Candyfreak: A Journey through the Chocolate Underbelly of America by Steve Almond

Author:Steve Almond
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Algonquin Books
Published: 2004-05-04T04:00:00+00:00

7

SOUTHERN-FRIED FREAK

I do know an unfortunate number of southerners, as a result of attending a university in North Carolina (state motto: Why Can’t You Be More Polite?), and virtually all of them, when I mentioned candy bars, assumed that the Goo Goo Cluster would be at the top of my list. It was not. Part of the reason for this is that candy bars are not often grist for literary culture and thus have been spared the relentless invocation of other such southernisms as kudzu, moonshine, Co-Cola, and Shiloh.

Nonetheless, Goo Goos are by far the best-known candy bar in the South, and certainly the most ornate. They’re giant turtle-looking critters, with marshmallow and caramel in the center and peanuts scattered on top. The Goo Goo Supreme, which features pecans rather than peanuts, was cited by no less an authority than Ray Broekel as his favorite candy bar in the world and he swore to me that I could find them up North, that he had, in fact, bought one just a couple of weeks earlier “in town.” This led me on a wild-goose chase through the suburban precincts of Ipswich, where I would not recommend you look for a Goo Goo Cluster. Nor would I necessarily recommend that you fly down to Nashville, as I did, in order to track down a Goo Goo.

Then again, Goo Goo production is incredibly cool to watch, and Joanne, the marketing director for Standard Candy Company, is also incredibly cool (once you get to know her) and she will give you lots of free Goo Goos. The parenthetical caveat is the result of a lengthy series of phone calls and e-mails, during which I tried to determine on exactly which days Goo Goos would be in production, while Joanne tried to determine whether or not I was insane.

She was much nicer in person, an attractive, fortyish woman with a blond bob and the indefatigable enthusiasm of a camp counselor. On the day I showed up, a Monday, the Goo Goos were not in production. Joanne felt bad about this. She promised that if I came back the next day, I could watch Goo Goos being made, and, as a token of goodwill, she led me through the factory, which was busily cranking out a diet bar for a well-known weight-loss company. The diet bar consisted of: chocolate, crisped rice, and caramel.

I will leave it to the reader to determine just what sort of “diet” would encourage the consumption of these ingredients, though it bears mentioning that this product is but one in a tsunami of pseudo–candy bars, variously called PowerBars, Granola bars, Energy Bars, Clif Bars, Breakfast Bars, Snack Bars, Wellness Bars, and so on, all of which contain roughly the same sugar and fat as an actual candy bar—with perhaps a dash of protein sawdust thrown in—but only half the guilt, and stand as a monument both to shameless marketing and the American capacity for self-delusion, particularly in matters related to consumption (see also: frozen yogurt, fat-free chips, and low-calorie lard).

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