Easter

Bunny Ears, Bunny Tails, and Lots of Eggs: Which Do You Head for First?

March 24, 2016 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

Easter candy, 100 and 200 calories

Peeps, jellybeans, and chocolate eggs are extremely popular types of Easter candy, but the National Confectioners Association says that on Easter, children head for chocolate Easter bunnies first.

No matter how old we are, we all have our preferred way of attacking the chocolate rabbit. Just so you know where you rank, 76% of us eat the ears first, 13% bite off the feet, and 10% go for the tail. Sixty-five percent of adults prefer milk chocolate; 27% prefer dark chocolate.

Bunnies aren’t the only chocolate treat of the season. Chocolate eggs — solid, hollow, decorated, candy-coated, and filled with sweetness – give the bunnies a race through the grass.

Easter Bunnies and Eggs – the Confectionary Type

Chocolate Easter eggs, along with chocolate bunnies, first made their appearance in the 1800’s. They can be found everywhere and at every price point, some decorated with flowers and others wrapped in foil. You can find them in chain stores, discount stores, high-end chocolatiers, and sitting in a bowl on just about every receptionist’s desk.

Easter is the second ranked holiday for candy purchases in the United States (just behind Halloween) and solid, hollow, and filled chocolate Easter eggs and chocolate bunnies are extremely popular choices.

Hollow and Solid Chocolate Easter Eggs

Today’s Easter eggs are mostly sweet chocolate made from cocoa solids, fat, sugar, and some form of milk. The first chocolate eggs were solid and made of a ground roasted cacao bean paste. Hollow eggs didn’t come on the scene until sometime later when a type of “eating chocolate” was developed. By the turn of the 19^th century the improved process of making chocolate, along with newer manufacturing methods, made chocolate Easter eggs an Easter gift of choice.

Decorated with Flowers and Wrapped in Shiny Foil

John Cadbury developed the first French eating chocolate in 1842, but the first Cadbury Easter eggs didn’t arrive until 1875. A far cry from today’s Cadbury Crème egg, early Cadbury eggs were smooth surfaced dark chocolate filled with small silver candy balls called dragees.

Today’s Cadbury Crème Egg has a chocolate shell and a filling that’s a mix of white and yellow fondant made of sugar and water beaten into a crème. Since the first egg was made in the 1920s, new varieties include fillings of caramel, chocolate, mint, and peanut butter.

The average calories in popular types of chocolate Easter eggs:

Hershey’s

Cadbury Chocolate Crème Easter Egg, 1 egg (39g): 180 calories, 8g fat, 25g carbs
Cadbury Crème Egg, original milk chocolate with soft fondant crème center, 1 egg (39g): 170 calories, 6g fat), 28g carbs
Cadbury Mini Eggs, 1 package (1.4 ounces): 190 calories, 9g fat, 27g carbs
Cadbury Mini Caramel Eggs, 4 pieces (1.3 ounces): 180 calories, 9g fat, 23g carbs
Cadbury Mini Egg, 12 eggs (40g): 200 calories, 9g fat, 28g carbs
Milk Chocolate (foil) Eggs, 7 pieces (1.4 ounces): 200 calories, 12g fat, 24g carbs
Candy Coated Eggs, 8 pieces (1.3 ounces): 180 calories, 8g fat, 27g carbs

Dove

Silky Smooth Milk Chocolate Eggs, 6 eggs: 240 calories, 14g fat, 26g carbs
Foil Dark/Milk Chocolate Eggs, 6 eggs (1.5 ounces): 230 calories, 14g fat, 26g carbs

Reese’s

Milk Chocolate and Peanut Butter Eggs, 5 pieces (38g): 190 calories, 12g fat, 21g carbs
Reese’s Pastel Eggs, 12 pieces (1.4 ounces): 190 calories, 8g fat, 25g carbs
Reese’s Giant Peanut Butter Egg (whole egg, 6 ounces): 880 calories, 52g fat, 100g carbs

M&M’s

Milk Chocolate Speck-Tacular Eggs: 1/4 Cup (12 pieces): 210 calories, 10g fat, 29g carbs
M&M’s Peanut Butter Eggs, ¼ cup: 220 calories, 13g fat, 23g carbs
M&M’s Pretzel Eggs, ¼ cup: 180 calories, 6g fat, 28g carbs

Snickers

Original Peanut Butter Egg (1.1 ounce): 160 calories, 10g fat, 18g carbs
Snickers Mini Filled Egg (0.9 ounce): 130 calories, 6g fat, 17g carbs

