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"Formed into the shapes of maple leaves and other small, classical candy mold objects, maple candy is made from pure maple syrup that's boiled over high heat until opaque."
Every once in a while, perhaps more often than that, we're going to post quick notes on our favorite pre-packaged foods and drinks from inside or outside of Western New York. Today's update focuses on maple syrup candies and cookies, Mackintosh's toffee, and an update on Buffalo availability of the amazing 1921 Cream Tequila, also known as the hard-core version of Bailey's Irish Cream. If you have a sweet tooth and are looking for something cool to expand your palate, you'll want to read on, and read quickly - local supplies of 1921 are decidedly limited.
Certain states are known for their maple products, and thankfully, we're living in one of them. Western New Yorkers are actually surrounded by such an abundance of syrup options that we don't even know their brands, and annual maple events - a late March annual Maple Weekend and a late April Maple Festival - come and go around here with far too little local attention. Buffalonians are so used to having authentic maple syrup around that we take it for granted, a fact that we recognized during a discussion a few years ago regarding the merits of Mrs. Butterworth's: companies have convinced us that their cheaper, artificial maple syrup alternatives are good enough, but when you actually taste-test them, they're really not. Unless you believe that ignorance is bliss, try a little experiment: go to your favorite local market, buy a small bottle of genuine maple syrup, and compare it with whatever else you've been pouring on your pancakes. You'll see that most faux maple syrups actually taste like corn syrup with a little butter or other accent flavor mixed in; some are so thin that they hardly taste like anything.
A local and personal favorite that can't be duplicated with artificial syrups - or at least, hasn't been - is maple candy. Formed into the shapes of maple leaves and other small, classical candy mold objects, maple candy is made from pure maple syrup that's boiled over high heat until opaque, poured into molds, and allowed to cool and dry. The result is a semi-hard piece of candy that is like biting into a yielding, ever so slightly pasty block of strongly maple-flavored sugar, an accurate but clinical description that doesn't do justice to the experience. Imagine the essence of maple transformed into bite-sized snacks and you'll understand what makes these so special. They're generally sold in boxes of four or nine pieces, sometimes more, and go for around 50 cents a piece, sometimes a little more or less; with such strong sugar and maple content, they've never been anything but addictive in our experience.
That's not to say that everything with maple flavoring is fantastic. As just one example, we were thrilled this past weekend to discover "maple syrup-flavored" pizzelles - flat, round Italian waffle cookies - at Guercio's in Buffalo, sold as a pack of 40 large cookies for only $2.89. As much as we love maple and pizzelles, we couldn't get excited about the muted flavor in these; they had only a tiny bit of maple taste, and were otherwise indistinguishable from the far more common vanilla pizzelles. It turns out that they're made in Mississauga, Canada by Nustef Foods, which also produces a Dulce de Leche cookie. The maple pizzelles are actually made with "maple flavor," rather than maple syrup, and the dulce version is similarly made with "caramel toffee flavor." Perhaps the other flavor fares better; our hope is to find out for ourselves in the near future.
In the meanwhile, we've been getting our caramel toffee fix from Mackintosh's toffees, originally a British brand from 1890, and now owned by Nestle. Sold in Canada under the name "Mack" for years, Mackintosh's toffee is very hard to find in the United States, but can be had in red 170-gram bags at Canadian border Duty Free shops for around US$3.25. We've found that the individually wrapped candies inside last for around a week, sometimes two, based on our appetites rather than their freshness. Each piece is a little larger than a Tootsie Roll, golden brown in color, and unusual in hardness: served at room temperature, the pieces don't initially feel like they can be bitten straight through, but slowly reveal their pliability as they warm in your mouth. That's also when the taste of rich, buttery, and almost creamy toffee begins to hit the tongue, and you start to wonder just how long you can keep the candy intact before having another. A search will help you find stores where the imported candies can be purchased online, but a quick candy run to the Northern border - complete with Caramilk, Smarties, and other Canadian goodies - is a lot more fun.
Last but not least, we also wanted to let you know that another of our favorites, 1921 Cream Tequila, is finally locally available! By request, it's been added to the inventory at the Williamsville Premier Group Premium Wines location, alongside three of the non-cream tequilas sold under the 1921 brand. This spicy alternative to Bailey's Irish Cream has been one of our favorites for the past two years, and is decidedly better than a couple of more common, weaker alternatives we've also reviewed - Tequila Rose Java and Baja Mocha. Details are in our cream tequila roundup; we strongly recommend that fans of Bailey's give 1921 a try.
