I’ve often wondered why these isn’t an organic version of Candy Corn out there. A few years ago I got a mellocreme mix from Marich, but I haven’t seen in at Whole Foods for at least two years. You can get organic, fair trade peanut butter cups ... you can get M&M knock offs made with natural colors and less sugar ... why no Candy Corn?

Well, Sweet’s Candy Company of Utah has come through with an American-made, Kosher, non-GMO and gluten free Candy Corn.

The bag for Sweet’s Naturally Flavored Candy Corn certainly looks festive. But the little window reveals a bit of weirdness, which is fine if weirdness is what you like in your Halloween treats. The candy corn comes in three different colors. Not three layers in a single piece, three different colors. Yellow, white and orange.

The ingredients are as complex as they are simple:

Ingredients: Cane Sugar (non GMO), tapioca syrup (non GMO), corn syrup (non GMO), invert sugar (non GMO), egg whites (cage-free), coconut oil (expeller pressed, extra virgin), colored with fruit and vegetable extracts (pumpkin, carrot and apple), titamium dioxide (for color), honey, natural flavors, salt, carnuba wax, confectioner’s glaze.

Though they’re using all natural colors and flavors and plenty of sourcing information about the ingredients, the Candy Corn is not vegan since it contains egg whites, honey and confectioners glaze.

The pieces are normally sized and very well made. I guess when you don’t do the layering, there are fewer weak points on the candy, so there was no pile of the white caps at the bottom of the bag at all.

The Candy Corn smells sweet and pleasant, but more like orange sherbet than honey. I tried a few pieces and noticed right away that they were different from each other. Whether intended or not, the different colors are different.

White is nice, pleasantly mild with a sort of vanilla marshmallow note. It didn’t have the honey flavor that I’d expect from my candy corn, and was also missing that little note of salt I was craving.

Yellow is similarly mild, but has a sort of, well, root flavor to it, like a vague sort of boiled carrot thing going on in the background.

Orange is ever so slightly tangy and has an orange note.

I really missed the layers, I like eating each layer as a separate bite, as I imagine they taste different or sometimes have slightly different textures. The candies had a high gloss on them, the glaze kept them from being sticky but did mean that it took a moment for them to start dissolving unless I chewed them. The yellow one was the only one that seemed like it didn’t belong, the white and orange were perfectly acceptable as a natural alternative to the convention version.

Even though these are all natural and gluten free, they’re made in the same facility with peanuts and tree nuts. There’s no statement about dairy.

Related Candies

1. Spangler Candy Corn Circus Peanuts
2. Brach’s Caramel Macchiato Candy Corn
3. Brach’s S’mores Candy Corn
4. Jelly Belly Peas & Carrots Mellocreme Candy
5. M&Ms White Chocolate Candy Corn
6. Marich Halloween Mellocremes
7. Toffee Flavored Chocolate Covered Candy Corn
8. Zachary Candy Corn & Jelly Pumpkins

A favorite treat in late summer and into fall are caramel apples. I often start seeing them as fair season starts, but at this point they’re available all year round. The combination of a fresh apple and well made caramel is interesting. The apples are crispy and juicy, with a tartness and sort of quick sweetness. Caramel has a slow lingering sweetness and chew as well as the more toasted notes of the burnt sugar and browned butter. It’s hard to imagine a candy that can replicate this, and they pretty much can’t. The flavor combination has been a trend in the past few years, so here’s a recap of a few that I’ve tried.

Name: Jolly Rancher Caramel Apple Crunch ‘n Chew
Brand: Jolly Rancher (Hershey’s)
Place Purchased: Target (Eagle Rock)
Price: $1.00
Size: 1.55 ounces
Calories per ounce: 109
Type: Hard Candy
Review: 7 out of 10
In Short: What’s lacking here is the true Jolly Rancher green apple hard candy with its smooth texture, but if you set those expectations aside, these are pretty good.

Name: Twizzlers Caramel Apple Filled Twists
Brand: Hershey’s
Place Purchased: Ralph’s (Glendale)
Price: $2.29
Size: 10.29 ounces
Calories per ounce: 101
Type: Chew
Review Rating: 6 out of 10
In Short: Twizzlers has created a candy no one asked for. It might actually have been worse if the caramel twist was on the outside and it was filled with green apple goo.

Name: Laffy Taffy Caramel Apple (Limited Edition)
Brand: Wonka (Nestle)
Place Purchased: Ralph’s (Glendale)
Price: $2.50
Size: 10 ounces
Calories per ounce: 102
Type: Chew
Review Rating: 5 out of 10
In Short: These are definitely tangy, but lack a good caramel flavor, which is too bad because the texture is quite nice.

Name:Caramel Apple Lollypops
Brand: See’s Candies
Place Purchased: See’s (The Grove)
Price: $.65
Size: .7 ounces each
Calories per ounce: 100 (70 each)
Type: Hard Candy/Caramel
Review Rating: 7 out of 10
In Short: See’s makes an excellent caramel pop, and these have just a touch of apple flavor to them. But if you’re really in a caramel mood, just get the regular flavor.

