UPDATED: Riverside Sweets Offers Traditional Chocolates

UPDATE: This article first appeared on Sept. 3. Patch has added additional details and corrected the price per pound of choclate previously listed as $18.99.

Anyone who has read the last three "summer sweets" columns might have begun to wonder if I love all sugary treats equally. I’ve gushed about everything from to and professed my undying love for .

I’m toning my love down a small notch this week for my review of . Don’t get me wrong—they’re still good. They’re just up against some stiff competition.

Traditional delights

In contrast to its European inspired neighbor , Riverside Sweets focuses on old-fashioned, classic candies. You’ll see three shelves of homemade fudge as soon as you walk in. To the left is a long row packed with small bags of classic hard candies, brittle, toffee, caramel, and more. To the right is a display case full of chocolaty temptations. 

Picture it: Oreo cookies dipped in chocolate. Chocolate dipped peanut butter crackers topped with diced peanuts, marshmallows dipped in chocolate and pretzel sticks dipped in chocolate. I asked for one of each. Also on offer: four flavors of golfball-sized truffles. I got an amaretto one bigger than my cheek.

The slightly gritty, soft milkiness of the Riverside Sweets chocolate is reminiscent of what good candy bars used to taste like before the switch to high fructose corn syrup. This is American chocolate, the kind that you have to lick off your fingers before you reach the last bite.

Savoring sweets

Since it was going to take me a couple days to eat through my box of sweets, I left mine in the fridge. I recommend that to everyone. A little cold transformed the chocolate dipped s’mores bar from nice to addictive. It was hands-down my favorite treat of the bunch. The firm layer of marshmallow sandwiched between two graham crackers and dipped in a thick layer of milk chocolate was a heck of a lot better than anything I ever made over a campfire.

Give the peanut butter cookie a try. The dash of peanutty-saltiness on top creates a great contrast to the sweetness of the chocolate and the crunchiness of the cookie itself. This was a close second to the s’mores bar. The flavors of the dipping chocolate and the Oreo cookie together created a surprising bitterness that left me wishing I’d picked up a couple more of these treats. 

American-style chocolate doesn’t always lend itself to truffles. The chocolate itself was too soft to hold its shape as I tried to nibble at the massive confection. I ended up with a lot of the exterior melted onto my fingers.

If you like sweets dipped into other sweets, this is your place. It isn’t fair to critique stale candy, so in the face of all that temptation I struggled to pick an amount of a sane person could reasonably sample in a few days. That meant I didn’t add on one of the quarter pound blocks of fudge nor did I indulge in the ice cream. 

The verdict

The variety at Riverside Sweets leaves a sweet taste in the mouth. Did I mention the rock candy, assorted gummies, candy blocks, sour worms, Australian licorice, seasonal favorites, taffy, and jelly bellys? And, for a summer flashback there's ice cream, too.

For chocolate rates start at $18.95 per pound, and individual items are also priced by weight.

I give Riverside Sweets a B+.