Yes!  The Ca$hew Cow has milk chocolate mixed into the cashew butter.  The What The Fudge has milk chocolate fudge in it.

During the holidays we actually have a little time to play around, so we do special stuff, but it is still experimental and not for sale.  Last Christmas I candied some orange peels and ran them through the chocolate line.  Wow – so fresh and so good.  I’d like to figure out how to make enough to offer them to the public.  Workin’

We’re experimenting with a few flavors.  I love coconut and chocolate so that is pretty near the top.  I’ve also done some amazing things with the fresh coffee beans from Zingerman’s Coffee Company.

We are going to make other types of candy.  I’d really like to make panned items for a few of the other Zingerman’s businesses.  There is a lot of fun to be had cooking sugar and I love all kinds of candy.  For now we are making just the candy bars, but in the future there will be other types of candy – and just as flavorful as the bars are!

If you don’t already know, I’m happy to inform you that the bars are available in a mini size six-pack. Mini bars are not currently in most stores we sell to nationwide, but they are in some. I don’t know where you are writing from, but I can suggest that your nearest store carry them so you may buy them there. Please write back.

Dear Eva,

I know what you mean.  Everyone wants to have their bacon in everything these days.  I want you to know that our candy is bacon-free and will remain that way.  If you would like to experience the wonderfulness of smoky, salty, meaty bacon with our candy bars may I suggest you gently fry up some Nueske’s Applewood smoked bacon and eat it warm with a bite of your favorite Zzang! candy bar?  I believe that the best way to eat bacon is hot or still warm from the pan, no matter what you choose to eat it with.

The Zzang! Original and the Wowza are gluten free.  The Ca$hew Cow and the What The Fudge? have small amounts of wheat in them.

The chocolate we use on the candy bars is made by two companies: Valrhona and Guittard.  We did start with a single vendor and these two companies combined produce a chocolate that meets the flavor profile we want for the Candy bars.  Our mix of these chocolates does not compete with the centers of the bars – where we show off our passion for sugar cookery.  The chocolate is about 64% and is neither too sweet nor too assertive – it is very approachable and smooth with a nice chocolaty aroma and flavor. (more…)

I used to think sugar was simple. It’s a naturally occuring carbohydrate found in fruits and vegetables, right? Well lately it’s gotten more confusing in the popular press. What’s the difference between – sucrose, fructose, dextrose, maltose…? These are all different versions of sugar that are digested in different ways and at that I’ll leave the rest of the explanation to the chemists. At Zingerman’s Candy Manufactory we choose our sugar based on its flavor and how it reacts to cooking. We use white granulated cane sugar, muscovado brown sugar from Mauritius, corn syrup (not high fructose) and honey. We use cane sugar because of it’s clear flavor and how it reacts to cooking which is different from, say, beet sugar. Muscovado brown sugar has an incredible rich and varied flavor relative to typical brown sugar available in our grocery stores. Most American brown sugar is made by processing sugar into white sugar and then adding molasses back in. Muscovado brown sugar is never processed all the way to white sugar and you can tell. It’s very caramel-like and flavorful. Honey has great and very different flavor from sugar so we use it where we want its distinctiveness.