The Absolute best Colombian Snacks and Sweet

Ask any Colombian expat what they normally carry again from Colombia, they usually’ll most likely let you know Bon Bon Bum, Nucita, Chocoramo, or different mecato, what we name our staple chocolates and snacks. Colombian snacks spark nationwide pleasure. Lots of them are made by way of native mom-and-pop retail outlets that use nationally grown elements like espresso, corn, and chocolate. And those which were round for many years remind us of our childhoods when, if we didn’t get them in our lunch packing containers, we’d take hold of a handful at birthday events or the varsity’s tienda when nobody was once gazing.

As an expat myself, one of the meals I’ve ignored maximum during the last decade I’ve spent dwelling within the U.S. are those milk-heavy chocolates blended with arequipe (dulce de leche); lollipops with tropical flavors; and savory, tacky, crunchy, treats. Fortuitously, dwelling in New York Town, I’ve been in a position to search out a lot of my favorites on the Colombian bakeries in Jackson Heights, Queens. However for individuals who don’t have a Colombian eatery or comfort retailer close by, there are many choices for locating them on-line, together with Amazon, retail outlets promoting world snacks, or even a subscription field devoted solely to offering per month shipments of Colombian snacks. Listed here are 15 savory and candy mecato which might be smartly price in search of out.

Bon Bon Bum

Those spherical, gum-filled lollipops are a birthday party staple. They arrive in a number of fruit flavors, together with strawberry, lulo, tangerine, passionfruit, watermelon, and mango. Bon Bon Bum lollipops are so well-liked in Colombia that we name all gum-filled lollipops by way of the logo title. In 2020, Colombina, the Colombian corporate that makes them, introduced that Walmart would get started distributing the 50-year-old pops within the U.S.

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Quipitos

Milk is found in many Colombian dishes, and snacks aren’t the exception. Quipitos is a pouch of powdered milk with sweet items that pop to your mouth (they’re principally like Pop Rocks, however milky). No birthday celebration is entire with out those.

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Leche Condensada Tubito

Colombians love condensed milk and principally put it on the entirety: fruit salads, juices, cocktails, and muffins. So it shouldn’t be unexpected that we even have a condensed milk snack. Known as El Tubito, it’s quite simple, consisting of only a tube (fashioned like a tube of toothpaste), full of condensed milk. I might devour one nearly on a daily basis right through my faculty lunch breaks. At the moment, there’s additionally a chocolate-flavored model.

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Maní Moto

First invented by way of a Jap immigrant in Mexico, Maní Moto is the Colombian similar of Mexico’s cacahuates japoneses. They’re peanuts with a crunchy, fairly candy wheat-flour coating. They’ve lengthy been a Colombian lunch field mainstay.

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Chocoramo

With over 70 years of historical past, Chocoramo has been rightfully referred to as Colombia’s most renowned cake by way of native newspapers. Circle of relatives-owned corporate Ramo began making the for my part packaged slices of vanilla pound cake lined in milk chocolate in 1950 and ever since, generations of Colombians have grown up consuming them for breakfast or a snack with a pitcher of milk.

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Choclitos

My mouth waters each and every time I call to mind Choclitos — and the way may it no longer? They’re intensely acidic lime-flavored corn tortilla chips and the easiest savory afternoon snack. A brand new highly spiced model debuted in 2019.

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Tozinetas Fred

Snacking on bacon is if truth be told conceivable with those wheat-based, bacon-flavored chips referred to as Tozinetas Fred. They regularly include a pouch of honey connected to the bag, to be poured onto the chips for a sweet-salty snack.

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Bon Yurt

In easy phrases, Bon Yurt is a cup of yogurt that includes a serving of cereal on most sensible. However what makes it distinctive — and other from identical U.S. variations like YoCrunch — is that the yogurt is made by way of Colombian dairy corporate Alpina, and it’s a lot sweeter and creamier than, say, Yoplait. My favourite model comes with Frosted Flakes, however crunchy cocoa and granola toppings also are choices.

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Barrilete

A chewy, bubblegum-flavored taffy, Barrilete, is ever-present in Colombian celebrations and birthday events.

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Supercoco

There’s no speaking about Colombian sweet and snacks with out speaking about Supercoco. Round for the reason that Fifties, those chewy caramel chocolates with items of shredded coconut began with a circle of relatives recipe that was once itself impressed by way of the normal cocadas, or coconut sweet, made in Cartagena.

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Espresso Pride

Colombia produces one of the highest espresso on the planet, so after all we’d have a well-liked espresso sweet. Espresso Pride is a coffee-flavored caramel hard-candy made 100% with Colombian espresso. Colombina, the corporate that makes them, additionally has a chewy model, which I favor.

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Nucita

Colombians of my era grew up with a jingle selling Nucita: “Nutritiva y sabrosita” (nutritious and scrumptious). And possibly that’s a part of the explanation why we’re all obsessive about those mini servings of hazelnut and milk pudding that include a tiny spoon. (Mexico has its personal model in Duvalín.)

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Rosquitas

Dairy merchandise strike once more with Rosquitas: Those are donut-shaped, tacky baked chips made with tapioca starch. There are a number of manufacturers to make a choice from, from the extra mainstream sorts produced by way of Frito-Lay, to lesser recognized variations like Los angeles Niña and Rosquillas Caleñas.

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Chocolatinas Jet

Chocolatinas Jet are iconic. Rising up, I used to be obsessive about those milk chocolate bars, most commonly as a result of they got here with stickers of Colombian landscapes and animals that you need to later upload to a sticker-collecting album made by way of the century-old manufacturing facility Compañía Nacional de Sweets. However they’re additionally scrumptious. The chocolate’s specifically creamy style and cushy texture is most definitely owed to the truth that Colombia is one among only a few dozen international locations on the planet to supply what’s referred to as “advantageous cocoa” or top quality cacao. Right through the corporate’s 100 years of life, it has added permutations like Jumbo Jet, which is a bigger bar and is derived with peanuts; Wafer Jet, a chocolate-covered wafer; and Burbujas Jet, chocolate muffins full of dulce de leche.

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Chokis

Chokis mix two of Colombia’s culinary staples: the aforementioned chocolate, and corn. The crunchy, ethereal corn puffs lined with milk chocolate are available rather tiny luggage, so it’s just about unattainable to not open up every other one (or a couple of extra) in an instant after completing the primary.

Valeria Ricciulli is a New York Town-based Colombian journalist. Her paintings has gave the impression in New York Mag, Curbed, DNAinfo NY, and El Diario NY. Clay Williams is a Brooklyn-based photographer.