Name: Big Bite Caramel Apple
Brand: Russell Stover
Place Purchased: Walgreen’s (Echo Park)
Price: $1.00
Size: 2 ounces
Calories per ounce: 135
Type: Chocolate/Caramel/Peanuts
Review Rating: 7 out of 10
In Short: For the most part, these are just well-rounded caramel patties with the added interest of an apple flavoring. The crushed peanuts on one version add a new dimension to this category.

Name: Jolly Rancher Caramel Apple Lollipops
Brand: Jolly Rancher (Hershey’s)
Place Purchased: Target (WeHo)
Price: $2.69
Size: 9.1 ounces
Calories per ounce: 109
Type: Lollipop
Review Rating: 5 out of 10
In Short: If you’re looking for a very sour version of a caramel apple candy, look no further. If you’re looking for authentic apple flavor or caramel texture ... move along.

Name: Super Blow Pop Caramel Apple
Brand: Charms (Tootsie)
Place Purchased: Walgreen’s (Studio City)
Price: $.89
Size: 1.125 ounces
Calories per ounce: 101
Type: Hard Candy/Gum
Review Rating: 4 out of 10
In Short: The gum is terrible.

Name: Caramel Apple and Caramel Coffee Soft Candy Chews
Brand: Shurms Candy
Place Purchased: samples from Shurms Candy
Price: $4.59
Size: 3 ounces
Calories per ounce: unknown
Type: Jelly/Caramel
Review Rating: 7 out of 10
In Short: This is by far the most inventive version of this flavor combination with a good caramel and interesting pectin jelly candy. They’re also beautiful.

Name: Caramel Apple Pops: Orchard Assortment
Brand: Tootsie
Place Purchased: Rite Aid (Glendale)
Price: $2.99
Size: 15 ounces
Calories per ounce: 94
Type: Caramel/Hard Candy
Review Rating: 6 out of 10
In Short: Though I didn’t give them a high rating, these are probably the favorite for most people. The apple candy base is reliable and the caramel coating, though sticky and not appetizing to look at, is smooth and creamy.

Name: Limited Edition Milky Way Caramel Apple Minis
Brand: Mars
Place Purchased: CVS (Bryn Mawr, PA)
Price: $4.49
Size: 11.5 ounces
Calories per ounce: 125
Type: Chocolate/Nougat/Caramel
Review Rating: 6 out of 10
In Short: This is a confusing mess, as it combines both nougat and caramel with the apple flavor then throws chocolate on top. I think shifting this over to the Simply Caramel version might be more successful, but what do I know? This has been coming back as a seasonal item for four years now.

Name: Werther’s Original Caramel Apple Filled Hard Candies
Brand: Storck
Place Purchased: 99 Cent Only Store
Price: $1.00
Size: 2.65 ounces
Calories per ounce: 118
Type: Toffee
Review Rating: 6 out of 10
In Short: It’s interesting to see a German take on this combination, especially since Werther’s is so great with caramel. Though they’re not bad, they’re not as good as the traditional caramels that they do.

Name: Caramel Apple Sugar Babies
Brand: Tootsie
Place Purchased: samples from All Candy Expo
Price: $1.00
Size: 5 ounces
Calories per ounce: 112
Type: Caramel/Sour
Review Rating: 6 out of 10
In Short: Sugar Babies are great, don’t mess with them. If you want a caramel apple version, just eat some apples with your Sugar Babies.

Name: Milk Maid Caramel Apple Candy Corn
Brand: Brach’s
Place Purchased: Long’s (Dublin, CA)
Price: $1.49
Size: 9.5 ounces
Calories per ounce: 99
Type: Halloween/Caramel
Review Rating: 5 out of 10
In Short: The color is weird, but the quality is good. I didn’t care for them, but like many of the other candies profiled here, they’ve been returning for years so someone must like them.

Name: Apple Caramel Creams
Brand: Goetze’s
Place Purchased: Giant Eagle (Liberty, OH)
Price: 1.00
Size: 12 ounces
Calories per ounce: 108
Type: Caramel
Review Rating: 5 out of 10
In Short: In retrospect I think these were worse than they actually were.

Name: Caramel Apple Kisses
Brand: Hershey’s
Place Purchased: Hershey’s Chocolate World
Price: $3.00
Size: 10 ounces
Calories per ounce: 128
Type: Chocolate/Caramel
Review Rating: 5 out of 10
In Short: Hershey’s has really pared down its list of seasonal items, and these did not make the cut, probably compared to the Pumpkin Spice Kisses, which are made with less actual chocolate content.

Bonus Candies (reviews are coming):
Brach’s Milk Maid Apple Caramel Royals: Enveloped in Brach’s signature caramel and crafted with real milk, each piece is like a home-made caramel apple straight from the cookie sheet… without the seeds or stick to get in the way. (Now reviewed.)
RM Palmer Caramel Apple Cups: Bite into one of these individually-wrapped chocolaty cups with a caramel apple flavored center and find out why everyone’s falling in love with Caramel Apple Cups! (I’ve searched 3 Walgreen’s, 2 Targets, 2 Rite Aids, Cost Plus World Market, KMart and a CVS ... I cannot find these on store shelves.)

