The Butterfinger Candy Bar was created in 1923 by Otto Schnering of the Curtiss Candy Company of Illinois. Between 1964 and 1981 The Curtiss Candy Company changed hands and also merged into other companies that include Nabisco and R.J. Reynolds. In 1990 Nestle bought Butterfinger (and Baby Ruth) from Nabisco. Then in March 2018 Nestle sold Butterfinger to Ferrero. (picture above is from www.BussinessWire.com)
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February 2019 fun sized Butterfinger Candy Bars began to display “Improved Recipe” on the packaging. (red on right side – right upper corner in photo below)
Bite sized Butterfingers (that are expired from my local grocery store) are made by Nestle.
Fresh new Butterfinger Candy Bars are now made by Ferrara Candy Company.
When you compare the ingredients you might read that molasses is no longer an ingredient in the Butterfinger Candy bar…..and the sodium has increased by 20%.
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The Butterfinger now lacks that caramelized molasses flavor and is now more salty.
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Other changes are that the Butterfinger now uses a larger sized peanut in its core and more cocoa and milk in it’s chocolate coating.
www.Simpsons.Wikia.com
The Ferrero Company also dropped the hydrogenated oils and uses a double layer wrapper instead.
On the left is a Nestle Bite Size Butterfinger. On the Right is the Ferrero Butterfinger
The Nestle Bite Size Butterfinger (on the left) has a more textured peanut butter type of candy threw it with a more caramelized nutty kind of taste.
The Ferrero has a noticeably better chocolate coating and more deep peanut flavor but it is salty…..seems less sweet…..It’s almost sandy…….It doesn’t have that flaky texture that the Nestle Butterfinger had. The Molasses taste is missing.
Both are good just different now.
Your opinion and experience may differ.
Those were my Forking Thoughts on WTFork happened to the Butterfinger Candy Bar.
These are the best of what I tasted in Metro Phoenix this year so far. The dishes aren’t really in any particular order. These are dishes that are not just very good……These dishes are The FORKING BEST! I mean like from another planet delicious….Out of this world!
Pictured above is a Tuna Aguachile from Barrio Gran Reserva in Phoenix. It was light, refreshing and spicy. It’s filled with special ingredients and also some unexpected surprises. The flavors just POP and it’s amazing. Actually I could list just about all the plates I tried at Barrio Gran Reserva but will list just one more special one.
Barrio Gran Reserva
This is Pan Seared Corvina. It’s with a Salsa d Xoconostle…..The fish is perfect and this salsa is the best salsa I’ve ever tasted….It’s made with a special pepper that fire roasted with an extra delicious taste….Unusual delicious ingredients are on the plate like red pine nuts and rose mole. Every bite taste different but it’s all insanely delicious together.
www.BarrioGranReserva.com
From Confluence in Carefree AZ
Confluence serves food that is astoundingly amazing….Every Forking plate is a masterpiece. It’s really great food times TEN. The plate above is a Sweet Potato Ravioli….its as great as it can be and then you taste a leek….and it taste better than a leek….It taste Forking BETTER than a leek…The chef did something to the leek to make a Forking leek amazing. Then I get to a leaf of radicchio……and it taste better than radicchio……..The waitress tells me that the Chef cooked the radicchio leaf in red wine and brown sugar. A really special plate I can add over TWENTY plates from here but I will just pick one more plate.
From Confluence in Carefree AZ
The Red Sea Bream is prepared and seasoned to perfection. Here’s that magic thing again….The little green things on the plate are green beans…..But they are OMG Amazing! They are sweet, tender, slightly pickled…..they taste better than I can describe….They sort of burst and pop in your mouth. Every other vegetable just adds another delicious layer of flavor…Also there are some really melt in your mouth gnocchi on the plate….This plate was just magical.
