Sweet As Fudge Candy Shoppe

Ah. Sugar.

$4.99/lb for the self-serve, and varying prices for other types. There was Turkish delight, fried egg gummies, peach Sour Patch candy (that I was extremely tempted to buy), and shelves of liquorice (ew...).

I was determined to try new candy, so I ended up putting a few novel pieces into paper bag from the self-serve place. I know that everything in the self-serve place can be bought from literally any grocery store/gas station, but I like this because I can buy one piece of candy instead of a pack of candy, which is great for sampling and blogging.

The Squirrel Nut Zipper has the most interesting name ever! It also tastes very interesting: burnt, barbecued, peanutty, and not too caramelly. It's very dense and chewy. There's PHO in it though, so I don't think I'm trying it again.

I also bought jelly mints and "cigarette" candy.

Okay, let me explain. I have one really strong memory about cigarette candy, which I will from now on refer to as "candy sticks". I was 5 or 6, in Australia, and my dad was driving our family to the Plaza, I think. Sitting in the backseats of the car, my brother and I were both sucking on these really chalky, not-super-great tasting candy sticks. We ate them slowly, pretending to smoke, holding them delicately in our hands.

That's my only vivid memory of them; I'm sure my parents probably bought them for us a few times (another childhood candy memory of mine is my brother and I eating a large pack - yes, a whole pack - of wine gums in one afternoon).

Evidently, the marketing of candy sticks in a box to resemble cigarettes didn't influence me or my brother to smoke. We despise it when people smoke, and cigarettes just rile us (I could go on...)

Anyway, I had to buy these Stallion ones (65c) because I feel really nostalgic about them, and I want to share that nostalgia with my brother (when I get home in - wow - 5.5 weeks!).

Unfortunately, they taste NOTHING like the candy sticks I had as a kid; those were pretty much icing sugar on a stick with some sort of solidifier. These taste like exceedingly bland and dry toothpaste. I am not kidding.

I bought the smallest packet of Jelly Mints, because I really wasn't sure whether I'd like them or not. It's very nice that they package the candy by weight.

I am extremely glad I bought the smallest pack! What I imagined was some kind of hard mint coating, with a gummy/jelly center (the consistency of gummy bears). I was so wrong! The coating is chalky, powdery, and not really minty. The inside "jelly" is hard and the consistency of candied fruit. The lemon and orange flavours are very pronounced, which is pretty nice. All is well, or so it seems.

There are two downsides to this packet of candy, and I can't figure out which is worse.

1. >60% of the bag is filled with LIQUORICE-flavoured jelly. I. Despise. Liquorice.

2. There were 5 green mints in total. Green was peppermint flavoured. The best one! Only five! In the whole bag! In all 0.6 lbs!

So, I'm never getting these again.

In all, Sweet As Fudge Candy Shoppe has pretty great pricing, especially if you're buying the bulk prepackaged stuff (not the self-serve stuff).

Reading Terminal Market - The Spice Market

It was forecast to rain around 1pm today, but it never did. It rained for around two minutes at 2pm. It never rained again. Because of this, I had planned my run for the morning, when I totally could've run in the afternoon (which is what I prefer). I ran to Reading Terminal Market with $5 in my key pocket, my key strung to my shoelaces, and my ID card in a secret location (haha).

$5 couldn't possibly buy everything that I wanted at Reading Terminal Market. It's a wonderful place; nothing like markets in Hong Kong (which are way better), but it's still pretty amazing; it's like Quincy Market in Boston, except that Reading Terminal Market sells more than prepared food; there are links of sausage, expensive kitchenware, honey, candles, and spices!

After browsing around the candy store and the spice store (The Spice Market), I decided to spend my $5 on curry powder and sour salt. Apparently, the sour sugar on Sour Patch Kids (and other delicious, addictive sour foods) is called "sour salt", which is just citric acid. Around February, all I wanted was to eat citric acid! ...Now I've found it, for $2.50 for 2 oz! (At least, I think it was 2 oz...the broken customer balance said "0.14". The woman told me that the stuff in the packages are either 1 or 2 oz). There were also juniper berries, but they weighed "0.07", so I'm assuming they were selling 1 oz for $2.25.

I've yet to try the curry and the citric acid... so stay tuned.

On the run back, I went through Rittenhouse and browsed the farmers market there. It's pretty awesome; next time, I'll have to bring more money and walk back, instead of run back. I'm lucky I have running shoes, and plenty of time. I don't know what I'm going to do during the semester, when I need my citric acid fix...

Later, I went to Clark Park's Farmers Market, and bought 8 oz of unsweetened coconut for $2.50! I also bought a bunch of organic rainbow chard ($2.50) for the first time, since I recall that chard tastes pretty okay from Penn Dining (although the way they cook it isn't that appetizing).

So, now I'm nearly out of cash.