Fran's Chocolates - Park Bar - Sept. 6, 2017

Chocolate of the Day: 

Fran's Chocolates
Park Bar - Peanuts and Caramel in Milk Chocolate bar
Good
Weight: 1.5 oz. (42 g.) in total bar
Calories: 230 calories in 1 bar
Cost: $5.99 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Draeger's Market, San Mateo, CA

Welcome to Day #8 of Chocolate and Peanuts Theme Week, and Day #1 of Chocolate and Caramel Theme Week.

Today's Park Bar from Fran's Chocolates (Seattle, WA) was a blend of peanuts, caramel and milk chocolate.

This small, but substantial, sweet confection was attractively wrapped in a shiny gold wrapper. It could be considered as a very high-end candy bar.

The relatively short ingredients list included organic cane sugar (#1 on list), but also real cream and butter, milk chocolate, peanuts, tapioca syrup, and no artificial additives, preservatives or colors.

It had golden caramel and peanuts with a soft crunch. The milk chocolate covered bar was a little on the sweet side, but enjoyable nonetheless.

The Park Bar was USDA Organic, Fair Trade and labeled as being gluten free.

Kate's Real Food - Tram Bar - Peanut Butter Milk Chocolate Trail Mix bar - Sept. 5, 2017

Chocolate of the Day: 

Tram Bars LLC
Kate's Real Food
Tram Bar - Peanut Butter Milk Chocolate Trail Mix Pocket Meal bar
Good
Weight: 3 oz. (85 g.) in 1 bar
Calories: 360 calories in 1 bar
Cost: $2.99 (estimate) for 1 bar
Purchased from: missing information

Welcome to Day #7 of Chocolate and Peanuts Theme Week.

Today's Peanut Butter Milk Chocolate Trail Mix Pocket Meal bar, aka Tram Bar, was from Kate's Real Food (Victor, ID).

The sibling to this bar (the Grizzly Bar with dark chocolate) was featured last week. Both were billed as Pocket Meals, which was a fitting description. Both were enjoyed for breakfast and fueled adventures well into the afternoon.

Today's substantial oat-based bar contained mostly organic ingredients, including organic oats, organic honey and organic peanut butter (made with dry-roasted peanuts). Rice nuggets (rice flour and bran, honey, raisin juice, salt) added some crunchy texture. Dried organic fruits (banana, apricots and raisins) and organic seeds (sunflower, sesame) amped up the fruit and "nutty" flavor, texture and natural sweetness.

The milk chocolate (not organic) was more of an accent flavor that added a bit of rich flavor. Unlike many trail and energy bars, this one did not taste overly sweet (thank you!).

Chocolino - Milk Chocolate Peanut Butter Crunch bar - Sept. 4, 2017

Chocolate of the Day: 

Chocolino
Milk Chocolate Peanut Butter Crunch bar
Good
Weight: 1.07 oz. (30 g.) / 2.14 oz. (60 g.) in total bar
Calories: 170 calories in 1/2 bar
Cost: $1.87 for 1 bar
Purchased from: CVS/Pharmacy, Palo Alto, CA

Welcome to Day #6 of Chocolate and Peanuts Theme Week.

Today's Milk Chocolate Peanut Butter Crunch bar was made for Chocolino (Fresno, CA).

Labels can be confusing. While the chocolate maker isn't clear, the Trademark for "Chocolino" (La Dolce Vita) seems to be owned by SSI G. Debbas Chocolatier, LLC*  (Fresno, CA).

Today's sweet, soft milk chocolate bar contained "bits of crunchy peanuts (and) soft peanut butter chips."

*G. Debbas Chocolatier is a name associated with several chocolate confections and bars and a private label production business. Private label businesses don't always want to reveal when/what they're making for others so perhaps this choice extends to their own brands as well.

Frito-Lay - Nut Harvest - Milk Chocolate Peanuts - Sept. 3, 2017

Chocolate of the Day:

Manufactured for Frito-Lay, Inc.
Nut Harvest
Milk Chocolate Peanuts
Good
Weight: 3 oz. (85 g.) in 1 package
Calories: 480 calories in 1 package
Cost: $1.99 for 1 package
Purchased from: CVS/Pharmacy, Palo Alto, CA

Welcome to Day #5 of Chocolate and Peanuts Theme Week.

Today's Nut Harvest Milk Chocolate Peanuts were manufactured for Frito-Lay, Inc.* (Plano, TX), a very large company that knows its snacks.**

We're a people on the go, frequently working and having to find and eat food away from home for much of the day. Snacks help us through the day when we have no access to a kitchen. It's no wonder Frito-Lay brings in several billion U.S. dollars in revenue each year.

Today's nuts had genuine peanut flavor with no off-taste and, happily, did not meltdown in fairly hot weather. The milk chocolate that coated each nut was a bit sweet and and may not have been top quality, but this snack served as functional food on the go this morning.

**Frito-Lay, a subsidiary of PepsiCo, is famous for Fritos, Cheetos, and other best-selling snacks.

*According to Dictionary.com, the word "snack" first may have appeared around 1300 A.D., and meant "to bite or snap" (of a dog, or animal with a snout). By 1800, snack had evolved to mean a light bite of food or a small meal (of a human).

