A marshmallow company says its products are designed to make the perfect s’mores. Cheddar News speaks with Michael Tierney, CEO and Founder of Stuffed Puffs, which makes marshmallows filled with milk chocolate that melts from the inside out.

Summer Sizzle

Elevate Your S’mores Game With Stuffed Puffs

Welcome back to Cheddars. Summer sizzle. Nothing says summer like gooey delicious s'mores roasting by the campfire, but eating this summer tree can get messy with the chocolate just falling out in the melted marshmallow oozing out of the back. But Michael Tierney Ceo and founder of stuffed puffs, is on a mission to change that is bigger. Machado spoke with him to get all the sweet details. So the big difference is we put the chocolate on the inside and so I don't know about you, but I only have two hands and when you make s'mores, there's three ingredients. You're trying to do this whole balancing act. And the other thing is that never melts. And so having it on the inside, when you roast that marshmallow over the flame, you get all that heat inside, you melt the chocolate from the inside out, interesting. So how many different flavors of stuffed puffs are out there and and talk about the chocolate on the inside. What made you decide and how were you able to sort of create something like that? Sure. So we have six varieties of stuffed puffs, three more in the traditional pillow bag format for an ingredient, whether you're making s'mores or another recipe. And then a new line called Big Bites, which is more of a snack, herbal confectionery sweet snack item. Um, and the chocolate is the key to the whole thing. And so I spent the 1st 10 years of this company trying to find somebody who would partner with me to do this. And what I found out is everyone tried it and they said it couldn't be done. And so we had to build all of our own plants and infrastructure, but it is a real milk chocolate inside and really delivers on flavor inside. That's the magic, that's the magic, interesting. So by the way, you have an amazing sort of resume in history. You have worked at world renowned restaurants before the french laundry in napa California 11 Madison park right here in new york. So what made you decide to sort of leave fine dining and pivot to something completely different like this? Sure. I mean I've been food since I was 12, I've been working in restaurants and so I came into the business world not with a warden, NBA, but with a culinary background. Uh, and I had this idea sitting around a campfire in 2009 and I couldn't shake it. And so after working in these great restaurants of the world, I said, okay, I need to go try this. And I gave myself a six month window and here we are, many years later. So you, by the way, also stuffed puffs, has a very famous partner and it's very fitting for this company, DJ marshmallow is a part of this as well. How did that relationship sort of come about? Yeah, so I was a Forbes 30 under 30 in 2009 and he was on the cover, I was somewhere in the magazine, I was like, I was, I was in the middle somewhere. Uh and there was a big event that they had in boston. And I reached out to them and said, hey, you know, starting this, this stuff puffs brand, you are a human marshmallow. How do we get together and blow this thing up as kind of the new age candy company. And what was his reaction when you sort of came to him and said, look, we're making these marshmallows, you're perfect for this. What he said, we put some product in his mouth and that was exactly okay. So let's actually get to the best part making the s'mores. What does it take to sort of make the perfect because as you said before, you only have two hands to sort of put this all together. So what sort of the perfect sort of way to make this? A couple of ways to do it. The old school way is to drop a skewer in the marshmallow roasted over the fire kind of low and slow. Let it all melt from the inside out. And then sandwich, sandwich it with graham cracker and you don't have to go graham cracker, you can go cookies, you can, you can bring a whole new world to remixing s'mores. But there's plenty of other ways to do it. You can s'mores indoors in the microwave seven seconds and you can make s'mores all year long in your city apartment, even there's still traditional way with the stuff, you still do it, the traditional regular way you can do it do it? The old school and what other recipes can people easily make at home with something like this. So the recipes span from air fryer s'mores and microwave s'mores for your new york apartment all the way to replacing your traditional marshmallow in your rice krispie treat. And now you've got like a chocolate ooey gooey rice krispie treats. Okay, so all this talk about this like I literally have to have something like this, like okay, so it was interesting because yeah, the chocolate right there. Can we see you right over here? You see the chocolate inside of that, which is so crazy. Like did you just put like how did you sort of make this? I'm really so fascinated by the science and something. So we don't buy marshmallows and then inject them with chocolate and make everything fresh from the factory. And the science behind it was the proprietary piece of it. Right? That's the piece that that's our little moat and that's why no one's copied us in the marketplace yet. But we take a very nontraditional approach to the way you make a marshmallow. So I started with just a blank sheet of paper and I have all this infrastructure and equipment that I had to figure out how to retool. And so we were able to think differently and bring something cool to the market. Okay, so where can viewers who want to buy stuff, where can they get there? Were sold at 33,000 stores nationwide. So most of your local grocery stores, your mass market stores will carry us or you can head to our website and purchase from there. Okay, so what's next for you guys? Is there other sort of iterations of things that you can do, like you've done with marshmallows on other food products? Maybe down the road we're gonna stay in the marshmallow space as stuffed puffs. Um We think we've tackled some s'mores and that season, but there's four other big seasons of the year. And so we've got some really great innovation coming out for Halloween this year with Monster Marsh, that will, will send you some of valentine's Day hearts that are individually wrapped. Oh my God! So yeah, a lot of fun stuff. So before we wrap here, I want to actually have a full on melted S'more and look how cool this is by the way for our viewers at home. Like that chocolate is so melted inside of that. Your cheers, this have an amazing summer. Oh, if you have this over a campfire, I mean this would be so good. Where's ours? That looks so good, Michael Tierney Ceo and founder of stuffed puffs. Yes. And our very own baker Machado