Open Flavor Fridays - Holiday Cookies & Candy

I really like flavor experiences. That's rather obvious. Much of the American traditions around the late November through early January time period is about eating things that you don't consume normally. That is especially true for candies and cookies.

The joke goes that you know it is Christmas time because it is the only time of the year that eating cookies for breakfast is acceptable.

There are certain things that my family does well - lemon bars, little fudge things, various cookies. None, not a one, bring out awesome memories like the buckeye.

What's a buckeye? It's a peanut butter ball dipped in chocolate. My family from the Toledo area of Ohio calls these buckeyes because they look like the tree's seed. It's a rather common candy out there.

And every time I eat one, including the one I had from one of my wife's coworkers (they used dark chocolate), brings me back to Christmas in the 80s, a snowy hill, a roaring fire and about 30 members of the family. All in a tiny town of Waterville. There were two trees (cut from their own property, or living ones to be planted). Train sets.  Now it sits in my memory vault like some kind of Rockwell painting or Hallmark movie.

That's a hell of a flavor experience; a story in a couple hundred calories.