Russell Stover

Caramel Egg (1 ounce): 130 calories, 6g fat, 19g carbs
Truffle Egg (1 ounce): 140 calories, 8g fat, 15g carbs

Whoppers

Robin Eggs, 8 pieces (1.4 ounces): 180 calories, 5g fat, 3g carbs
Mini Robin Eggs, 24 pieces (1.4 ounces): 190 calories, 5g fat, 35g carbs

Nestle

Butterfinger Eggs, 5 pieces (1.5 ounces): 210 calories, 11g fat, 29g carbs
Crunch Eggs, 5 pieces (1.3 ounces): 190 calories, 10g fat, 25g carbs

The average calories in popular types of chocolate Easter bunnies:

Solid Milk Chocolate Easter Bunny (2.5 ounces): 370 calories (average)

Dove Solid Chocolate Easter Bunny, whole bunny (4.5 ounces): 675 calories

Cadbury Solid Milk Chocolate Easter Bunny: 890 calories

Lindt Dark/Milk Chocolate Bunny (1.4 ounces): 225 calories

Sees Whole Bunny (4.5 ounces): 650 calories

Reese’s Peanut Butter/Reester, whole bunny (5 ounces): 720 calories

Russell Stover, whole bunny (4 ounces): 630 calories

Kosher Chocolate Candy

According to the Hershey Company website, Hershey’s candy coated milk chocolate eggs, chocolate crème eggs, peanut butter eggs, and all hershey’s kisses arel OUD.

How Much Easter Candy You Can Eat for 180 Calories or Less?

Most of us don’t need a reason to indulge on a holiday – it is a celebration, after all. But, just in case you want to “carefully” indulge on Easter candy, here’s how much of your favorite candy you can gobble down to the tune of 100 calories:

17 Brach’s jellybeans = 102 calories (6 calories each)

5 Peeps = 98 calories (28 calories for one Peep)

6 Cadbury mini eggs = 96 calories (16 calories for one mini egg)

2/3 of a Cadbury Crème egg = 100 calories (one egg is 150 calories)

5 Cadbury mini crème eggs = 100 calories (one Cadbury mini crème egg has 40 calories)

2/3 of a Cadbury caramel egg = 113 calories (one Cadbury caramel egg has 170 calories)

2 Cadbury mini caramel eggs = 90 calories (one Cadbury mini caramel egg has 45 calories)

2/3 Reese’s peanut butter egg = 113 calories (one Reese’s peanut butter egg has 170 calories)

5 Hershey’s milk chocolate eggs = 102 calories (one Hershey’s milk chocolate egg has 29 calories)

4 Reese’s Peanut Butter Mini eggs: 160 calories

Jelly Beans: One by One or by the Handful?

March 20, 2016 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

Jellybeans -- What's Your Favorite Color?

Should jellybeans come with a warning label: “STOP NOW or you’ll keep eating until they’re gone?” It’s pretty darn hard not to love those little nuggets of sweetness that come in multitudes of colors and flavors and get stuck in your teeth! The proof: Americans eat 16 billion jellybeans at Easter – if they were lined up end to end they would circle the earth nearly three times.

Where Did Jellybeans Come From?

The gummy insides of jellybeans are thought to have originated from the centuries old treat, Turkish Delight. Jellybean outsides are just like the colored hard candy coating, developed in the late 17^th century, for the Jordan almond.

The modern jellybean became popular during the American Civil War when Boston’s William Schraft encouraged citizens to send candy to Union soldiers. Jellybeans were the first bulk candy and they became one of the staples of the penny candy that was sold by weight in the early 1900s. Because of their egg shape, which can be taken as representing fertility and birth, they became popular as Easter candy around 1930.

Standard jellybeans come in fruit flavors but there are now a huge number of flavors like spiced, mint, tropical, popcorn, bubble gum, pepper, and cola. They also come in a sugar free version (seems weird, but true – don’t you wonder how many chemicals are in those?). Teenee Beanee jelly beans and Just Born jellybeans are Pareve & O/U; Jelly Bellies are certified OU Kosher.

Do You Eat Them By The Handful Or Pick and Choose?

Do you eat your jellybeans one at a time, or do you gobble them up by the handful? What about colors and flavors – do you pick out your favorites or just eat them altogether?

70% of kids aged 6–11 say they prefer to eat Easter jellybeans one at a time
23% say they eat several at once
Boys (29%) are more likely to eat a handful than girls (18%)
Kids say their favorite Easter jellybean flavors are cherry (20%), strawberry (12%), grape (10%), lime (7%), and blueberry (6%)

What’s In The Hard Shelled Nugget Of Sweetness?

