Trick-or-treaters know this. And at the end of the night what is left in the candy bowl when all the goblins, Jedi's, princesses and superhero's have gone?
That's right. Candy Corn.
According to some in depth research, done just now, there is 20 million pounds of candy corn sold annually in the United States. That is enough candy corn to circle the globe 4.25 times if it was laid end to end. A single serving of candy corn is nineteen individual pieces and has 120 calories and the shelf life of a bag of candy corn is roughly 100 years, enabling the confection to stay on store shelves indefinitely. (That last fact was mine.)
Candy corn is shaped like those orange road construction cones, and coincidentally, if you were to shrink a road construction cone down to candy corn size, they would taste the same.
There has got to be some sort of government/big business conspiracy going on here to keep the candy corn manufactures in business, because I cannot conceive that this candy is making anyone any money.
If you walk the discount candy aisle the day after Halloween, it's all bushel bags of candy corn. They might as well call this the candy corn aisle.
So how are these candy makers still in business?
Kids are the ultimate demographic for taste testing candy, and they have no qualms about taking the candy they want out of the bowl and leaving the rest for the unfortunate souls who would follow.
And what would that left-over candy be?
Candy corn of course.
You remember what it was like to trick or treat don't you?
If you were like me you planned your costume right after you finished your back to school shopping. (Thanks for all those pencil boxes and corduroy pants mom - and for that killer Transformers Trapper Keeper.) You had your costume picked out by late September and your trick or treating route planned out a few weeks before October 31st. (And of course adjusting for ambient air temperature and maximum moonlight exposure on those back woods paths).
I grew up in the greatest small town for Halloween activities, because it was spooky even in bright sunlight.
If the town you live in had it's hay day about one hundred years before you were born, then it probably was like mine, filled with beautiful old falling down houses and those creepy wrought iron fences and gargoyles that were en vogue at the turn of the last century. And on your map you would mark out all those spooky houses that had the best candy, and plan your route accordingly. You knew the houses that gave you apples and pencils and that wonderful old lady on your street that gave out nickels and bags of candy corn and who could not tell Darth Vader from Tinkerbell.
And when you returned home after your wild adventures you would do that candy triage thing on your bedroom floor where you spread the candy out and arrange it in "most edible to least edible" order for consumption. And inevitably candy corn would be at the end of the row, right next to squirrel nut zippers. (If you have not had the pleasure of eating this rock hard, tooth shattering Depression era candy then stop what you are doing right now and fish the time machine out of the closet.)
Of course candy corn is not the only questionable candy on the block.
The runner up for awful Halloween candy would have to be Circus Peanuts, those inedible peanut shaped marshmallow lumps that though they look like peanuts, taste like a mutant banana and can also be used as a door stop or for insulating your house in the wintertime.
We must be a wildly nostalgic buying public, because we continue purchasing fruitcake at Christmas time, "Peeps" marshmallow chicks at Easter and candy corn and Circus Peanuts at Halloween even though no one actually eats any of these items.
So next year, when you find yourself in the candy aisle a few days before Halloween ask yourself this all important question: "Did anyone eat these when I bought them last year?"
And if the honest answer is "no" then put that bag down and slowly back away.
The Kit Kats are just a shelf away.
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