Halloween 2014 Candy Roundup & Review

by Lora Wiley-Lennartz

Every Halloween I buy a bag of candy corn. Or two. I admit I have a huge weakness for candy corn. This year, when purchasing my candy corn, I noticed I had a choice of flavors like S’mores and Pumpkin Spice. What?  Then I started to notice a deluge of different and crazy candy flavors for the season. Out of curiosity I snagged several unique items I had never seen before.

Some of this Halloween/Fall candy is strange. Some downright scary.  Of course my idea for this post was probably just a huge excuse to buy a ton of Halloween candy. We have no trick or treaters expected at our door because we live in a brownstone in NYC where all apartments in the building are child free. We’re also never at our house in Pennsylvania at Halloween (the East village is so much more fun) so there have been no opportunities to hand out candy to the locals there.

Below is my unbiased review of sampling what’s on offer this year. I am sure I missed out on several new products, but since I am trick or treater challenged, I had to limit myself to what I could unload on co-workers and take to parties.

Let’s start with M&Ms:

Caramel Apple M&Ms

These taste pretty much the same as regular M&Ms with a hint of hard candy apple flavor on the shells. They are also bigger than regular M&Ms. They are a nice change but the taste is very subtle.

White Chocolate Candy Corn M&Ms

Also a jumbo size, these are sweeter than regular chocolate M&Ms and frankly taste nothing like candy corn.

Now onto the marshmallows:

Pumpkin Spice Marshmallows

These are very spicy and tasty. The pumpkin flavor is mild but the spice rounds the flavor out nicely.  I love the little pumpkin shapes. When these first came out, I used them to make pumpkin spice marshmallow fondant

Candy Corn Marshmallows

These are cute but they taste nothing like candy corn.

Moving on to the cookies:

Pumpkin Spice Oreos

I loved these. The colors are so festive and the spice version of traditional Oreo cream is delicious. It pairs well with the vanilla cookies. 

Pumpkin Cheesecake Cookies

These Pepperidge Farm cookies are soft and tasted the most like real pumpkin than any other item in this post. They have a mild pice and the white chips bring lovely little clumps of sweetness to this cookie. Liked these.

Some chocolate treats:

Candy Corn White Chocolate Bars

These mini candy corn studded white chocolate bars are super sweet. They also do not taste much like candy corn but are delicious.

Caramel Apple Milky Way Mini Bars

These little nuggets are a great variation from the standard Milky Way bars. The nougat is apple flavor in this version, then topped with caramel. I found they packed more flavor than the regular variety.

And a Halloween taffy:

Candy Corn Taffy

Aside from fresh salt water taffy, I am not a huge fan of taffy in general. These are decorative and surprisingly and unlike other candy corn flavored items in this post, did taste like candy corn. The flavor is mild to medium so they contain candy corn flavor without making your teeth hurst from sweetness, like realy candy corn. The taffy smooths out the flavor.

Speaking of Candy Corn, here are some flavor variations from the traditional:

Caramel Macchiato Candy Corn

 I expected to hate these but the coffee caramel flavor is surprisingly good.

Pumpkin Spice Candy Corn

These are more spice than pumpkin . The overwhelming taste and aftertaste is of clove. So if you don’t like a strong clove flavor in your spice mix. Avoid, these.

S’Mores Candy Corn

Frankly, aside from a synthetic taste of chocolate, I found these to be a hot mess.  Very sweet and artificial flavor. Big. Fail.

Caramel Candy Corn

These were my favorite out of all the flavored candy corns. The caramel flavor is present and makes me happy. So much so I have been cheating on my old love, regular candy corn with this sexy caramel flavor version.

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1 comment

Catherine October 22, 2014 - 6:14 pm

I love!!!! Candy!!! Blessings, Catherine

Reply

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