www.RestaurantConfluence.com
From The Collins Small Batch Kitchen in Phoenix AZ
Chef Christopher Collins has a few restaurants in Metro Phoenix but it was at The Collins Small Batch Kitchen I tried The Twisted Noodle Salad. One would never guess that a salad could have so much going on…..This salad has everything and is bright, sour, sweet, spicy, flavorful, crunchy and chewy. It’s made with soba noodles, kale, avocado, pickled cucumbers, arugula, scallions, herbs, toasted coconut, peanuts, carrots and is dressed with chili-lime vinaigrette. I am certain that their are a few more secret ingredients that make this salad unbelievably scrumptious with a KICK that doesn’t hurt.
www.TheCollinsAZ.com
The Cabbage Rolls from Cafe Chenar in Phoenix were the BEST Cabbage Rolls I’ve ever tried. Did you ever taste a cabbage roll that melted in your mouth just like cotton candy? I never had a cabbage roll like this before. The cabbage was so tender it just dissolves in the mouth. The filling was so light, tender and really perfectly seasoned. The filling was a mix of this amazing tender beef, rice and some potato. I never had beef of this light texture before. It was tender like it was cooked in a sous vide water oven. These cabbage roll were really extra special!
I haven’t found a website for Cafe Chenar but you can find them on Facebook.
This next one was an unexpected one…….and doesn’t look special.
Both of us were blown away with all the incredible flavors packed into this Quinoa Meat-less-ball from the newly opened Meat The Ball Restaurant in Phoenix. It has a crisp thin breaded exterior and an amazingly delicious stracchino cheese core. This meatball was also SPICY HOT and full of awesome flavors……..I hope they don’t change a thing with this recipe because it was perfection. I should note that the rigatoni pasta and secret tomato sauce I had that same night was also perfection. It was shocking to get pasta that was so spectacular like from the finest restaurant but was from this little casual place.
www.MeatTheBall.com
I was recently at the newly opened fine dining vegan restaurant in old town Glendale called Casa Terra.
All the food I tried at Casa Terra was flavored very well but the street sized Tapas Tacos had all kinds on flavors and textures going on with them. They were so delicious that once the word gets out about these incredible tacos everyone will have to try them…..I wish this restaurant was open for lunch so I could enjoy these tacos for lunch………..with a soup or salad………or more food..
www.CasaTerra.com
From Singh Meadows in Tempe AZ
Singh Meadows is in Tempe and is a produce market and cafe. The cafe serves stunning dishes that are mostly vegetarian featuring magnificent fresh vegetables. I recently tried three plates from Singh Meadows and all three are worthy of being here but there’s something about the beet plate….It’s not a boring beet plate like you get from most restaurants…..It’s more like a plate that could win at a Chopped Championship. Assorted fresh beets are prepared four different ways. Almond, avocado, cream cheese, fancy greens, super sweet green beans, high quality country bread and what I think was urfa pepper just go amazingly well together.
www.SinghMeadowsTempe.com
Those were some of the BEST PLATES I tried in Metro Phoenix in 2019 so far. I can’t wait to taste the rest of the yearn Metro Phoenix!
Everything is subject to change and your experience may or may not differ.
If you regularly read my blog you know that I’m not a fan of Oreo Cookies. Even as a child I couldn’t eat Oreo Cookies. I recently received a gift box in the mail from my sister in New Jersey. In the box were peanut butter Kandy Kakes and a lemon pie by Tastykake…..and this package of Carrot Cake Oreos….I was very puzzled by the package of carrot cake Oreo Cookies. .I thanked my sister for the package and asked her why she sent me Carrot Cake Oreo Cookies. She said that she remembered that I used to like lemon pies and peanut butter Tandy Kakes. She also said that she remembered that I use to eat a lot of carrots so she thought I’d like Carrot Cake Oreo Cookies…….Well that was very nice of my sister to remember all that and to think of me by sending me this package……….well……..I have to give these carrot cake Oreos a try.
These cookies are marked artificially flavored in the right hand corner. Towards the left bottom this package reads carrot cake flavored cookie with cream cheese frosting flavor artificially flavored.
I notice that the cookies don’t contain any carrots or cream cheese. 🙁
I open the package and take a good sniff.
