I’m used to and it’s pleasantly smooth.

Pink Grapefruit (pink): I was most excited to try this one. So of course it goes first. It surprised me as to how sweet it was, as the flavor is something that’s very tart in my mind. There’s less tartness here and more emphasis on the sweeter, more juicy notes of the fruit. I was hoping for that great sourness I like with grapefruits, so I was a little disappointed.

Lemon (yellow): My second most looked forward to flavor of the bunch, so it comes next! This one made up my disappointment of the grapefruit. It’s a real punchy, tart, zesty, authentic lemon flavor. It’s got that wonderful essence to it that makes your brain go “Oohh yes, this is lemon alright!”. Lovely.

Tangerine (orange): The more exotic flavor that isn’t quite orange (but actually is half Mandarin orange). Depending on how it’s done, tangerine can be represented much zestier than a regular orange flavor so I was excited by this one. I am also disappointed by this because like the grapefruit, it’s just sweet. It tastes like orange to me, and lacks that zest I love.

Key Lime (white): I wish more lime candies tasted like this one. It’s a really robust and strong flavor. It’s has that authentic lime flavor, but because it’s key lime it’s way more tart and zesty.

So I liked half and felt let down by half of these flavors. Granted, my boyfriend enjoyed all four, but he’s sometimes not as picky as I am. If you’re a fan of having your citrus flavors sweeter and smoother, I think you’d really like these.

Rating: Might Eat Again

Links Trader Joe’s Website