UNREAL – Candy Unjunked!

What would you say if I told you that all the candy pictured below was free of corn syrup, hydrogenated fats, GMOs, artificial colors, flavors, or preservatives AND used gluten-free ingredients?

Not only that, but all those unwanted items were replaced with real cane sugar, real milk, more peanuts, and twice the cacao. UNREAL is a new brand that just launched and is on a mission to unjunk ‘junk’ food.

Last week, I had a chance to attend a blogger event and hear all about the company and its products firsthand. Samples abounded and tasting trays were constantly being restocked.

The whole concept of UNREAL was based on a young boy’s challenge to his father, trying to prove that candy wasn’t as bad as his father thought. Instead, he found out just how bad it was. The ingredients in question didn’t even affect the taste but made the candies cheaper to produce. Hmph!

That young boy was able to get in contact with lead chefs and scientists and, after some 8,000 recipes, they came up with winning combinations to rival Snickers, Mars, Reese’s Peanut Buter Cups, M&Ms, and M&Ms with peanuts. It all comes down to how they taste and if people, especially kids, will like it.

I wish other companies did this – it’s really tasty!

That was my daughter’s first reaction when tasting the UNREAL peanut butter cups. It echoed the oohs, aahs, and mmms at the luncheon and the overall reception is that they taste the same, if not better, than our ‘old’ favorites. These candies are REALLY good! You do notice that something is different, but in a good way. There’s a fresh aspect to them with no aftertaste. Better still, you don’t get that lingering guilt feeling of shoving X amounts of junk down your throat or those of your kids!

Here are a few tidbits I got from the Q&A portion:

• the cost, set by the retailers, will be the same as the other leading brands
• the shelf life is about the same, the key is in the packaging
• numerous taste tests have been done with most exclaiming, “These taste unreal!”
• packaging tests were done to appeal to everyone
• there are currently only 17 employees
• they will be available at CVS stores nationwide this week!

UNREAL hopes to rattle the current market and encourage the big brands to unjunk as well, changing the way we eat by offering better food choices. By October, they plan for their products to take up serious shelf space in some 30,000 stores. If all goes well, the company will expand into the soda and chip markets.

I really hope that happens. My family enjoyed all five varieties…maybe a little too much since we finished off a box of samples in a couple of days. The peanut butter cups were a bit too creamy for my taste but my daughter loved them. My husband was most skeptical of the bar similar to Snickers but after tasting it (well, chomping it up on under two minutes) he’s convinced of the quality as well.

So join the mission with us and get ‘unjunked’ with UNREAL!