Patsy’s Candies: A Colorado Tradition
By 1903, El Paso County was just hitting its stride as one of the premier tourist destinations of the West, and entrepreneurs from the east coast and Europe alike where looking toward the budding towns at the base of Pike Peak for a future full of hope and prosperity.
One such visionary was Patsy Mahaney, an Irishman who had a recipe for candied popcorn that was a hit around the state and county fair circuit of Indiana. Legend has it that before heading to Colorado, Mahaney lost his famed recipe from a bad hand of poker to a couple of gentlemen who went on to create the iconic American snack, Cracker Jack.
Who woulda thunk the Colorado connection?
Finding a home in Manitou Springs, Mahaney opened a candy shop across from the Manitou Spa, and Patsy’s Original has been a Southern Colorado Institution ever since.
The Original still in Manitou Springs after all these years
The Manitou store is still in operation more than 100 years later, though the factory has since relocated to its home off of South 21st Street. Complimentary tours of the facility are offered twice daily, and to the surprise of my son Tyler and I, they get packed fast. We found ourselves near the tail-end of a group that had swollen to well over thirty to see the Patsy’s operation in action.
Our guide Sharron greeted us in the store that fronts the factory, where a lighted glass case running nearly the entire width of the building displays the confections and separates the finished product out front from the more than a century of tradition held tightly in the back.
The Patsy's candy case at the factory location
The tour began in the Candy Kitchen, where everything not made of chocolate is produced. The area was dominated by huge copper kettles with over sixty years of duty already behind them, as well as an antique industrial popcorn popper that works as well today as it did when it was pulled out of its crate back in 1945. Commanding the back corner was a large tank which resembled a hot water heater, but instead houses over 32,000lbs of corn syrup.
An afternoon batch of candy corn had just gotten underway, releasing the sweet aroma of caramel throughout the building. Tyler, watching with amazement at the sheer scale of the production, tugged at my shirt without taking his wide eyes off the biggest vat of popcorn both of us had ever seen.
“Daddy, it’s like a bathtub of popcorn,” he whispered. I couldn’t have put it any better myself.
In back of the Candy Kitchen was the polished stainless steel confectioner’s table which can cool a 110lb river of toffee down in just 20 minutes before then rolling it out and cutting it up with its automated pizza cutter-like accessories.
The taffy area stood behind the table; a trio of machines that stretch and roll massive batches of the classic boardwalk candy. Each of the now 17 flavors of taffy that Patsy’s offers are then sent though a taffy wrapper that has been cutting and individually wrapping pieces at a clip of 500 a minute for nearly 45 years.
The Patsy's Taffy Stretcher
The other half of the factory is dedicated to chocolate production. A web of piping sends melted chocolate throughout the factory, creating delicious waterfalls over conveyor belts full of pretzels and pumping chocolate into molds for the newest edition to the Patsy’s catalogue, the Prelude, with a melt-away flavored center.
Tyler may have been a bit young to fully appreciate traditionally-crafted chocolates and candies made with the highest quality ingredients including absolutely no additives or preservatives. Yet the 45-minute tour features enough moving parts, not to mention free samples, to keep anyone’s attention. Young and old will marvel at a family operation where all of the different generations can still be found placing almonds atop world-class chocolates by hand.
Still family owned and operated
The Patsy’s Original factory is located at 1540 South 21st Street, just south of Highway 24. The tours are free and are offered at Monday-Friday at 11am and again at 2pm, or by appointment. Call 1-800-3-PATSYS (372-8797) for additional information.