It’s an odd odor. it’s a little sour, a tiny bit like graham, I’m getting more sour again,. I take a small bite…….WOW that’s weird. Yuk…before I can figure out what I’m tasting my mouth is a slimy. The cream is awful. The cream actually has a slight coconut taste. The cookie is a little bit like a graham cracker but not exactly. The cookie has chucks of salt in it. When I take another bite I can taste something citrusy…..The worst part of these cookies is the paste like cream that builds a turtle wax finish in the mouth………. They are just very unpleasant. ICK they made me burp and I had to re-live the experience.
I didn’t like them but my dogs are very intrigued by them……..?
Those were my Forking Thoughts on the carrot cake Oreo Cookies.
Cambodian Inspired Vegetables with Tapioca, Couscous and Peas
I was inspired to create this dish after I watched on AZCENTRAL.COM the “Killer Dish” not sure but I think it was by Food Critic Dominic Armato all photos were by Michael Chow. The above photo is my inspiration by me. In the video I watched a chef from our local Cambodian Restaurant Reathrey Sekong made a Cha Kreung paste. The flavoring paste was made by pounding in a mortar with a pestle a combination of turmeric, lime leaves, lemon grass, galangal, shallots and garlic. They added peppers, asparagus, oil, chicken to a very hot pan and then added flavoring paste (the Kreung) vegetables, sugar, fish sauce and red onions. The mixture got finished with sliced lime leaves. I didn’t finish my mixture with lime leaves because my lime leaves were very tough even when I removed the vain in the leaf I thought that they were too tough to eat completely raw.
I made a good size batch of the paste…..not sure on how far it will go..but I like the taste of it with vegetables. Latter I will do this with chicken.
Here are the vegetables with that taste and I thought the combination of tapioca, Israeli couscous and peas would be perfect………I think they are……..These of course are NOT TRADITIONAL to this flavor but I think they work.
I think this paste might work as a marinade for chicken so I’m giving that a try with the addition of maybe some lime juice, a little salt and sugar.
I pretty much winged this recipe so I don’t know if I did what exactly the Cambodian Chef did…
I think I did around……
1 teaspoon turmeric
30 lime leaves with veins removed
7 – 3 in bottoms of lemongrass with hard outers removed – sliced extra thin on mandolin
galangal – 1.5 oz sliced paper thin on mandolin – mine was very woody and strong tasting..was going to use more but didn’t…..
garlic confit that I do for sous-vide cooking and keep frozen…. and I used 3 ounces
Maybe a lb of broccoli I used the florets and trimmed the stem and sliced stem into strips.
Used maybe 9 mini bell peppers and cut them in strips
Used 1/2 a large sweet onion – cut in strips
I sautéed the broccoli and added the paste and a little oil while I broiled the onions and peppers tlll they charred. Added a splash of sugar and red boat fish sauce to the vegetables and then added the prepared tapioca, couscous and peas. I think this taste very good and most people will also think the same.
This is very aromatic and delicious. A day latter I marinated three very large chicken quarters with the paste for about 24 hours, rinsed off chicken and blotted dry. Roasted them off with more aromatics and the chicken was developed and super moist with delicious flavors and was served with more of these vegetables.
I think most people would enjoy this.
Cambodian Inspired Vegetables with Tapioca, Couscous and PeasCambodian Inspired Vegetables with Tapioca, Couscous and Peas The Forking Truth
Smoked is a brand new event that was hosted by Arizona Foodie at Ocotillo Restaurant in Phoenix Arizona March 23 1-4pm. Top local chefs offered exciting “smoked” creations. There also were offered smoked cocktails samples, fun activities such as make your own candles, make your own succulent jewelry, a photo booth and live music. This was a 21 and older event. General admission tickets were $35.00 and VIP tickets were $50.00 that got you in early. Parking was free and close.
First stop was from Proof at the Four Seasons Resort in Scottsdale at Troon North.
