Orange, maize, brown background. Image of cup full of lollipops. Text "Favorite Things: Halloween Candy. Petticoats & Pistols"

Favorite Things: Halloween Candy

by

For the past month, I’ve been at war with myself. Every time I walk into the grocery store, I’m weaving through towers of displays with every kind of Halloween candy imaginable. I push the cart around bags of Reese’s, only to be confronted with “fun-size” peanut M&Ms. *gulp*

I’m not buying it. Come on, Jill, stay strong!

Beads of sweat line my forehead. The cart slows. Maybe I slow. Who knows? But a sharp right turn leads me down the first row of delicious candy. Then the next one. And the next.

I’m pretty sure I clipped a digital coupon for 30% off. And, wait, is that a buy one get one free deal?

Before I know it, five bags of candy are in my cart.

I have no regrets.

Jill Kemerer at fall festival pretending to stir a steaming cauldron
I’m getting into the spooky season spirit at a local fall festival!

Candy, candy, candy! I love it all! (Well, not candy corn, although I will eat it occasionally.)

All this candy brings me back to my days trick-or-treating. We lived out in the country in mid-Michigan. My mom would usually drive my sister and I to trick or treat. We always stopped at Grandma and Grandpa B.’s house first. Good call on my mom’s part. Grandma would take a bag of mini Milky Ways and start dumping them into our bags. I loved her!

Then we’d head to various aunts and uncles and stop at Grandma and Grandpa D.’s house. Grandma usually made up little treat bags. She was a fabulous cook, so when I saw a popcorn ball, I got excited. Occasionally she’d throw in an apple or shelled peanuts, too. I’m not going to lie, I wasn’t into the healthy stuff. The apple and peanuts were probably the last thing I ate!

Another highlight was stopping at our babysitter’s house. Margaret would line a cookie sheet with full-size candy bars, and we could choose any one we wanted. Exciting times!

After we’d made all the stops, we’d head home and dump out our bags. Then came the negotiations. My sister and I had fun trading for favorite candy. My mom and dad always got my Mounds and Almond Joy bars. Coconut wasn’t my thing back then. I don’t mind it now.

I still love Tootsie Rolls. I’m sure it’s from my Halloween days. Oh, and Smarties–the little sugar candies. And Laffy Taffy, and M&Ms, and Twix, and Reese’s, and Snickers, and…

Oh, boy.

I have a problem.

What can I say? I love Halloween candy!

What’s your favorite candy? Were you allowed to trick or treat when you were young?

Have the best day!

Website |  + posts

Jill Kemerer is a Publishers Weekly bestselling author of heartwarming, emotional, small-town romance novels often featuring cowboys. Her essentials include coffee, caramels, a stack of books and long walks outdoors in Ohio where she resides with her husband.

51 thoughts on “Favorite Things: Halloween Candy”

  1. I would say my favorite candy is Almond Joy, but I love others too. I did trick or treat as a child.

  4. I love candy! I don’t like caramel, but most anything else is fair game. I love candy corn and peanut m&ms. Three Musketeers is a favorite.

  5. My absolute favorite is Reese’s PB Cups! When I was a kid, we always went door to door trick-or-treating, but by the time I had my kids, we only took them to family. Our church also has a fall festival with candy for the kids.

  6. Jill – my sister! I’m right there with you. I always buy Halloween candy that I like because it’s the one time a year I have a legitmate excuse to eat candy bars. Butterfinger, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, and $100,000 Dollar Bars are my faves. I tried really hard this year not to OVER buy candy since I really don’t need a month’s worth of leftovers. We’ll see how the distribution goes tomorrow night. I’m sure I’ll be snacking between trick-or-treaters. 🙂

    • *high five* Yes, I’m a candy nut! I LOVE $100,000 bars! Our grocery store doesn’t carry them in Halloween size, which is probably a good thing. If they don’t have them, I can’t buy them! I hope you have just the right amount of leftovers tomorrow night!

  7. We didn’t go trick or treating since we lived way out on our farm though one year we did get to go with our cousins who lived in Cheyenne. My mom always said “if we wanted you to have candy, we would buy it for you”. We never missed doing it since there was always something to do on the farm.

  8. We trick-or-treated went we were little. The three of us, my brothers and I, usually went together and mom stayed home to give out candy. Dad worked second shift at the auto plant.

    We lived in a suburban neighborhood, so going without parents was normal back then.

  9. My favorite candy is marshmallow cups and also cherry crush. They are very hard to find nowadays. Freddies may have them from time to time. Since I lived on the farm until the 12th grade of high school, I do not remember ever trick or treating. I did let my kids go though. They were so cute back in the day.

  10. Favorite candy, Milky Way Midnight……trick or treat, we lived in the country and dad was the only driver so we didn’t get to. With my girls they got to wear costumes for school (I probably did too but don’t remember) and have parties and I occasionally took them to friends and family when they were younger to go trick or treating because we live in the country too and our church would do Heroes Unmasked so the kids could wear costumes and play games where Biblical characters were the adults in charge.

