Dubbed "lollipops for the new generation" by the company, Jelly Belly's LolliBeans are one of the company's newest products and were promoted at the SF Fancy Foods Show along with their new pomegranate jelly beans. Lollipops are hardly innovative, as far as candy goes, but the company seems surprisingly excited about these pops. Each one is shaped like a very large (over 1 inch long) jelly bean and is embossed with the famous Jelly Belly logo, and 10 flavors - very cherry, watermelon, sizzling cinnamon, strawberry cheesecake, cotton candy, blueberry, tangerine, bubblegum, grape and lemon - all of which are as true-to-life as the original Jelly Bellys are.

Perhaps if I had picked up a Strawberry Cheesecake pop instead of a lemon I would have been more impressed, but this was simply a good - not fantastic - piece of candy.

The Lollibeans are available at candy and gourmet stores nationwide and will probably be more widely available as we head into Easter.

There are three ways to eat Jelly Bellys: one by one, in random handfuls or paired up in specific combinations. If you regularly take the last option, you know that every box and bag of Jelly Bellys comes with a selection of recipes that combine the standard bean flavors into much more complex ones, miniature versions of favorite desserts. Some examples include Banana Split (Top Banana + Chocolate Pudding + Crushed Pineapple + Strawberry Jam + Very Cherry + A&W Cream Soda), Chocolate Covered Cherries ( 2 Very Cherry + 1 Chocolate Pudding ) and Blueberry Muffins (2 Blueberry + 1 Buttered Popcorn). To expand their recipe selections, Jelly Belly is turning to consumers, fans of Jelly Bellys, for some new ideas.

Jelly Belly is launching the Jelly Belly Recipe Game on January 22nd with the intention of finding the next great jelly bean recipe. The contest invites participants to come up with creative new combinations of Jelly Bellys for the chance to win $10,000 or one of 100,000 other prizes. Entries can be submitted on the game website, which will not be active until the 22nd.

Hershey isn't the only one buying up candymakers this week. Jelly Belly has also bought Los Angles-based Ben Myerson Candy Co., makers of Christopher's Candy and Sunkist fruit gems. Now, when I think of Jelly Belly I think entirely of jelly beans -- though the company says that they make "over 100 different candies including chocolates, gummies, candy corn, taffy, and... jelly beans" I couldn't name another candy brand they produce. (Perhaps a down-side of having a jelly bean for their corporate logo.) This purchase, however, will provide them with some new candy types to think of when the name "Jelly Belly" comes up.

I'm a big Jelly Belly fan, but aside from the usual 49-flavor blend, there aren't that many opportunities to try some of their other flavors. Every once in a while, though, I spot a more unusual bland and snap them up. This week, I saw the "Soda Pop Shoppe" and "Smoothie Blend" mixes.

I was particularly interested in trying the soda ones after reading a review on the Candyblog and they did not disappoint. The flavors included are the A&W Root Beer, Dr. Pepper and Cream Soda from the classic blend and three new flavors, Grape Crush, Orange Crush and 7-Up. All the flavors had a slight zing to them that did remind me of soda, and the three new flavors bear an uncanny resemblance to their namesakes. Orange Crush, in particular, is outstanding.

The Smoothie mix was released earlier this year and contains a number of unconventional flavors including Mandarin Orange Mango, Cherry Passion Fruit, Pineapple Pear, Strawberry Banana and Mixed Berry. The cherry and mixed berry flavors seemed common, much like cherry and grape flavors in other types of candy. Strawberry Banana jumps out as the most easy to recognize flavor and the Pineapple Pear was pleasant, but the Mandarin Orange Mango was my favorite from this batch - vibrant and fruity.

All in all, both mixes were good and worth buying again, although I'll have to replenish my supply of the Soda Pop Shoppe beans, since I have already run out.

Easter is just about my favorite holiday. I know this is the holiest week out of the Catholic year and that I should be reflecting and doing some serious soul searching, but in all honesty I'm thinking about food and decorations. I can't help it. I am giddy with Easter fever. So imagine my delight when I recently ran across a recipe for Easter Biscotti that uses jelly beans. What a beautiful union of colors to dip in my caffeine.

I found it on a site devoted almost entirely to recipes and food experimentation. The author, Joe, has had a lifelong love of food exploration and has created Culinary in the Desert to his wanderings and discoveries. Joe mentions that he had to somewhat modify his typical biscotti recipe to accommodate the jelly beans. He used butter, which made the recipe somewhat more sticky than usual, but by wetting his hands he was able to easily shape the loaf. He also states that the loaf must cool somewhat after baking so that the jelly beans can harden to prevent any sticking when cutting the bicottie pieces. I very much appreciate his tips about the stickiness because the sticky factor is what typically prevents my forays into cooking and baking endeavors. Biscotti is one of the few recipes I have successfully created in my kitchen so I am definitely going to give this one a try.

Forbes magazine recently announced their top 10 healthiest candies. Chosen for taste and nutritional benefit, some of their picks are not really candies at all. An apple, which might be considered to be a treat by many people, is not and never will be candy.  A candy is a sweet, a confection and something that should not be confused with a piece of fruit, as the Pop'ems chosen by Forbes surely are; the combination of fruit and nuts, even if called a treat, should never be confused with candy. Taste-wise, a Larabar is a better option if you are going to count fruit as candy, because at least the spicy, complex, adult-tasting Cocoa Mole flavor has a good amount of cocoa powder in it.

Forbes is not off base on all of their choices, but candy still needs to be something at least a little special. Here are Slashfood’s 8 picks for healthiest (or least unhealthy) candies:

• Cocoa Via - Formulated to promote a healthy heart and even lower cholesterol, Cocoa Via chocolate bars are also fortified with nutrients like calcium, folic acid, B6, B12, C and E. The fruits and nuts in the bars make them a little something different, too.
• Adora – Sure, it has fifty percent of your daily recommended calcium, but that doesn’t mean that Adora tastes like it’s healthy. The smooth, rich chocolate comes in dark and milk flavors and will satisfy any sweet tooth in addition to strengthening bones.

From now until the end of August, one of my absolute favorite candies is having a contest. Jelly Belly's Taste the Mystery contest has put one of five mystery flavors into bags of Jelly Belly's and, by identifying the flavor in your bag and typing your secret code in on the contest website you have a chance to win the grand prize of $250,000 among other things. Admittedly, the odds of winning are slim, but I am mostly interested in the new flavors and not the grand prize. The question-marked jelly beans come in Apple Pie, Maple Syrup, Raisin, Ice Cream Sandwich and Papaya. This particular package of mine had the Ice Cream Sandwich beans and I can assure you that they are excellent. I hope they add at least a few of the new flavors to the famous 49-flavor mix when the contest ends.

[Photo by Nicole Weston]