The Sweetest Things

New York City has been, and despite Mayor Bloomberg’s best efforts always will be, fertile ground for plenty of vices. Mine is candy. Not chocolate. I’m taking about the hard stuff.


It’s not an addiction, yet. I can make it from meal to meal without a fix, but I do get sudden urges. Walking down the street, I feel a physical pull towards shops where I sense the the promise of sugar — melted and shaped into strangely bright forms — for sale. I tend to favor the sour fruits (raspberry and lemon) and on the other side of the spectrum, creamy flavors like English toffee, coconut and almond. Gummies of any kind, but especially the sugar-dusted sort, are great too.

I blame my candy habit on my childhood. After stories were read and teeth brushed, my father (usually when my mother wasn’t looking) would bribe me and my siblings to stay in our bunk beds with Haribo bears, usually just one, but occasionally two. His mother is French and so he inherited an appreciation for imports, and now so have I.

Sweets, I think, make for the best souvenirs. In Madrid I discovered just how good marzipan could be. After six months in the city, my last stop before heading for the airport was Casa Mira (Carrera de San Jerónimo, 30 or Goya, 6-8) near Puerta del Sol, where I loaded up with half a dozen boxes of it, freshly made, to bring home to my family at Christmas. In Berlin, Kadó is where I converted to the dark side — of licorice, that is. They have over 400 varieties, from intensely strong, smoky and salty (and nearly inedible) to mild and sweet, covered in chocolate or filled with liquor. From Istanbul, I took home hunks of halva, the kind speckled with pistachios and almonds.

The US has no shortage of candy. Unfortunately, most of it is terrible. But if there’s a place to find high quality confections, it is New York. Sticky, chewy, gooey, nutty and buttery, imported and exported: this is a city with a candy — and a candy store — for every taste. And I confess that while I do love eating candy, really it is the shopping — the sampling, the picking and mixing — that gives me a thrill. It’s a chance to be part-owner in a rainbow — admittedly, a childish fantasy, but one that comes rather inexpensively compared to New York’s other tempting collectibles, Jimmy Choos or Eames rockers for example.

Candy is about as far removed from today’s purist food fetish as Andy Warhol is from Thomas Eakins, but I’d like to think that these shops serve as evidence that my favorite guilty pleasure still has a place in this city.

Papabubble
On the outer fringes of SoHo/NoLIta is Papaubabble — artisan candy makers from Barcelona. At most times, you can walk in and find someone behind the counter actually making candy: neatly braiding and stretching soft ropes of color and then slicing bite-sized pieces for sampling. Flavors range from classic (watermelon, cherry) to more inventive (cinnamon, grapefruit, lime and chili) and the designs are always eye-catching.
380 Broome Street (closed Mondays)

Sockerbit
A white-washed, minimalist candy emporium in the West Village, specializing in traditional Swedish smågodis, or “little sweets.” Like Papabubble, Sockerbit keeps their list of ingredients short and sources colors and flavors naturally. There is a ton of variety here, from familiar treats like Coke-flavored gummies to some confections we bet you haven’t tried, like Skumsvampar Choklad — mushroom-shaped marshmallows dipped in chocolate.
89 Christopher Street

Dewey’s Candy
Dewey’s, in Brooklyn, is probably the most traditional of the lot, stocking classics like Wax Lips, Fun Dip and Pop Rocks. For adults, it’s a trip down memory lane. For kids, it’s paradise.
141 Front Street

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