Halloween Review ‘09

My kids are at ballet for the next hour, that means I get unfettered access to the giant bowl’o'candy until they return. This year, many of my more sophisticated friends are dismissing the concept of free freakin’ candy as a bad thing, as it’s not as refined as Thomas Haas nor does it come with a Swiss pedigree. How dour does your life view need to be to not love a giant bowl of free candy? It’s candy dammit, and it was free; what a time we live in.

Treats are universally “fun sized”, marketing speak for small, and we all know nothing small can be fun, with the exception of a Lotus Elise, or box of kittens. More urban sophisticate bullshit. Fun sized means you can sample, sample with impunity, think of them more as winery  tasting room samplers. Plus what they lack in volume is made up with in quantity.

First off, why the hell can I not find a damned Twix in this giant bowl of high fructose corn syrup and palm oil? My neighbourhood sucks. If it wasn’t almost a week after the date I’d make my kids get back out there until they returned with the pinnacle of the confectioners art. Hell,  I still may. Twix are the Latour of candy, I’ll accept no arguing this fact. They may be the Petrus.

In lieu of a presence of Twix, I chose to do a taste test between Sour Patch Kids and Sour Skittles, in the name of scholarly research. First up, Skittles. Skittles Sour tastes like what I IMAGINE urinal blocks taste like. Fruity with a barnyard/kidney kick. The tang of urine is definitely present. Next Sour Patch Kids – Which do not list children among it’s constituents. I hate imitation kid flavour, it reminds me of imitation bacon bits we’d be forced to put on our potatoes as kids. Damn, minor textural differences only – taste test inconclusive. Same funky high notes. Same floral front notes. Bah, if I was cynical I’d suggest they are just a cheap knock off of the Skittles, and not a serious attempt to refine the candy makers art.

Everything else is generic. Those kids brought home nothing interesting this year. We are fully in the grip of the Wal-Mart-ization of candy. The same bland shit that I gave away. Where is the creativity people? Where was the new Taiwanese family giving out squid tentacle snack? The retired couple caught off guard by Halloween throwing airline miniatures into pillow cases? An ounce and a half of ten year old Frangelico? Hell yeah. The economic downturn saw the end of the prosperous family giving out full sized Aero bars. And why all the M&M’s? Smarties are the Canadian hard shell waxy chocolate inside candy, not M&M’s. Where is the patriotism? We have to import candy now? What about our trade balance, won’t the flood of M&M’s screw our trade surplus?

That all said, a special shout out to all those that gave away chips. Happiness is not a warm gun, happiness is a pantry stacked with Doritos. Plus they make a nice change from the chemicals in sugared treats, it’s refreshing to get a whole other type of chemical coursing through your bloodstream.

I can’t eat candy in the same quantities as I previously could just like how getting older reduces tolerance to copious quantities of alcohol. I am currently experiencing a sugar hang over. I wonder if a booze hangover would cancel out the sugar hangover leaving me crisp and alert. Time to test that theory.

~KT