Angie's Boom Chicka Pop - Milk Chocolatey Peanut Butter Flavored Kettle Corn - Sept. 2, 2017

Chocolate of the Day: 

Angie's Artisan Treats, Inc.
Boom Chicka Pop
Milk Chocolatey Peanut Butter Flavored Kettle Corn
Good
Weight: 1.75 oz. (50 g.) in total package
Calories: 260 calories in 1 package
Cost: $2.50 for 1 package
Purchased from: Starbucks, Charleston Ave., Mountain View, CA


Welcome to Day #4 of Chocolate and Peanuts Theme Week.

Today's Boom Chicka Pop Milk Chocolatey Peanut Butter Flavored Kettle Corn was from Angie's Artisan Treats, Inc. (N. Mankato, MN).

I don't generally eat kettle corn; it's too sweet for me. And while I do like dark and "dark milk" chocolate accents for snacks, sometimes a lighter touch is better.

This kettle corn, made with Non GMO popcorn, was lighter on the sugar. And the light drizzle of milk chocolatey peanut butter flavor wasn't too excessive. The flavoring was enough to add some accent flavor without overwhelming the popcorn.

Today's kettle corn contained no high-fructose corn syrup or trans fat and was gluten free.

Hammond's Candies - Dark Peanut Butter Cup bar - Sept. 1, 2017

Chocolate(s) of the Day: 

Hammond's Candies
Peanut Butter Cup - Dark Chocolate with Peanut Butter bar
Good
Weight: 1.125 oz. (32 g.) / 2.25 oz. (64 g.) in total bar
Calories: 175? (guess) calories in 1/2 bar
Cost: $3.50 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Mostly Chocolates, Rapid City, South Dakota

Cabela's
Half Dipped Squares (Peanuts)
Good
Weight: 1 oz. (28 g.) / 14 oz. (396.9 g.) in total container
Calories: 140 calories in 1 oz. serving
Cost: $6.81 (with tax) for 1 container
Purchased from: Cabela's, Rapid City, South Dakota

Welcome to the last day (Day #10) of Chocolate and the Wild West Theme Week, and Day #3 of Chocolate and Peanuts Theme Week.

Today's entry includes two chocolate items with peanuts, recently purchased in Rapid City, South Dakota—a part of the country known for its wide open spaces, the Badlands, Black Hills, towns like Deadwood, and in some cases ranches with cowboys who aren't just all hat and no cattle.

Hammond's Candies - Dark Peanut Butter Cup Bar
Peanut Butter Cups. H.B. Reese is credited with inventing this confection in 1928. Reese's Peanut Butter Cups (The Hershey Company) are a prominent feature of the American (and global) candy landscape. What's not to like? A dark chocolate peanut butter cup bar? Sign me up.

Today's Peanut Butter Cup bar was made for Hammond's Candies (Denver, CO), a company that has been in the sweets business since the 1920s. The dark chocolate bar contained a soft peanut butter filling. I would have liked the dark chocolate to have been a little richer and darker, but it was a good rendition of a classic pairing.

Cabela's - Half Dipped Squares
Today's Half-Dipped Squares were made for Cabela's—an outdoor sportsman's paradise of a retail location. Beneath Cabela's vaulted ceilings lie stuffed game and hunting, fishing and camping equipment galore. A reflection of the wild west in its present day form.

These small squares were made of a sweet, peanut crunch brittle and were coated with chocolate on one side.

They were also very similar to an Uncle Buck's peanut squares item found a few years ago in a Bass Pro store (a Cabela's competitor). It's worth noting, the two large outdoor stores have recently agreed to merge; so one of these lines may eventually also be merged with the other. 

Brown-Haley - Mountain Thins Peanut Butter - Aug. 31, 2017

Chocolate of the Day: 

Brown-Haley
Mountain Thins - Milk Chocolate Peanut Butter
Good
Weight: 1.4 oz. (40 g.) / 5.3 oz. (150 g.) in total bar
Calories: 210 calories in 1 serving
Cost: $3.45 for 1 package/bag
Purchased from: Safeway, Alameda, CA

Welcome to Day #9 of Chocolate and the Wild West and Day #2 of Chocolate and Peanuts Theme Week.

To all you cowboys and cowgirls out there: sadly, this Wild West week is ending too soon. There are still so many good wild west themed chocolates and western towns not covered yet. There will have to be another Western week sometime in the future.

One thing we like about the west, and it's worth mentioning again this week, are the mountains: Sierra Nevada, Cascade Mountains, Rockies, Alaska Range and many more rugged peaks and valleys.

Today's Milk Chocolate Peanut Butter Mountain Thins were from Brown and Haley (Brown-Haley) (Tacoma, WA), a company probably most well-known for their Almond Roca confections. (On a clear day, company employees may see Mount Rainier (formerly known as Mount Tacoma), the tallest mountain in Washington state and in the Cascade Range, and an active volcano to boot.)

The name "Mountain Thins" is a tie in with the Brown and Haley Mountain Bar line that first debuted with the Mount Tacoma Bar in 1915. (In 1923, the name Tacoma was dropped.) Conventional chocolate "thins" are generally flat rectangles or squares; but today's thins had a more, well, mountainous surface.

Chocolate and peanut butter are natural partners in edible crime. Together, with some crunchy peanuts and the right dose of sea salt and sugar, these Mountain Thins formed a potentially addictive snack.

The Milk Chocolate Peanut Butter Thins had a roasted peanut aroma and well-rounded peanut flavor. And the sweet milk chocolate had a touch of creamy touch of peanut butter-like melt and consistency.