Shopping in Seattle, with a sugar rush

Thanks for coming back for my second post about Seattle!  In this post I'll tell you about my new favorite candy store along with some unique finds inside of it.  Read my previous post listing essential candy to buy while you're in Seattle (or buy online if you're not taking a trip) here.

During my time in Seattle I wanted to explore a new area and while I was at it, check out a popular candy store.  If you're in town, you must check out University Village.  It's a lovely, serene, outdoor shopping mall with a huge, food-serving, tea-tasting Teavana store among other clothing/beauty/home stores.  It also holds my new favorite candy spot in Seattle: The Confectionery.  Here's the entrance and some interior shots:

perfectly organized tables by theme!

This store has everything, lots of old favorites as well as new and hard-to-find candies.  The OCD in me loved that they had little tables set up by theme, and the germophobe in me loved that all of the candy was either pre-packaged or packaged-to-order by the adorable girls behind the counter.  These coed's could not have been sweeter and they let you taste anything you want in the store.  The Confectionery is unique in that the candy is bulk candy but not accessible without some help from the staff.  The candies are pre-bagged or the staffer will weigh and bag a custom portion for you.  This really appealed to my inner Howard Hughes as it keeps the general public from scooping (and contaminating) the candy jars themselves.

Here's a rundown of my experience in the store.  First, I am a crazy lover of all things pumpkin and was initially side tracked by this fantastic fall spread.  They had one of my seasonal favorites, pumpkin spice caramels (see the tall orange jar below) which got me reeeeally excited to stuff my face with all things pumpkin for the changing weather:

fun fall candies, including pumpkin spice caramels

then, I passed by the chocolate counter and stared at their chocolate covered candy for awhile...

...and these halloween chocolates...

...and these adorable wedding mints!

But thankfully, I had come with a plan in mind so I was able to control myself (just barely!) and continue down the counter to find what I was looking for: their unique and hard-to-find collection of malt balls and caramels including my new favorite, birthday cake caramels.  Yaaaay!  Birthdays for everyone!

huge selection of flavored caramels

uniquely flavored malt balls

Overwhelmed with excitement, I asked the very patient coed behind the counter if I could try her favorite caramel (chocolate peanut butter) along with a red apple caramel, a cookies and cream caramel, and a bag of birthday cake caramels which are my new favorite and hard to find so a stockpile was mandatory.  (I should mention too that I LOVE pumpkin spice caramels but have tasted them several times before so I didn't buy them at The Confectionery.  Make it known though, pumpkin spice caramels are a great iteration on the pumpkin theme and a solid choice.  Buy them!)  From the malt ball section I tasted the pumpkin spice and the gingerbread.  Here are my tasting notes (my totes?) on the malt balls and caramels:

gingerbread malt ball

pumpkin spice malt ball

I found the gingerbread malt ball to be a little ho-hum but the pumpkin spice one had a nice layer of pumpkin, chocolate and malt ball flavoring.  Def worth a taste if you like malt balls and pumpkin flavors.

Next was the chocolate peanut butter caramel, a staff favorite for good reason.  It was a great blend of three flavors involving an outer coating of milk chocolate, followed by a layer of peanut butter and then a chewy, caramel center which sort of glues all three flavors in your mouth for awhile while you chew it down.  It was so good that I went back inside (shame-be-damned!) to buy a bag of them.

chocolate peanut butter caramel

chocolate peanut butter caramel interior

yah, I went back for more

The cookies and cream caramel was good but tasted a little chalky/fake.  Not as oreo-y as I would have liked.  The red apple caramel kinda tasted like a red apple but the red flavoring was a little too strong and had that fake apple flavor to it.  In theory, a red apple caramel is a winning combination but in reality it tried too hard.

What DIDN'T disappoint were the birthday cake caramels...just as dreamy and amazing as the first time I encountered them:

ethereal bday cake caramels

 When I saw that they had birthday cake caramels I got a little more excited than someone should.  I think I even did a little dance while she scooped and weighed them for me.   Never thought I would see them again, dreams really do come true.

So overall the Seattle trip was a real winner in the candy department.  From the moment you touch down in Seattle, head straight to the stores in the airport to pick up my Seattle candy essentials.  Then be sure to check out University Village and visit the cheerful, adorable staff at The Confectionery.  Taste their hard-to-find, unique caramels and malt balls and show me your favorites by tagging me on Instagram @thecandyquestblog.  Happy Questing!