Tiny detailed grilled sandwich on house baked bread…..God so Forking Great!….It’s a smoked opah BLT with red onion jam, cured yolk, tomato and lettuce……Just delicious! WOW! I could scarf down one (or more) of these every day!
Next is another doozy…..The INCREDIBLE…INCREDIBLE smoked brisket ramen…(I think that’s what is was called) from Obon Sushi and Ramen.
Flavors are OFF THE CHARTS! This is insanely delicious. A little brine-ee, smokey, a little spicy, really balanced. The brisket is also amazing…..As soon as I got home I looked this restaurant’s menu online and didn’t notice this dish on their menu……It NEEDS to be there! I actually woke up the next day imagining I was eating this again….It really was that great!
Last sample as delicious and amazing as it was ….was also quit large and next to impossible to stop eating…..Took a break but my husband said that this one was up there too.
Fat Ox offered grilled piadinas with fried mortadella, smoked pancetta, oregano mustard, olives, arugula and parmesan.
There was Seagram’s 7 offerings and a photo both in this area.
After that we were on to Jewel’s Bakery and Cafe for smoked salmon, smoked poblano on everything bagel chip with quail egg.
It’s just Forking Stunning and DELICIOUS…..so exciting. It certainly was by far the most attractive plate.
The Clever Koi had an attractive offering but I forgot what it was.
After that was Handlebar Diner with this really Forking Awesome smoked house reuben fries.
OMG this is far better than my picture shows. The house corn beef is amazballz………best corn beef I’ve eaten in like 10 years. That PERECT corned beef flavor…….Everything in this cup is way..WAY up there. Frit street kennebel fries, house corned beef, smoked beef fat Russian dressing, Swiss cheese fondu, pickled cabbage and hickory smoke. I need to see if this on the Handlebar Diner menu….so good. This is another one of the dishes that I wanted to sneak an extra one out for later.
From Nook Kitchen was an attractive smoked ahi tuna roll with smoked wasabi cream, smoked tobikko and micro cilantro.
I didn’t do this one the justice that it deserved….I should have had this dish before the last one because the flavors are far more delicate…….think I’m still tasting the last dish in my mouth……….But it was good!
Roka Akor offered smoked iberico pork with rhubarb emulsion and charred carrot relish.
I did many of the photos blindly. The sun was very bright and I couldn’t see anything on my screen…just hit button and hoped for the best.
The Delta and The Larder offered this absolutely STUNNING Chicken on a Hoe Cake.
It’s such a joy to eat such masterfully prepared chicken and the hoe cake is so tasty too. WOW this sure was a treat that was so GREAT to eat!
Then Ocotillo offered a few goodies inside.
Mesqite grilled beef ribs with house bbq sauce and jalapeño chimichurri.
WOW look at that! They are like enough for dinner! They are not over seasoned or too spicy either. They are the kind you have to eat on the bone.
I’m pretty filled up by now but my husband eats this one from Ocotillo. It’s a smoked baby back rib on buttermilk bun with spicy rhubarb bbq sauce and house pickles. P.S. he said this was really REALLY GOOD!
Then we stepped out.
I try a cocktail that’s a mezcal union smoked Paloma and a water.
Look ! *********When have you ever seen a jewelry bar like this before?
How neat! But I couldn’t bring myself to rip out a plant from it’s roots and glue and string it to a ring…..but I eat plants…? …….So I took a plant home to sit on my windowsill instead. Hope the plant is happy.
I thought I was in line to try a cocktail but found out that is was candle making.
They also had live music.
They had a few more cocktail areas……I hit one more.
Tried a Johnie Walker Black Penicillin made with Johnie Walker Black Label, diner liquor, honey syrup, lemon juice and bitters.
Toasted Mallow ends things on a sweet note with a couple varieties of s’mores.
I felt the same way as this cat at Smoked!
Smoked was Smoking Hot & FORKING Great!
I enjoyed myself at Smoked!
www.ArizonaFoodieMag.com
Thank You so much to everyone and to Arizona Foodie for hosting such a Forking Great Event!