Jelly beans are primarily made of sugar and also usually contain gelatin (Jelly Bellies don’t), corn syrup, modified food starch, and less than 0.5% of citric acid, sodium citrate, artificial flavors, confectioners glaze, pectin, carnauba wax, white mineral oil, magnesium hydroxide, and artificial colors.

The traditional jellybean has flavor only in the shell. In 1976, the Jelly Belly (Goelitz) Candy Company introduced their gourmet jellybeans, Jelly Bellies, which are smaller and softer than the traditional kind and are flavored both inside and outside. Jelly Belly makes about 50 different flavors of gourmet jellybeans.

Calories In Jellybeans:

Even though they may give you Technicolor insides, jellybeans are fat free. On average:

10 small jellybeans (11g) have 41 calories, no fat, no cholesterol, no protein, and 10.3 grams of carbs
10 large jellybeans (1 ounce or 28g) have 105 calories, no fat, no cholesterol, no protein, and 26.2g carbs
10 Jelly Bellies have 40 calories (4 calories a piece), or about 100 calories in a single serving (25 beans)

Jelly Bellies

Jelly Bellies were invented in 1976 and were the first jellybeans to be sold in single flavors and a menu of flavor choices.
It takes 7 to 21 days to make a single Jelly Belly jellybean.
Very Cherry was the most popular Jelly Belly flavor for two decades until 1998, when Buttered Popcorn took over. Very Cherry moved back into the top spot by only 8 million beans in 2003.
Jelly Bellies were the first jellybeans in outer space – they were sent on the space shuttle Challenger (1983) by President Reagan, a big jellybean fan.
Jelly Bellies don’t contain gelatin and are suitable for vegetarians, but some strict vegans may have issues with the beeswax and shellac used to give them their final buff and polish.
Jelly Belly jellybeans do not contain any wheat, rye, barley, or oats in the basic recipe. The modified food starch used to manufacture them is cornstarch and all ingredients are free of dairy.

How Far Do You Have To Walk To Burn Off Your Easter Candy?

April 3, 2015 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

If you want to attempt to walk off the chocolate bunnies, jellybeans, and Peeps:

It takes a herculean effort to walk off lots of calories. It’s easier and more efficient to cut down on portion size. In case you want to make an attempt “to walk” off your candy indulgence:

If this is the candy in your Easter basket — and you eat it all:

25 small jellybeans
5 Peeps
8 malted milk robins eggs
1 ounce chocolate bunny
1 Cadbury Creme Egg
4 Lindt Chocolate Carrots

that adds up to 990 calories. You will need to walk 9.9 miles, 15.96 kilometers, or 19,800 steps, assuming you cover one mile in 2,000 steps.

If this is in your basket:

25 small jellybeans
5 Peeps
5 marshmallow chicks
8 malted milk robins eggs
1 large 7 ounce chocolate bunny
1 chocolate-covered marshmallow bunny
1 Cadbury Creme Egg
1 Cadbury Caramel Egg

that comes to 2076 calories. You will need to walk 20.76 miles, 33.48 kilometers, or 41,520 steps, assuming you cover one mile in 2,000 steps.

If you’re going “light” and only eat:

25 small jelly beans
5 Peeps
1 medium (1 3/4 ounce) hollow chocolate bunny
1 Cadbury Creme Egg

you would rack up 730 calories and you will need to walk 7.3 miles, 11.77 kilometers, or 14,600 steps — assuming you cover one mile in 2,000 steps — to walk off that number of calories. Sounds like a lot, but it is very doable over a few days.

Holidays and Celebrations

Holidays are days of celebration. But remember that a holiday is just one day and our bodies can easily compensate for a day of indulgence. Problems start when the holiday eating keeps going and going — which is easy to do when there are cabinets stuffed with Easter candy and bowls full of it every where you turn.

So arm yourself with some information, enjoy your holiday, and don’t feel obliged to eat every piece of candy in sight – the first bites always taste the best!

Please share this post with someone who may have eaten every last chocolate egg and jellybean in the Easter basket!

Happy Easter

How Much Easter Candy Can You Eat For 100 and 200 Calories?

