Sweeten your day with...

Confections

Our focus is on celebrating confections – whether chocolate covered bon bons or gloriously simple caramels – produced using locally grown, natural, minimally processed ingredients that celebrate regional culture and tradition, highlight American terroir and exemplify excellence in the candy making craft.

About

The Good Food Awards rely on the expertise of the confections community to create the tasting, determine judges and set standards for the category. Read on to learn who has been integral to building the category, as well as what the confections standard are and who will be judging this year.

Commitee

Co-Chairs

Jessica Lesh Koehler

General Manager, The Meadow

 Jessica is the General Manager and Purchaser for the Meadow.

 

Kaitlin Hansen

The Meadow

Judges 2024

Mitch Daugherty

Director, Built Oregon

Heather Keisler Fornes

Executive Director, Portland Fruit Tree Project

Sarah Masoni

Product & Process Development Team Manager, Food Innovation Center

Natalia Toral

Marketing, Sales & Events Director, Chefstable Group

Sara Ashcraft

Account Director, Rain Agency

Holly Hukill

Director of Operations, Groundworks Industries

Michael Haller

Strength and Condition Coach, Cully Strength

Frank McDonnell

Founder, Full Service Commerce

Lindsay McDonnell

Executive Director, Project Lemonade

Sarah Hart

Damon Sullivan

CEO, Concrete

David Briggs

Senior Recipe Developer, Salt and Straw

Sarah Weiner

Executive Director, Good Food Foundation

Standards

In order to be eligible for a Good Food Award, confections entries must meet the following standards:

  • Made in the USA or US territories.
  • Free of artificial ingredients, including colors, flavors and preservatives.
  • Free of genetically modified ingredients.
  • Free of high fructose corn syrup.
  • Sugar must be Organic or Fair Trade certified or traceable to the farm level.*
  • If made with chocolate, it must be premium couverture and may not be made with substitute fats as alternatives to cocoa butter. Additionally this chocolate cannot be made with GM sugar, GM lecithin or alternatives to real vanilla (ie flavoring).
  • If made with dairy and other animal-derived ingredients, these are locally sourced and/or certified organic; free range; hormone-free; and from animals raised using good animal husbandry.**
  • If made with inclusions and flavorings that are grown domestically, they are locally sourced wherever possible; traceable; and grown without the use of synthetic herbicides, pesticides, fungicides or fertilizers.***
  • If made with inclusions and flavorings that are not grown domestically on a commercial scale, they are farm-direct, certified organic or Fair Trade certified.**
  • Made by a crafter that is an upstanding member of the good food community, committed to equity and inclusion in all levels of their business,**** as exemplified through integrating these practices:
    • Creating a safe and healthy work environment where employees receive a fair wage, are safe and respected at work and have access to the resources they need to keep themselves healthy.
    • Offering a diversity, equity, and inclusion training to staff members and/or leadership annually.
    • Thoughtfully acknowledging the heritage of culturally-specific food on websites, packaging and/or marketing materials.
    • For the small percentage of Good Food community that operates on a significantly larger scale, meeting additional criteria related to board diversity, maternity leave and employment practices.****

*Sugar traceable to the farm level will be evaluated on a case by case basis.
**The Good Food Foundation will refer to GAP Level 5 guidelines to define “good animal husbandry” should there be any questions as to eligibility based on this criterion.
***If less than 2% of ingredients in the product do not meet this stipulation, the entry will not be disqualified.
****Check if you are in the 2% of companies meeting the Good Food Foundation definition of large scale, and review the addition criteria on the Rules & Regulations page.

Subcategories

Additionally, confections entries must fit within one of the following subcategories:

  • Candy (Gummies, Taffy, Lollipops, Licorice)
  • Marshmallows, Nougats, Torrones
  • Caramels, wrapped
  • Caramels, chocolate covered
  • Brittles & Toffees
  • Chocolates: Truffles, Creams, Bon-bons, Pralines
  • Fruit: Pate De Fruit, Candied Fruit and Peel, Fruit Gelee
  • Sweet Snacks: Dragees
  • Candy Bars
  • Flavored & Inclusion Bars*
  • Sauces & Spreads

*Bean-to-bar makers must enter flavored or inclusion bars in the Chocolate category.

Couverture

Note that we encourage but do not require that Confections entrants use domestically produced craft chocolate that is made with beans from a traceable source, purchased at a price above Fair Trade standard pricing, with focus on sustainable farming.