10 Candy bars I wish were easier to find in the United States

To be fair, many of these candies can be found in the United States, but only in specialty shops or if they've been specialty ordered. But still!

Aero

The Aero is a segmented chocolate bar that's filled with a kind of soft candy, sort of like nougat but fluffy with lots of little bubbles. I love this stuff. There are different flavors of the Aero, my favorite being the mint one. You can get it in much of Europe. I've had it in Canada and seen it at a very few few places in the U.S.

Caramac

I first had this caramel candy bar way back in the 1970s in Canada, but I've never been able to find it anywhere since. Apparently it's still for sale in England, so I might just have to make a special trip over the Atlantic for one of these bars. The Caramac was just a simple candy bar, like a Hershey's bar or something similar, except it was made all of caramel instead of chocolate.

Drifter

This is a really hard-to-find candy bar. I've never found it in North America anywhere, though I've seen it in Ireland. It's center is kind of crispy with caramel mixed in with the crisp. Then covered in chocolate, of course. Really one of my favorites. Wish I knew where to get some.

Happy Hippo

Rumor is the Happy Hippo candy can be found in some parts of the U.S., but I've never seen it. It's hard to describe the Happy Hippo, because it's almost more like a cup cake or cookie or something than it is like a candy bar. The Happy Hippo is a cookie with the bottom covered with a kind of icing with crunchy chocolate pieces and some kind of crunchy, nutty things. The top part of the cookie part has some little icing pieces that give the candy eyes, making it look like a hippo. The inside of this candy is a mixture of chocolate and vanilla, sort of like nougat.

Kit Kat Orange

The orange Kit Kat can occasionally be found in the United States; it seems like I run across it about once a year or so, usually during Spring. But that's not good enough for me. They sell the Kit Kat Orange all the time in Britain, and I want it all the time in the U.S. Call me fussy.

Milkybar

The Milky bar is basically a white chocolate candy bar. And I can never get enough white chocolate. I've had this in the U.K., but never seen it in the U.S. Nestle, oh please won't you bring the Milkybar to the States?

Peppermint Crisp

This one isn't for everyone, I'll admit. It took me some getting used to, but once I did, I began to enjoy it. The Peppermint Crisp is chocolate wrapped around a center that's ... well, it's hard to describe. The center of this candy bar is a blue, minty candy that's kind of crunchy. Hard to find everywhere I've ever been, though I've run across it in a few places in Europe.

Rolo

Yes, they make Rolo in America, but it's not the same Rolo as they make and sell on the rest of the planet. Didn't know that, did you? It's true. Rolo in America are made by Hershey. Rolo in the rest of the world are made by Nestle. Generally speaking, I usually prefer Hershey chocolates over Nestle, but not in this case. It's still the same basic Rolo no matter where you get it, but the ones outside the U.S. seem to have a little extra something that lights my taste buds up.

Star Bar

The Star Bar I've been lucky enough to find in a few places in the U.S., but one thing that's disconcerting is that the company keeps changing the dang candy bar's name all the time. This candy bar has been called Boost, Nudge, Moro and who knows what else. But the company always seems to come back to the name Star Bar. Anyway, this bar is a lot like the Snicker's bar, with nuts and caramel and chocolate, though I've always thought the Star Bar was a little sweeter.

Yorkie

This chunky chocolate bar comes in all kinds of flavors, though I've only ever had the original in thick chocolate. Sometimes, nothing's quite as nice as just a thick chunk of chocolate. I first had this one in the U.K., but I've had good luck of late finding it in America.

Brach's Milk Maid Royals: Six Flavors Wrapped Up in Caramel

Brach's has been making candy since 1904, and the Milk Maid Royals have been a favorite of sweets fans for a long time now.

The basics

If you like candy, especially caramels, you have to be familiar with Brach's Milk Maid Royals. These caramels wrapped around six delicious flavors have been a favorite treat for kids and adults alike for decades upon decades now. Most often you'll see these candies available at Halloween, though that's when you see most candy usually, but they are available all year in their own separate packaging or mixed with other candies.

Most often these Brach's candies are labeled Milk Maid Royals, but some packaging has them labeled as Milk Maid Flavored Caramel Rolls. So as there's no confusion, Brach's also makes a plain caramel called the Milk Maid that has no additional flavors added to it and is thus only caramel (but still quite good!).

Below you will find out more about of the six flavors of these rich and chewy sweets.

Vanilla

The vanilla flavoring is light here, but it's just enough to add a little zing to the caramel wrapped around that vanilla center. Comes in blue packaging. This is a nice caramel for those who don't want to try something too different but like their caramels.

Orange

The orange flavor can takes some getting used to for those unfamiliar with it, but go ahead and give it a try. It's a fine fruity citrus tang that's added to the caramel. Reminds me a little of the Butter Rum flavor of the Milk Maid Royals. Comes, of course, in orange wrapping.