April 1, 2015 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN 2 Comments

Do you need a reason to splurge on a holiday – it is a celebration, after all? But, in case you want to “carefully” indulge on Easter candy, here’s how much of your favorite candy you can gobble down to the tune of 100 calories:

17 Brach’s jellybeans = 102 calories (6 calories each)

5 Peeps = 98 calories (28 calories for one Peep)

6 Cadbury mini eggs = 96 calories (16 calories for one mini egg)

2/3 of a Cadbury Crème egg = 100 calories (one egg is 150 calories)

5 Cadbury mini crème eggs = 100 calories (one Cadbury mini crème egg has 40 calories)

2/3 of a Cadbury caramel egg = 113 calories (one Cadbury caramel egg has 170 calories)

2 Cadbury mini caramel eggs = 90 calories (one Cadbury mini caramel egg has 45 calories)

2/3 Reese’s peanut butter egg = 113 calories (one Reese’s peanut butter egg has 170 calories)

5 Reese’s peanut butter mini eggs = 100 calories (one Reese’s peanut butter mini egg has 40 calories)

5 Hershey’s milk chocolate eggs = 102 calories (one Hershey’s milk chocolate egg has 29 calories)

Over and under the 200 calorie mark:

Higher Calorie Easter Candy (over 200 calories per serving):

5 oz mini bag Cadbury Chocolate Mini Eggs: 210  calories

5 Nestle Butterfinger Easter Nestggs: 210  calories

1/4 cup Pastel Peanut M&M’s: 220  calories

9 Hershey’s Milk Chocolate Pastel Kisses with Almonds: 230  calories

5 Hershey’s Pastel Miniature Chocolates: 230  calories

1 small 2.5 ounce Fannie May Solid Milk Chocolate Rabbit: 420  calories

1 small 7 ounce bag Jelly Belly Jelly Beans: 700 calories

Lower Calorie Easter Candy (under 200 calories per serving):

1 package (5 chicks) Peeps Marshmallow Chicks: 140 calories

1 Cadbury Crème Egg: 150 calories

1 Cadbury Caramel Egg: 170 calories

1/8 cup M&M’s: 105 calories

1 Reese’s Peanut Butter Egg: 180 calories

4 Reese’s Peanut Butter Mini eggs: 160 calories

7 Rolo Pastel Chewy Caramels: 190  calories

Marshmallow Peeps: do you love ‘em or hate ‘em?

March 26, 2015 By Penny Klatell, PhD, RN Leave a Comment

If you have a thing for the fluorescent marshmallow bunnies and chicks that were hatched over 50 years ago, you’re not alone. They got their name – PEEPS — because they were originally modeled after the yellow chick. Now they’re made for Christmas, Halloween, and Valentine’s Day, too — so you can get them in yellow, pink, blue, lavender, orange, and green shapes that represent the different holidays. They also come chocolate dipped.

PEEPS continue to be the subject of lots of design contests (you’d be amazed what you can make out of peeps) and scientific experiments (some claim them to be indestructible). Just Born, the parent company of PEEPS, claims to produce enough PEEPS in one year to circle the Earth twice. Their website even boasts a fan club and a section for recipes.

Millions of Peeps

Each Easter season, Americans buy more than 700 million Marshmallow Peeps shaped like chicks, bunnies, and eggs, making them the most popular non-chocolate Easter candy.
As many as 4.2 million Marshmallow Peeps, bunnies, and other shapes can be made each day.
In 1953, it took 27 hours to create a Marshmallow Peep. Today it takes six minutes.
Yellow Peeps are the most popular, followed by pink, lavender, blue, and white.
Peeps seem to be almost indestructible and are famous for their two-year shelf life. Scientists at Emory University claimed that Peeps eyes “wouldn’t dissolve in anything.” They tried to dissolve Peeps with water, sulfuric acid, and sodium hydroxide. No luck.

Do You Like Your PEEPS Soft Or Crunchy?

People have definite Peeps preferences. Some like them nice and soft, others like to leave them out in the air to age to perfection and acquire a little crunch on the outside.

They’ve been microwaved (careful, they expand and can really make a mess in your microwave), frozen, roasted, used to top hot chocolate, and added to recipes. Because their outer sugar coating tends to burn, they don’t toast well on sticks like regular marshmallows.

What’s In Them?

Send a PEEP to a lab for analysis and you’ll find sugar, corn syrup, gelatin, less than 0.5% of the following ingredients: yellow #5 (tartrazine), potassium sorbate (a preservative), natural flavors, dye, and carnauba wax
They’re gluten and nut free but are not Kosher
You can get sugar free PEEPS that are made with Splenda
Five little chicks (42g, one serving size) will set you back 140 calories, 0g fat, 1g protein, and 36g carbs

If you want more sweet stuff, for 99 cents you can get the lowdown on Easter Candy. Check out my ebook, Easter Candy Facts and Fun on Amazon. You’ll spend less than you would on jelly beans. It’s also way fewer calories than a chocolate bunny!