When in Switzerland, raid the chocolate section at a local COOP. Their store-brand chocolate is fantastic, especially the organic dark.

Other than that, get anything from Callier (sp?), Chocolate Frey or even Lindt. You wouldn't believe the difference between what Lindt sells in Switzerland and elsewhere, even if the label is identical...

In Germany, just go to Aldi (they have 4,000 stores in Germany, should be easy to find anywhere) and buy their Moser-Roth chocolates and pralines, especially before Christmas. Great quality, low prices.

I also thought of GooGoo's as soon as I saw this topic. I remember being disappointed in them. When we first arrived in Knoxpatch 20 years ago, we were given a box of them, maybe 24 in the box and I threw out 20. 4 kids and none would eat a second one.

I'm more a fan of long gone or almost gone candy like the Nestle Skybar or Necco Wafers or b-b-bats or Sugar Daddys.

Most candy bars overseas taste better than their USA equivalents. I was not aware of this until after marrying a Brit. She prefers candy from England, and she's exactly correct. A Mars Bar from England beats the equivalent Milky Way in the USA by about a mile. The Bounty Bar in England tastes so much better than the Almond Joy in the USA.

Even the soda pops in Europe are better than in the USA. My friends in Germany say they cannot stand to drink cola beverages in the USA because they can taste the chlorine in the water we use to make the drink. Well, guess what, so can I! It's especially noticeable on your very first soda when you get to Europe, and of course on your very first one when you get back to the USA.

What about the fact that we use High Fructose Corn Syrup instead of Sucrose (table sugar or just sugar) in candies and sodas?

End the embargo on Cuba and stop subsidizing corn and see what happens to our food.

Bassetts Jelly Babies and wine gums. Even though we can get them here in Australia, they taste BETTER if bought from the UK. Unique Australian? Tim Tams. Mum was sending me care packages when I lived in the UK made up entirely of Tim Tams and Natural Confectionary jellies - neither of which lasted very long once word got around the expat aussies at college taht I had a stash.

Mmmm - can your mom send me a care package? ;) I tried Tim Tams for the first time when we were in Australia in December, and brought 3 packages home with me to the U.S. They are so good, and I like how I can justify to myself that they are a tea biscuit, and not a candy bar....

[QUOTE=TIMP;9329120]Unique Australian? Tim Tams. QUOTE]

I get Tim Tam care packages from family in Aus ~ (rewards for being a GREAT Auntie, I'm told :D ) but we have a variety available here called Arnott's Biscuits and guess what?! Tim Tams by another name ;)

Two web sites to find some of those hard to find goodies

www:hometown favorites.com
has some of the older things we remember from past years

www.foodireland.com
has some of the canadian and european candies.

Fried Oreos are a personal favorite. They're at the fairs here in PA and I don't know where else...perhaps on the boardwalks.

I love Fran's Gold Bars...which I saw were sold at Whole Foods down in San Diego, too, so they might actually be more widely available than before. They're made in Seattle (or at least got their start here; I remember going to Fran's shop years ago, before you could get her stuff in other stores).

Love the KitKats in Japan...but oddly, never thought to try any in Canada. I'll have to give them a go! ^

And hokey pokey...I've been making them using Nigella Lawson's recipe and it's pretty daggone easy to do. Although I am still finding bits in mystical places in my kitchen, where the first smack on them with a mallet scattered pieces far and wide.

I have been wanting to order the original flavor hula hoops from foodireland but they are out of stock every time I check!

[QUOTE=YYCWoMaN;9330011]It was a friend from Canada who first turned me on to TimTams. FYI, she bought them at her local grocery store in BC and they were packaged as TimTams.

Luckily I found a few spots in NYC that now carry them. ^

Before that I had them shipped in from of all places.....Arkansas :D

Coffee Crisp afficianados, never fear: http://www.coffeecrisp.org/coffeecrisp/sightings.asp is here. You can find locations by state. The site started a petition in 2000 to bring Coffee Crisp to the U.S., and was successful. Other countries have other flavor variations: caramel, triple mocha, french vanilla, orange, maple, etc. -- even yogurt and ice cream. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffee_Crisp

From their "News" page: "2006
Nestle Launches www.Nestle-CoffeeCrisp.com:
Along with their US launch, the folks at Nestle created Nestle-CoffeeCrisp.com. The site lists several chains carrying Coffee Crisp as well as a request form for the public to petition their local store into stocking Coffee Crisp.

Nestle Sells Coffee Crisp Nationally:
During the early summer of 2006 the petition received tips that Nestle might finally be marketing Coffee Crisp nationwide. The rumor was confirmed when we were contacted by the firm responsble for marketing Coffee Crisp in the U.S. At long last, what the petition was created to do and made noise for six long years [since 2000] had finlly been achieved. To boot, as the only Coffee Crisp "fan" site on the web, Nestle was generous enough to ship the petition eight cases of Coffee Crisp bars, four of which we decided would be given away in a contest. "
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Now I go by British shops, and other ethnic stores influenced by that culture and find Chicken-flavo(u)red chips and other chocolates mentioned in this thread.
If I could only find Shreddies without going to www.canadianfavourites.com or http://www.canadaonly.ca/ or http://www.snowbirdhelper.com/canadian_foods.htm (the new home for www.alwayscanadian.com) or www.britishdelights.com . Wikipedia says they are "sold in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada and New Zealand". That new rule about charging for an extra suitcase will -kill- me when trying to take 4+ boxes of the stuff back in my luggage at Christmas....
Nanaimo Bars I can make from scratch...

And the Belgian Chocolate they have. Heavenly.

Something totally different and from Minnesota, USA. Pearson's Salted Nut Roll.

Nothing screams "regional candy bar" more than the...


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