Cotton candy (or "fairy floss" to Brits) traditionally comes in two flavors: blue and pink. If it's a good day, yellow too. Each flavor tastes incredibly similar to one another. Even though cotton candy is supposed to be fun and whimsical, it typically tastes like sugary food dye.
But one company is bringing fairy floss back to life. Sugar and Spun, located in San Francisco, California, is creating delectable flavors never before heard of in cotton candy. Unlike a typical fair's flavors, they aren't just named after a color.
What Makes Sugar and Spun Special
Jason Angeles, one of the co-founders of the company, explained he had never dreamed of owning a business, let alone one that sells one of his favorite childhood foods. However, when he was watching the movie Shrek and saw Fiona eat a cotton candy-like stick of cobwebs with spiders weaved in it, a lightbulb went off. Angeles had the brilliant idea of swirling different ingredients into spun sugar. Luckily, instead of bugs, Sugar and Spun uses goodies such as cookie crumbles, peanut butter powder, and even habanero peppers. Plus, most of the flavors are vegan, gluten free, and GMO free.
As the business expands, so do their flavors. They come out with seasonal flavors, but also have standard flavors you can buy year round. The most popular flavors include Peanut Butter and Jelly, Li Hing Pineapple, Spicy Mango, Cookie Butter, and Matcha Green Tea Latte.
The company was super sweet *pun intended* and sent me some of their most popular flavors to try out. Each of the variations was perfectly sweet, and not too overwhelming. I was also pleasantly surprised to find out each large tub only contained 150-220 calories. For a quick and flavorful treat, it's definitely worth it.
Strawberry Shortcake
Description: This is S&S's most popular flavor for a reason. Because it uses powdered freeze-dried strawberries, the flavor is all-natural and all delicious. The vanilla cream cookies sprinkled throughout added a nice touch. However, the cookies were in big enough pieces that some of them fell out and made a mess on my kitchen floor. My family thought this one was the most "normal" of the flavors and were reminded of their childhood.
Sugar High Scale: 9/10
Habanero Pineapple
Description: As I'm not the hugest lover of spicy food, especially since I don't have a strong tolerance, I was a bit scared. Upon first taste, the airy treat turned into a perfectly pineapple bite. But then, the pepper hit me. It was slightly over-powering, and I suddenly craved an ice-cold gallon of milk. If you like spicy food, this is the flavor for you. I'd rather have had the pineapple flavor sans habanero.
Sugar High Scale: 7/10
Chocolate Hazelnut Banana
Description: Judge all you want, but my favorite flavor of Laffy Taffy is none other than banana. From just the smell, I could tell this was going to be good. While the banana flavor was prominent, the house-made chocolate hazelnut powder seemed to get lost in the mix. As banana cotton candy, it scores high. As chocolate hazelnut banana, its score has to be pushed down a few points.
Sugar High Scale: 7.5/10
Salted Chocolate Peanut Butter
Description: To all my fellow peanut butter lovers, yes, it is just as good as it sounds. I was slightly concerned reading that it was salted, but the sweet and salty combination worked perfectly. I could have easily eaten the whole container, but I had just tried 3 before. This was definietly the most fluffy of the bunch, and was a clear stand-out.
Sugar High Scale: 10/10
The Verdict
Each flavor I tried had a very distinct, unique quality to it. They were all very airy and definitely reminded me of eating cotton candy at my county's fair. Despite it being in a tub, it tasted like it was freshly spun.
With a product this good, it is a must-have. To get your own, you can either purchase it on their website and get it shipped to your door, or buy it from one of their retailers located in over 40 of the states. To see if they sell it near you, check out this list on their website. It's a sugar high you don't want to miss.