Old Candy Critic Articles - A Spooky look at Spooky Mix

I've decided to take down several old articles from the candycritic.org and re-post them here on the Candy Critic blog.  This week I'm posting an article getting you guys into the Halloween spirit.  It's all about a special bag of sweet treats, and what exactly is inside it.

In the candy world there is no bigger holiday than Halloween. The thing is, so often all you see is the same candy that you see all year round in smaller packages. I don't like it; I mean one of the ways of making the candy industry worse is giving me less variety. The other option candy companies take is to re-decorate their treats in Halloween wrappers. If you ask me the people should be wearing the costumes not the candy. People go in the costumes, candy goes in the people, that's the way it should be.

There are however a few companies that make special treats just for this holiday. The problem is they're generally really expensive or really cheap. The pricier ones are simple, they're generally great, but the chances of people giving them away on Halloween are pretty slim. The cheap ones are what I like anyways, I mean the surprise is the best part of this holiday. So here's what I've done, I went to my local bargain store and found the cheapest Halloween treats I could find. I'm going to eat them, I'm going to tell you what I think, and maybe I might even like a few of them. That or I'll be grossed out or even get sick. Wait a minute if I like them I'll probably get sick eating them all anyways. Either way I'm probably not going to be doing very well by the end of this, so it's a good time for all.

The treat of choice is a bag full of something called Spooky Mix. Now I don't want to give away the price but let's just say I couldn't buy an average chocolate bar for what I paid for these. Now they may be older than Halloween itself so that'll have to factor in. I picked out the less dusty of the bags, but that could always be because they where at the bottom of the pile. I should also mention that the eyes on the pack freak me out a little, not because they're out of the socket or blood shot, it's because they're not quite looking in the same direction. That always gives me the shakes.

So it's on to the tasting. I'll write up a simple review and then tell you how much I liked them by how many of them I ate all at once we'll call it the Glut-O-Meter.

Hard... holy cow this stuff is hard. Ouch!!!

As far as I can tell it takes a little work to actually turn this little piece of cement into gum. The part that sucks for me is I'm trying each color; to make sure there are no flavor differences and each time my mouth is put through its paces.

Well after a crazy chew I've come to realize that they’re all the same flavor, and that flavor is... Well gum flavored. I guess plain would be the best way to describe this gum, maybe sugary too. I really wish gum companies would stop it with this plain flavor stuff; even a little mint or something would be OK.

Chew time : 4 min

As you may have guessed this treat is both orange and licorice flavored. Fortunately for me the orange really takes over because I'm not a big fan of licorice. I have to say I kind of like the stripes, not as taste but how they look. This candy is really just your run of the mill hard candy, nothing spook-tacular at all.

Suck time : 8 min

Ah the lollipop, you won't steer me wrong, will you?

The lolly is purple and the flavor is grape, what could be more terrifying than grape? I'm actually a big fan of grape flavors, most of the time. This one doesn't really taste like grapes, the fruit. I don't care though, because if I wanted a grape I'd eat a grape, actually I wouldn't mind a grape, but that doesn't take away from this treat. It's tasty and it works for me.

Suck time : 13 min

Of all of the treats in this pack this one was the biggest mystery, and I suppose mysteries are good on Halloween right? As it turns out it's a chew (like taffy), the flavor really escapes me to be honest. It might be orange, but I could just be saying that because it was colored orange. To be honest I don't know what it was, but I guess the great unknown is what you want on Halloween.

Now I've put these treats together because they basically look the same to me, or at least the wrappers do. The candies themselves match the color of the wrappers and the flavor...

Well green taste a little like, pineapple? I was waiting to get a mouthful of lime but I think its pineapple or something like that. It's not bad just a little odd for the color.

Yellow is, yep you guessed it, lemon. I'm a big fan of lemon candies the only thing that turns me off them is when they contain medicine, then I feel like I'm being deceived. This lemon candy isn't bad, might be my favorite treat so far.

Orange... wait for it... Oh ya, it's orange. I'd like to say I figured it would be but if you've read up until now you'll realize that orange isn't always orange. This is another fine hard candy, I like'em

I should mention one bad thing about all of these candies, when I unwrapped them much of the foil package came off on the candy. I peeled all I could but I'm sure I missed some.

Suck time : 9 min

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