Grandma pizza is very rarely found outside of New York and is suppose to be similar to the kind of pizza that Italian Grandmothers make in their home ovens.
We happen to have a little pizza parlor called Crisp in Scottsdale AZ.
See it really is little.
The owner is friendly and says he will bring out our pizza in about four minutes. I pick a seat on the patio.
The Pizza looks like a toasted sandwich and is a five inch square that’s cut on a diagonal. I can see it’s topped with a rich thick tomato sauce, some melted cheese, a fine grated hard cheese and it’s generous with fresh basil leaves.
I take a bite.
Wow….it’s not really like any pizza I ever had before…….it is different.
The crust is so crisp….no wonder why this pizza place is named crisp. The crust is completely crisp and reminds me of toast. It’s light but a very sturdy crisp like an airy crouton. The sauce is very similar to most east coast pizzas that I have enjoyed. From what I remember east coast pizzas always are made with a delicious sauce. This sauce on this pizza is similar to east coast tomato pies……..The sauce is thick, rich, sweet …..but not sugary….sweet as in sweet tomato…. with a really good rich DELICIOUS tomato flavor. There’s a little melty cheese, fine grated hard cheese and a good amount of fresh basil.
This pizza is almost like a cousin of the Roman Style Pizza…..They are both are generously topped, both have sturdy crisp crusts but the texture and taste of the crusts differ. The grandma has a fine network of bubbles in the crust. The Roman has bigger bubbles in the crust. Both the grandma style and the Roman style are not doughy …….both have a sturdy but light airy crust with generous high quality toppings. Both the grandma and Roman style pizzas seem lighter and not as heavy as doughier pizzas because they both have lots of air in the crust.
That was my first taste of grandma style pizza at Crisp in Scottsdale AZ.
www.Crisp-Pizza.com
Try Crisp Pizza and see what you think! Give the grandma style pizza a try!
Everything is subject to change and your experience may or may not differ.
The 2019 Persian New Year Festival took place on the Scottsdale Waterfront in Scottsdale Arizona March 9th. Around forty venders participated. What you could find here was food, music, dancing, Persian Tea, jewelry, crafts, Persian Rugs, clothing, fortune telling and more. This was a free event with proceeds that benefit brain tumor research.
ZK GrillZK Grill Combo PlateWhite Orchid Persian Pastry1001 Nights1001 Nights Chicken Kabab PlateLive MusicReadings and Custom SpellsPersian TeaSaffron Jak and Killer BurgersFood Food Trucks
Three NEW Internationally natural and artificially flavored peanut M&M’s have just come out. Here are Thai Coconut, Mexican Jalapeño and English Toffee Peanut M&M’s. It reads on the bags that if you vote for your favorite that it is a possibility that you might win a trip around the world.
I opened them all up and tried them all. The one really weird thing about all of them is that after trying all the flavors I noticed all the peanuts break down the middle in your mouth….M&M’s are one of the few candies I’ve eaten all my life. It’s been decades since I was a child but I remember decades back the peanuts never separated…….This might sound gross but as a child when we had a dinner I didn’t like at home I’d eat M&M’s instead for dinner( as a child remember)……..I ate them very slowly and saved the peanuts for last sometimes…..so I do indeed REMEMBER!…………..it seems like they use peanuts that are more dry……..or maybe older these days?
I’ll start with my least favorite….It’s the most unattractive one the English Toffee in colors that I’ll be nice and not describe…..I open the bag and it sort of smells something like butterscotch. Then I go to taste one and I almost gaged. It taste like a spoonful of bitter instant coffee followed by other taste like maybe artificial butterscotch and maybe artificial caramel all there….This has the usual chocolate with a peanut center but this one leaves an unpleasant chemical aftertaste……..This one I don’t like at all
NOT WORTH A FORK!
