Olde Dutch Cottage Candy

No longer closed! And the best candy!
My supervisor got us all handmade Valentine’s Day boxes as gifts in the office and we were amazed by the love put into the product as well as the quality of the candy. I just enjoyed a delicious caramel filled heart the size of my palm — rich, but delicious. It also was full over other small parcels including mint crème filled chocolates and chocolate/​sprinkle covered pretzels. All of the candies were decorated in Valentine’s Day décor.
Can’t wait to check out this place in person!

Stop #21 4:07 PM:
Never had a chance to finish up my 2009 Boston Dining Tour in which I visited over 24 different restaurants in the span of 3 days. For a complete review, read Cindy Y’s original comments from 2÷18÷2009. Walking into the Olde Dutch Cottage Candy shoppe is pretty much stepping into another world. It’s the type of antique store where memories still linger in inanimate objects. If it sounds like a beginning of horror film, it might as well be. Everything you hold has a history that’s long seen forgotten. The catastrophic sensation heightens your sense of unease because you feel overwhelmed — physically and visually. It’s the type of antique store where any object could be a totem, horcrux, or the bridge to the underworld.
Oh yeah, Old Dutch also sells candies too. [Original Visit: February 2009]

Ever watched horders? ever want to experience it? then go to this Candy shop… It is the creepest place ever (even creepier than it’s neighbor the Eagle).
I walked around the narrow hallways seeing candy and every other knick knack possible on display in some shape or another. then I got to the back, and there were a collection of dolls all being hung from the ceiling.
You know that feeling you get when you are walking late at night and someone is walking in pace behind you, you get a little uncomfortable, you speed up, they speed up… well this is the store that, that person is hiding in, about to jump out and stab you… twice.
It’s probably a really cool antique store, and not that creepy, when you talk to who ever works there (no one seemed to be working or in there, when I was there)… but when you walk in off the street … you feel like you’ve stepped into a scene from a slasher flick.

This is probably the freakiest but coolest place ever. If you’re ever in town, you should really stop by. Have you ever watched those horror films where some girl walks into a store that was just beckoning her in? She walks in and cautiously checks the place out with a sparkle in her eye mesmerized by the wonders crowding all around her. A creepy old man or woman mysteriously pops up out of nowhere greets her in an eerie but nonchalant manner and weird things happen from then on. Well, I felt like that when I walked in. It’s like that charmed episode where the little kids walk into the ice cream truck thinking it’s ice cream but it’s really a door to a different dimension. It wasn’t as scary only because I was gripping on to my boyfriend’s sleeve for dear life. Other than the freakiness, the place is filled with treasures from all parts of the world and all eras. Everything is reasonably priced as well. The man carries almost every hard-​to-​find item and will do whatever he can to find you what you need if he doesn’t have it at the moment. He has everything from old books to relics and vintage jewlery, autographs and more. He also tells you lots of fun historical stories all from which he’s amazingly been part of. I’m not inferring that he’s lying, I just think it’s amazing. I wouldn’t go there for the candy neatly displayed in the showcases and strung from the ceilings. I would go to see all the unique antique items he carries. I almost felt obligated to buy something. He was in no way pushy, but something about the place just screamed «buy something!» You’ll be amazed at what you can find there. It’s definitely a diamond in the rough.

I would like to see Martha Stewart and the CEO of Home Depot walk into this place and instantly melt into frothy puddles of disbelief because it is a dark shiny orgy of ten fantasy granmothers’ sticky bowels pouring forth in a somehow delightful antique and chocolate experience festooned with ribbons and old cartoon tracks. People travel to Disney World hoping to see Mickey Mouse scratch his butt during a photo shoot or Cinderella makng out with the Beast as they are leaving one of the secret tunnels. Go here instead.
Up until last week, I had merely driven past this place maybe a thousand and two times and every time vaguely grimaced going, «Chocolate? Who would go there to buy chocolate?». Parking is horrible. The building looks like a dirty, out-​of-​the-​way bar where hookers might go to relax before ambling down for a night in Chinatown. Or a mafia front. It is a building dedicated to triggering the reflex thought in adults «I should not take candy from strangers». Basically the word «candy» on the front of this building has always made me intensely suspicious in that «Eh, it’s Boston…» way. And also get crawly skin at the thought of ever going in there. I figured I’d be arrested or suddenly starring in an old Jodie Foster film.
Obviously if I am giving it 5 stars, something must have happened, and it wasn’t a sudden penchant for rape or eating filthy dust-​laden candy corns.
Basically (true story!) my friend and I decided to walk from her apartment in the South End to a dinner party in Malden last week, and right after grabbing some coffee at a delightful little café, we walked by Ye Olde Dutch Cottage. We both started commenting along the lines of all perceptions mentioned above, and I go, «Yeah, and the place is NEVER open… what’s up with that?!»…just as I turned and happened to see that, in fact, IT WAS OPEN.
So we paused for a minute, wondering if we would be shot or die or be melted into pagan elderly-​woman chocolate lollipops covered in rock salt and sold to Mitt Romney (it’s his secret favorite…) or worse yet, stumble into a freakish time-​warp that would never release us back to the streets of our snowy Malden-​bound trek. Then, you know, we went «What the hell…» and walked in. Sometimes you just have to do this, melting time warp threats be damned.
We were not disappointed. In fact, it is hard to describe how un-​disappointed we were. We were transported through all of the above and more after crossing the threshold. It was like suddenly realizing you are the love child of Katherine Hepburn and Gene Wilder, coming home to their antique candy den right before a glitzy dark cocktail party. I’m going to leave it at the fact that we could barely make it three feet in because there were so many candy objects hanging directly in our faces, swinging on long strands of cheap ribbon. This is the Bird Cage cloaked in a trenchant exterior, aching for you to enter so it can consume a certain tiny nugget in your memory cortex for all time. It’s not really about buying candy, though you should, just in case it’s not a mafia front.
For the first few seconds I had my camera on video mode and caught just a blip of the experience before I remembered to ask permission. I’m not big on stealing store’s souls. Quite politely I was told that photographs were absolutely never allowed. Not surprising. Because come on — secrets like this are worth finding for yourself.

