Here’s how Hercules Candy Company offers holiday chocolate
Hercules Candy Company is rooted in chocolate, and has been since its founding, originally as the Boston Candy Company, in 1910. At its location in at 720 West Manlius Street in East Syracuse, New York, shelves are stocked with classic chocolate bars and innovative recipes like peanut butter coated potato chips and solid milk chocolate Santas playing the guitar. Here are the two chocolate variations in store for the holidays, on the vintage piece of furniture that sits closest to the front door:
1. Chocolate Christmas Bars
“Milk Chocolate Merry Christmas Bars” come in three sizes: large ($3.50), small ($2.50) and smaller ($1.25) — smaller is about equivalent to fun size, and is also available as dark chocolate. Each chocolate bar is wrapped in crinkly red foil and a simple red and white striped label reading “MERRY CHRISTMAS!” They’re displayed in old wood boxes.
One step up from those are the Season’s Greeting bars, displayed in gift boxes, available as milk or dark chocolate for $8.99. They’re about the width of a brick. They’re wrapped in only green or red foil, with a stamped decorative border and the words “Seasons Greetings” (no apostrophe, but who cares about grammar on chocolate?).
Chocolate at Hercules Candy is sold as molded pieces, as bars or just in bulk chunks. Sometimes, Terry’s day includes going at a square of chocolate as big as a coffee table with a hammer to break it into the chunks, which she then places into bags. It’s no nonsense. Just chocolate, the kind with what Terry describes as creamy with a good mouth feel.
“If you need a little fix, it doesn’t get any easier than this,” Terry says. “We sell quite a lot of this.”
Last year, the candy company sold six tons of chocolate.
2. Solid holiday chocolate
Beginning candy makers at Hercules start at the bottom: cleaning and pouring chocolate molds. Holiday themed molds include plain old Santa (displayed in a gift box for $5.99), Santa with a guitar (bagged with a green or red translucent ribbon as white or milk chocolate, $2.99), a Christmas tree puzzle (with M&M ornaments, $7.99) and chocolate snowmen (with red chocolate scarves, $2.99). Each chocolate piece is solid.
But everyone does their duty filling molds every now and then. To perfectly fill the mold, Steve will sit in front of a melted puddle of chocolate. With his right hand, he holds the plastic mold. With his left hand, he scoops the chocolate and squeezes it out of his hand into the mold. By twisting his hand at the very end of the pour, he guarantees no chocolate gets on the outside of the mold. The finishing touch, to make sure every crack is filled, is to tap the bottom of the mold on the table.
Some of the molds the shop uses — such as their metal bunny molds, for Easter — were used by Steve’s grandparents, the founders of the shop. They’re are at least one hundred years old, but the insides of the molds are still shiny and pristine.
“Even though it’s old, it still can be used for years to come,” Steve says.