Chocolate

This one is in a black wrapper. It's chocolate mixed with caramel, so what could go wrong? Nothing! The chocolate here tastes a little like a Tootsie Roll, and there's nothing bad about that, especially when combined with all that caramel texture and flavor.

Raspberry

The pink center to this candy is a strip of raspberry that brings a touch of berry fruitiness to the caramel. This is another one that might take some getting used to for the uninitiated, but I believe it will grow on you after you've tried a few. The packaging for this candy is a bright pink or magenta.

Maple

If you like maple flavoring, you're going to love this candy. The caramel and maple are mixed together perfectly, with neither overpowering the other. The texture is nice and light. The wrapper is red.

Butter Rum

This is my personal favorite. The butterscotch flavor and the caramel combine to make one of the perfect candies, in my opinion, with a rich flavor that seems like it melts in your mouth. The packaging here is gold.

New Reese's minis the greatest candy of all time

At the 2010 Sweets and Snacks Expo, a new age began. Let's call it Year One, A.R.M. (After Reese's minis).

What brings about this new age? Is it a new religious movement? A change in governments? A social tidal wave of change?

No. It was the release of the new Reese's minis, miniature Reese's peanut butter cups about the size of a dime.

These little chocolate-covered candies are so special, the Reese's folks also had to release their new treat at the 2011 International CES. It might seem a bit odd to bring out a chocolate and peanut butter candy for a consumer electronics show, but these little candies are so life-changing, so earth-shatteringly important, that they are worthy of being presented at every single convention or show across the globe for the next hundred years.

I exaggerate not.

If you don't believe me, then you've obviously not tried the Reese's minis as of yet.

And just to be clear: I am not talking about the Reese's miniatures, those small peanut butter cups that come wrapped in aluminum foil. Those are a fine product, but they are not the Reese's minis of which I write.

The Reese's minis are small, really small. They are about the size of a dime. They are new in stores, only having shown up over the last couple of months, and they come in two package sizes, an 8 oz size and a smaller 2.5 oz package size.

 Imagine a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup the size of a dime. Then imagine it one thousand times better than what you could have ever imagined. Imagine it better than epiphany. Imagine it better than the best sex you've ever had. Imagine it better than any drug on the planet. If you can imagine all that, then you've got just an inkling of how good the Reese's minis really are.

For flavor, texture, quality, this product deserves an A+++++++++++++++++ from every consumer.

The only downfall is that they can't make enough of them fast enough.

If you happen to disagree that the new Reese's minis are the greatest candy of all time, you are of course allowed to have your own opinion. But you are wrong. Empirically wrong. This is not an opinion. It is fact. It should be added as an amendment to the U.S. Constitution or something, but the Reese's minis are without a doubt the greatest candy ... nay, the greatest food item ... ever spawned by man. It is as if the gods of ancient times have come forth to bestow upon unworthy mankind just an inkling of bliss.

So go eat some.

10 facts about cotton candy

1. The sweet treat we know as cotton candy today was once called "fairy floss." In fact, it is still commonly called fairly floss in some parts of the world, including Australia. It's also known as "candy floss" in Great Britain and other parts of the world.
2. Who created cotton candy? No one knows for sure. There are historical records of spun sugar, basically cotton candy, going back to the 1400s in Italy, but more commonly modern cotton candy is thought to have come about in the 18th and 19th centuries.
3. So, who created cotton candy? Argh! There's no definitive answer. But in 1897 was invented machine-spun cotton candy. The creators of that were John C. Wharton and William Morrison. The two patented their cotton candy machine in 1899 and introduced it at the World's Fair in St. Louis in 1904.
4. BUT: In 1900, a fellow by the name of Joseph Patton received a patent for his own cotton candy invention. The argument could go on over who created cotton candy. Let's just say it's been around for a while.
5. The Tootsie Roll company makes a brand of cotton candy called Fluffy Stuff. The company claims its Fluffy Stuff is the oldest cotton candy treat, having been introduced in 1893 at the World's Fair in Chicago and with historical links going back to Italy in the 1400s.
6. A Persian treat known as Pashmak looks and tastes much like cotton candy. It's even made in a somewhat similar manner as cotton candy, but unlike cotton candy which is made almost entirely only of sugar, Pashmak also includes cinnamon.
7. December 7 is National Cotton Candy day in the United States.
8. The term "cotton candy" did not become common use in the English language until the 1920s.
9. Modern cotton-candy-making machinery was created in 1949 by the Gold Medal Products company.
10. The Turkish treat pismaniye looks somewhat like cotton candy, but it's not. It is made of pulled sugar, but flour and butter and sometimes nuts and fruits are mixed with it.