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The Confectionery Come-On
It began two weeks ago, and it is only getting worse. Up and down these office halls I walk, and everywhere I turn, on every table in the break area, and nearly every door I pass, therein lies a bowl of sadistic sugary seduction. Oh, what foul season this is! … that breaks even the most conscientious of calorie counters. One piece, so small, barely registers on MyFitnessPal, surely can’t hurt – and then one piece becomes another becomes another – those sinister sellers of sweets, foiled again!
Little tiny packages of Snickers, Milky Way, Hershey’s bars (Hershey’s Dark, if you please), Peanut M&Ms, Twix, Butterfinger, Reese’s Cups, and my personal kryptonite – the Kit Kat bar. All are conspiring against me, even the unnamed malted milk balls that are wrapped like little eyeballs – in keeping with the season of course.
Less common than these ubiquitous name-brand offerings are those other pieces of confectionery that filled the buckets of my youth:
Bit-O-Honey
Milk Duds
Tootsie Rolls
Bottle Caps
Sugar Daddies
Nerds
Candy Corn
Smarties
Not to mention whatever the heck these things actually are:
So think back, what candy found its way into your Halloween bucket or pillowcase? What did you love, what did you hate? How many razor blades did your parents ever actually find in your stash, as they plundered your wares in the name of “safety”? Did you ever have to share your candy with younger siblings (and did you steal it back when your parents weren’t looking)?
It’s the season … whatcha got?
Published in Culture
Hmmn, salt water taffy.
Just goes to show how wealthy we have become as a society that we can afford to put out the good stuff.
Why are there Circus Peanuts? What were they trying to do? Was the circus in question run by Cooger & Dark?
No, they’re just meant for the elephants, but they caught on.
It has taken a life time to develop the intestinal fortitude to pass those buckets (that and a 30 year battle with Type II). The only ones that I find hard to not indulge in are the dark chocolates, the more bitter the better (something, something, it’s you pal own it). Halloween candies are focused on addicting our children and their sweet tooth, the bulk of the offerings are thus of the milk chocolate variety. So I have a helping hand from the natural marketing zeitgeist.
The compromise with the available calories allotted for the remainder of this lifetime have to be dark, bitter, and infrequent. It is a formula that seems to have worked the last decade to keep those unwanted 60 extra pounds away and the inevitable slide to the Type I regime.
I have good days and bad days – this week has been wall-to-wall, full day leadership Teams meetings (so, a week of bad days). I agree on the preference potency of dark chocolate – something just shy of straight bitter cocoa powder is about right for me.
Yes. Still, there’s a strange sense of nostalgia wrapped up in that set of totally artificial, plastic, oil-byproduct confections we called “candy”. A little color, a little flavoring, some addictive ingredient, and poof – kids’ll eat it.
Elephants got better sense than that.
Are you talking about these things? These were revolting:
I hate Halloween (as far as I’m concerned it’s just sanctioned begging) and even hated it as a child. But I LOVE Circus Peanuts! Pure sugar!
Maybe it was a texture thing for me, I don’t remember.
In the Detroit area, instead of “Trick or Treat,” they would say, “Help the poor!”
Too thick to chew. Not thick enough to caulk a boat with.
Almost anything chocolate. I’m not too picky. Don’t care for Twix, though.
Circus Peanuts are the predecessor of Peeps. Quasi-marshmallows
Yes. I’m not a fan of Peeps either. But you’re right, same genome.
Circus Peanuts, besides being of the marshmallow genre, actually have a unique flavor. Don’t leave a bag near me if you have future plans for it.
Worse. It’s sanctioned blackmail (“give me something or else I’ll do something bad and illegal to you without getting punished”). I think society has gotten far enough from actually carrying out the “or else” for that occasion (if not for others) that I’m just now beginning to come out of almost 40 years of refusing to participate in Halloween. Plus a couple of years ago we moved to a neighborhood of smaller more closely spaced houses with lots of kids that used Halloween 2020 as the neighborhood’s official “we’re done with Covid lockdowns” rebellion, and it was so much fun seeing kids running up and down the street.
Peeps are at least edible. Likely stale, but edible.
Oh no, but Peeps have that yummy crust of sugar particulates. Much better than the Circus Peanuts. (Though Peeps are lousy as Halloween handout candy unless you’re going to hand out whole factory sealed packages. Peeps must be eaten within minutes of opening the package, despite what the Cretans who say they actually prefer stale Peeps say).
Students today generally prefer Reece’s Pieces.
They’re okay. I remember when they were all the rage, thanks to E.T. of course.
Nope. I like pb&j but that’s it. Pb doesn’t belong in candy. Yech.
Ah the joys of living in a retirement subdivision. No children! I can’t stand the little creatures and I’m so glad I don’t have to put up with their noises. And their Halloween
beggingblackmail.More candy for me!
No one here likes marzipan but me?
I like. Not my favorite though.
I lived in Crete, and never heard one of them say that…
We got one trick-or-treater last year. Perhaps they heard that I would be giving out the little packs of Welch’s Fruit Snacks. I buy a big box at Costco, and always have a couple of packs in my work bag. I love seeing the costumed kiddies, who nearly always have parents with them (discretely waiting on the sidewalk as the kids ring the doorbell). I always compliment whatever costume they wear. We will again be giving out the Welch’s, and I will be wearing my Ravenclaw t-shirt and my black witch hat, and holding my wand.
Accio, Candy!
From a TV ad circa 1970:
“I took a little bit of money
and I bought a Bit-o-honey.
Cuz ev’ry bit of Bit-o-honey,
goes a long, long way.
Six-teen pieces in ev’ry bar,
and each will make you sweeter than you awl-ready are.
(strum, strum, strum) Goes a long, long way…”
Funny how the tune sticks with me, fifty years later, but not the imagery.
And I doubt that I have ever in my life tasted a Bit-o-honey.