For me it’s a bit of a toss up between the Thai Coconut Peanut and the Mexican Jalapeño. After my first taste of them I thought the Mexican Jalapeño had a slight edge because it tasted more like a Peanut M&M but with a burn…..When you open the bag it just smells like chocolatey M&M’s…….The Mexican Jalapeño M&M’s come in colors of yellow, red and green. They taste mostly like regular peanut M&M’s with a slight burn. Slightly disappointed because the burn doesn’t taste like jalapeño……….it just burns…….there is a very slight other flavor that might be something like cinnamon…..Not bad but not great.
1/2 a Fork…OK
The Thai Coconut package smells like coconut when you take a whiff. These Peanut M&M’s come in blue, lime green and yellow. The candy shells taste slightly different to me. Like the inside is coated with something that taste similar to saccharine mixed with coconut……but much more coconut to saccharine. It’s easy to taste the chocolate with this one. There is a slight other taste with the coconut but so slight and maybe too artificial for me to tell what it is suppose to be…….A few more Thai Coconut M&M’s later these M&M’s build up and remind me of coconut Easter Eggs. These Thai Coconut M&M’s are OK…not great..They differ from the Coconut M&M’s that were out years ago…..These are not as strong with coconut and also not as sweet. They don’t take me to anything Thai Food…….They are OK….like Easter eggs….kind of tasty……the peanut goes very well with these flavors…….not bad…not great.
1/2 a Fork…OK
Those were my thoughts on the International Flavor M&M’s of English Toffee, Mexican Jalapeño and Thai Coconut.
I do note your opinion and experience may indeed differ.
The FORKING Truth is that I am already disappointed with a new restaurant that I didn’t actually get to dine at yet. I was very excited about this new restaurants’ opening but dining there doesn’t seem like a possibility.
I live about 40 minutes away from this particular restaurant and don’t want to be turned away without a reservation so I attempted to a make a reservation. This is where all the Forking CRAZY unBELIEVABLE stuff happened……
I called the published phone number for the restaurant on Saturday 2/16/19 and requested a reservation for the next Saturday 2/23/19. It wasn’t until Thursday that I get a call back from the Chef/Owner of this particular restaurant that I called the wrong phone number and he gave another phone number to call. So my husband called that number during business hours and nobody answered the phone so he left a message that we still wanted a reservation for Saturday 2/23/19. Nobody calls us back…..So I wait until Friday 2/22/19 and I call the restaurant and ask if I have a reservation there and the person there at the restaurant says that I do not have a Forking (she didn’t say Forking… but I did) reservation. So I said good-bye and made a reservation someplace else.
We were very anxious to try out this new vegan restaurant somewhere in Metro Phoenix…..But it seems impossible to make a reservation with them and they don’t care either. We emailed the Chef Owner a similar copy of this story last Friday (2/22/19) and haven’t heard a thing back.
This is an Example of what NOT to DO When You Open a Restaurant.
When I came across this bag of White Chocolate Marshmallow M&M’s I thought this was a strange flavor. I also thought these M&M’s might be filled with marshmallow cream but they are not. These M&M’s are white chocolate that is marshmallow flavored.
I start by opening the bag and take a whiff……It smells like white chocolate mixed with a little yogurt……I’m thinking that these will suck…….
I spill some out.
The M&M’s are shiny and slightly larger than regular plain M&M’s. The candy shells are white, Robbin’s egg blue and like yellow ribbon color.
I taste one.
It’s very sweet……maybe too sweet for some people…but to me it’s as sweet as vanilla cake frosting….To me it’s just right for this flavor. It’s almost like you really are eating a marshmallow mixed with white chocolate. I think I really do feel and taste cornstarch in my mouth like from a real marshmallow. I eat a few more….when you eat more you get the sweet more……..These melt better in the mouth than most white chocolate M&M’s…they aren’t waxy at all. Instead of an aftertaste like I was expecting I got some cornstarch building up in my mouth…….It’s kind of weird.
I totally was expecting to hate these White Chocolate Marshmallow M&M’s but they are surprisingly realistic tasting and OK!
Adventurous Tasters might want to give the White Chocolate Marshmallow M&M’s a try!
Not my favorite flavor of M&M’s but worthy of a try
