Photo by Michael J. GallegosTribune

Tribune

Candy-maker George Buffett (left), the 78-year-old owner of Buffett's Candies, helps worker Mike Dixon pour hot piñon brittle onto a cooling table at his shop at 7001 Lomas Blvd. N.E. "I have a theory," Buffett said. "If you keep working and using your mind, you're gonna outlive someone who has retired."

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Frank Valdez remembers his father taking him to Buffett's Candies for treats when he was a boy.

The roasted piñons rolled over buttery caramel with brown sugar cream centers were special to him then and now, Valdez, 50, said.

"It's delicious," he said. "It's one of the best."

Recently, Valdez introduced his son, Larry, 24, to what's unique about the New Mexico tradition.

George Buffett has worked nearly 60 years building that reputation with his chocolate confections and signature piñon rolls.

A passing statement made by his mother after he finished high school put him on the path to a long-lasting candy business, Buffett, 78, said.

" `Why not candy? You'll only need a pot and a stove,' " he recalled her telling him. "Well, she was wrong there."

Sweet beginnings

Buffett learned making and selling candy took a lot more than what his mother thought while working for candy manufacturers like the Del Norte Candy Company in the late 1940s.

He worked at different candy companies while juggling his studies at the University of New Mexico.

After graduation, he moved to California - a state with an abundance of candy-makers - to gain experience. He told his employers there he had an 11th-grade education so they would put him to work in the manufacturing plant.

"To make candy, you are going to have to know how to use your hands," Buffett said. "Too many people think they are going to start out at the top. I knew I would have to learn everything."

Buffett spent four years in California learning everything he could about making quality candy, he said.

When he returned to New Mexico, he invested $250 in cotton candy, popcorn and snow cone machines with a friend. Together, the two young men worked at various fiestas until about 1953, when they won a concessions contract at the city zoo, he said.

In 1956, his partner decided to quit, so Buffett bought him out for $4,000. He then invested in the building on Lomas Boulevard Northeast, where his business currently resides.

Piñon signature

Buffett prides himself on two of his favorite ingredients: butter and cream.

"You know what you have to do to make something good?" he said. "Just keep adding butter and cream."

There are about 2,800 calories to a pound of his piñon rolls, he said, so it's probably a good thing they are sold in little three-inch nuggets priced by weight.

A whiff of the U.S. Grade AA butter and heavy-whipping cream Buffett uses to make his caramel fills the air inside the door of his store on Lomas just west of Louisiana Boulevard.

But it is what Buffett has been able to do with New Mexico's native nut that has made him a staple for the better part of a century.

There are other candy-makers who use other pine nuts from China or Greece, but they don't taste as good as New Mexico's piñons, he said.

His affinity for the piñon is what motivated him to develop his own pi¤on candies, such as the roll and pi¤on brittle.

When he first started, Buffett used to buy his shelled piñons. Then one year, he couldn't get the shelled nuts, so he decided to build his own sheller. It took him three years to do it, but, once it was done, the payoff was huge.

"The first year, we could shell about 30 pounds a day," he said. "By the third year, we were doing about 200 pounds a day. We now can do 300 pounds in one afternoon."

What it takes to make

A sheller isn't the only piece of equipment needed when wanting to make confectionary delights. He currently employs 13 people, including his three children and his wife, Jeanette.

Tables, cooling trays, copper pots and conveyors of varying sizes, marble slabs and something called a fire-mixer - a device which cooks the butter, cream and half-and-half until it becomes the golden goo known as caramel - are all integral parts of Buffett's operation.

All these pieces of equipment are pretty pricey, and could run between $10,000 to $50,000 each, depending on size and condition. Buffett suggests checking out restaurants that have gone out of business to find equipment to be liquidated.

Then there's the ingredients to make the candy. Buffett buys his chocolate 4,000 pounds at a time, in cases of 50, 10-pound bricks, which he then melts down. Each wholesaler sells their bulk product based on volume, so prices vary, Buffett said.

Sweet but competitive

For those who don't make their own candy, it's difficult to have just a candy store, said Dan Coffman, general manager of Gem State Distributors in Albuquerque.

"The competition is so incredible that it would be very difficult to be one dimensional," he said. "Instead of going to a candy retailer, a person can go to Wal-Mart or a convenience store and buy the same candy along with a Coke, cigarettes and fuel all in one stop."

Buffett says he doesn't think too much about the competition, small or large.

"I just try to make the candy so I like it or people I know like it," he said. "And I don't worry about them (competitors)."