  11. We did go trick or treating when I was little. One lady that lived down the street from us would make cookies, and we’d get like a dozen wrapped together. I always liked Sugar Daddy’s. I’d come home and dump out the candy, and give my Daddy all of the candy corn and circus peanuts. Mom didn’t usually want any of the candy. Mom would buy candy that we’d all eat to give out, so that if any was left (and there usually was some) it’d be stuff we’d eat! Now, I don’t buy candy, haven’t for years, as there are no kids on our block, and we haven’t had kids come in a long time. There are so many Fall Festivals and other places for them to go now. When I was growing up, we didn’t have to worry about things like they do now.

    • See? I would have loved the lady on your street–homemade cookies! Mmm! I liked Sugar Daddy’s, too, and I haven’t seen them in years! Circus Peanuts–yuck! I would have given those away pronto. Yes, in some ways we’re blessed to have churches doing Fall Festivals, but it’s sad that the world just isn’t as safe now.

  12. I grew up on Army bases and there was lots of trick or treating. We got so much candy. My favorite is pumpkin peanut butter cups and smarties and twizzlers.

  13. I liked tootsie rolls and still do. We never went trick-or- treat when I was young. As a high-schooler I took neighborhood kids out for UNICEF. When I had children I would keep them home from school on halloween and we would do something special.

  14. Good morning, my most favorite candies are the Peanut M&M’s. And yes we were allowed to go trick or treating when I was young. I have 5 siblings and we would all go, we lived in a small town so everybody knew everybody , which was nice. We would sometimes stay out trick or treating till before 10 since thats when the tv started announcing Do you know where your children are, that was a long time ago. We always had fun though.

  15. Oh, Jill, I have too many favorites which is a big problem. Had such a sugar high Sunday night I never got a wink of sleep. Learned another valuable lesson to slow it down and take it in moderation lol

  17. I love Milky Way, Butterfingers, and Reese’s Peanut butter Cups. Yes I went trick or treating and my kids went but my grandkids didn’t . I usually buy candy to give them.

  18. I GET HUNGRY FOR CANDY CORN about once a year. But I can’t eat a whole bag. But it only comes in a whole bag. I haven’t had any yet this year. Heading for the car now.

  19. Yes. I went trick or treating when I was younger. I went with a group of friends. One of the Moms would go with us. We had a friend who would make candy apples. She kept them for special people. My aunt and uncle lived a block over. My aunt would make up a treat bag for me.

    It is hard to pick one candy. I love the Reese’s pumpkins, Snickers, Twix and Hershey’s chocolate bars.

    Thank you so much for sharing. God bless you.

  20. Story about Halloween collecting for UNICEF….

    Years ago our troublesome paperboy would collect for UNICEF and my Dad said he probably spent the money himself so he would only give him candy.

    That paperboy is a grown man now and I recently saw him and I told him what my Dad said. He said my Dad was probably right!

    Not funny for UNICEF, but funny our parents are almost always right!

  21. Jill, I had to stop buying Halloween candy. If I bought ahead of time, it was gone by the time Halloween rolled around. I would buy it…and buy it…and buy it again so we’d finally be able to have enough for trick or treat night. Now, we don’t participate in trick or treat–we’ve got two dogs that are very sweet, but they bark like crazy when anyone steps foot on the front porch–and we go to bed pretty early anymore because we get up early. I miss that Halloween candy, though! This is just the beginning of the season for allllll that good stuff! Loved your post–you made me laugh!

  24. I like Rocky Road dark chocolate candy bars the best but for Halloween I hand out Ring-Pops or some type of sour candy like Warheads that I don’t eat. 🙂

  27. Years ago when I went trick-or-treating, I liked anything chocolate and still do. Anything else that I was given was given away or my dad took the candy to work and gave it away there 🙂

  29. We did Trick Or Treat a bit as children, but not to the degree they do today. It as more dressing up for a parade in town. I got to enjoy it when taking our children out Trick or Treating.
    I really try not to buy Halloween candy until the last minute. If I do, I will have to replace it by the 31st. We live out in the country. In 32 years, we have had children come by only 4 times. Three of those times were our grandson. So there is really no reason to buy candy. I just make sure I am getting what we like.
    Tonight wen had a Trunk or Treat event at our church. So much fun. It was the first time in years I got to give out candy for Halloween. When I was a children’s librarian, we gave out books for our treats. The candy was in the office for staff.
    Favorite candy: Almond Joys, Mounds, Twix, Milky Way Sugar Babies, Skittles, and Tootsie Rolls.

  30. We were eventually allowed to go trick or treating. When we were very young my mom limited our sugar consumption because she had teeth with poor enamel that needed capping and finally false teeth and didn’t want us to ruin our teeth. My dad put his foot down and insisted we needed a modicum of candy when I became a thief (age 3 or 4) by helping myself to candy that a neighbor child had (I don’t recall what kind it was).
    Favorite candy: M&M’s, Heath Bars, Reeses Peanut Butter Cups

  31. Definitely Reeses peanut butter cups then and now, so love peanut butter. Oh yes me my twin sister had so much fun going around the neighborhood and getting all kinds of great candy. Dress as princess, bride, witches, gypsies and pirates mostly. Our mom helped us go through her cloths and jewelry for us to up with costume. Much ore then buying something

Comments are closed.