I love this place for its unique qualities and endless mix of inventory. It has several sections/​rooms full of items from estate jewelry, records, (vintage??) kitchen magnets, a candy counter with some variety of chocolates and candies, plates, books, signed photos of celebrities (older celebrities mostly). i even saw a giant harvard stuffed animal (man-​made not taxidermied) bear… walking through, you are surrounded by inventory on all sides and sometimes above you (some items were hanging from ribbons). One of my personal favorite finds was an «I Love Cowboys» pin, an item from one of the hanging ribbons… which reminded me of my roadtrip through the South this summer. I would recommend a trip here for the fun of it. Then, form an opinion. I simply think there is nothing like it in Boston. Most antique shops that I have been to in Boston are more polishedand upscale. This shop has some nice things but is more casual and as another poster put it «dimly lit and dusty» Well… I will not begrudge an antique shop for that. Lastly, the owner was very nice and struck up conversation about goings-​on inthe neighborhood.

Did I just walk into the Hasel and Gretel witches cottage, only backwards? The outside of this place is just a dusty brown/​grey exterior on Tremont, but walk inside and WOAH! Candy drips from the ceiling, like literally! The owner has strung all sorts of crazy decorations and candies from colorful ribbons! Its kinda dimly lit, but I like places where you aren’t exactly sure what you might find when you go digging, and this place is 100% a digging adventure.
Make your way down the candy shelf to discover PEZ!!! More PEZ (especially old ones) than I have EVER seen in one place — except collectors collections ;) One of my best friends is OBSESSED with PEZ! You know, those candy dispensers where you lift the head and out come a delightful square of strawberry, grape, orange or lemon? Well he just LOVES them and just moved out to the West Coast, so this was the perfect excuse to buy him a gift! I ended up getting one of the Star Wars remakes and some strange red character than I knew was «rare» from checking out his nerdy collector books.
The rest of the store is equally as treasure filled. Yes, maybe some things are lying under a bit of dust, but wander through the antique side of this store to find vintage furniture that your mind can’t help but dream-​up stories for who previously owned them and how they ended up there!

whoa. this place is a TRIP.
it’s 75−80% antique shop, and 20−25% candy shop. i think my expectations were all off because i expected it to be a candy extravaganza like that candy shop on the lower east side in NYC, you know the one i’m talking about, that has every insane variety of candy ever? but even so, it didn’t have that much candy and i agree with the other reviewer, the owner was very nice and chatty but the prices were expensive (tiny bags of candy corn for $ 4 each! but then i did buy a fucking $ 2 macaroon from south end formaggio last week because the lady gave me the hard sell about some dude from paris making them by hand, and i’m still embarassed i did that. but anyway). i don’t mind spending $$$ on chocolate if it’s good but the chocolate i bought just didn’t taste very good. and the antiques. jesus christ. my boyfriend was in heaven because his sundays are good days if the junk dealers are at the south end open market so he can stare longingly at all the mismatched glasses and old unfunctioning cuisinarts. i, on the other hand, was getting incredibly claustrophobic. the aisles are not very wide and the whole store is basically exploding with STUFF — pictures, furniture, records (could potentially have been interesting, but i felt too overwhelmed by all the STUFF).
this seems like maybe the kind of store where most people just wander around looking at the stuff and hardly anyone buys anything. i do appreciate having such a vast collection of things to sort through, i bet one could find some kitschy stuff if you had the time and patience, i just wish it was arranged a little better. especially because i highly doubt people with wheelchairs could navigate this place comfortably.

I had high hopes for the Olde Dutch … after all, it was featured on Phantom Gourmet, and its cozy location in the South End looked very appealing. Unfortunately, it’s emphasis is more about being an antique shop than a candy store, and the candy isn’t home made either. In fact, some of the candies could themselves be antiques; I had a couple of different pieces that all seemed pretty stale. The owner’s nice enough, and a chatty conversationalist, but all in all, I wouldn’t return here for candy.