Conclusion: This is no great caramel apple candy ... that won’t keep me from trying them, but I’d prefer to focus on flavors that do make great candy.

Related Candies

1. Halloween Candy Spotting 2013
2. 10 Underrated Candies
3. Halloween Candy Spotting 2012
4. 6 Candy Corn Candies That Aren’t Candy Corn
5. The 110 Essential Candies for Candivores
6. Four 99%-100% Chocolate

I’ve been a guest on Marvo‘s podcast The Nosh Show a few times now, so we thought maybe a podcast devote just to candy might be fun. So candy blogging buddies Lauren from Candy Bar Reviews and Maria from Sometimes Foodie and I will be getting together twice a month to run down the sweet news on Candyology 101. Our first episode is about Halloween candy.

You can listen here or check out the website for full links to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, Stitcher or via RSS.

I’ve purchased quite a few candy corn themed candies this year, so it was easy to toss the Brach’s Candy Corn Nougats in my basket as well.

Brach’s makes a variety of holiday versions of their individually wrapped nougats, but this is the first year they’ve made a Halloween Candy Corn version. The bag holds 12 ounces of three different color varieties of the candies. They come in yellow, white and orange, just like the layers of candy corn and each features a little image of candy corn at the center. Like many of Brach’s other candies, these are made in Mexico.

Nougat is already very similar to Candy Corn in its ingredients. It’s basically sugar, glucose (sugar syrup), honey and a little protein (in this case egg whites, some candy corn uses gelatin). It’s a little different from taffy in that it’s usually a bit softer chew and has a mild honey flavor. Nougat is usually a smoother texture than fondant, but they should both have a clean and fresh melt on the tongue without much tooth-sticky.

It’s hard to say that these are bad when they succeed at being exactly what they’re supposed to be. They’re a soft nougat that tastes like candy corn. So that’s good.

The chew is soft, really too soft. They’re not quite foamy or puffy like a marshmallow, but not chewy like a taffy. They’re not quite melt in your mouth divine like a French nougat, either.

Related Candies

1. Spangler Candy Corn Circus Peanuts
2. Brach’s Christmas Nougats Mix
3. Charms Candy Corn Pops
4. 6 Candy Corn Candies That Aren’t Candy Corn
5. M&Ms White Chocolate Candy Corn
6. Brach’s Cherry Cordial Nougats
7. Eat with Your Eyes: Pinwheel Nougats
8. Nougat de Montelimar

Ah, yes, a holiday candy with a bit of cognitive dissonance.

This is a pumpkin shaped candy that’s flavored like Apple Pie. This is really nothing new, as Russell Stover has more than half a dozen holiday shaped treats that are flavored like baked treats: Carrot Cake, Birthday Cake, Wedding Cake, Pumpkin Pie, Gingerbread, Cookie Dough and Red Velvet. The packaging looks pretty much like the other Russell Stover one ounce pumpkin shaped candies, so I had to look carefully on the shelves to find it.

The Russell Stover Apple Pie Pumpkin is an apple pie flavored fudgy center covered in milk chocolate. At only one ounce, it’s a small little treat.

Since there are two versions of the Apple Pie on shelves, I thought I’d compare them.

The milk chocolate pumpkin is compact and has a nice enrobed milk chocolate coating. It’s not overly sweet but is milky and creamy. It’s a nice balance to the fudgy, grainy filling. It’s like a spice fudge center. It’s mostly a spice blend of cinnamon and nutmeg maybe with a hint of lemon zest but there’s also an apple flavor that kind of floats above it all. There’s just enough salt to keep it interesting. Some of the other cake flavored pumpkins have actual cake mix in them (uncooked flour) but this is just a sugary, buttery center.

I enjoy these sorts of confections in small quantities and the chocolate kept it all together well, even if it kind of kept it from tasting like actual apple pie.

Russell Stover has started making year-round versions of some of their usual holiday items. The Big Bite line includes the Big Bite S’mores (which aren’t sold in any other format to date) and some Big Bite Caramel Apples. The Big Bite Apple Pie actually accomplishes an Apple Pie experience a bit better than the Pumpkin.

Like the Big Bite S’mores, this confection features a graham cracker base.

The Big Bite Apple Pie is twice the weight of the regular Pumpkin but features a large graham cracker base. The milk chocolate coating seems a little thinner, but the spiced penuche fudge filling is about the same. The addition of the graham cracker really brought home the pie notes, but the lack of actual apples and the anomalous existence of milk chocolate in an otherwise chocolateless pie kept this from being the best emulation ... but taking it for what it is, it’s a fun little candy. It’s different, it works.

In some other news, Russell Stover was purchased this year by Lindt & Sprungli, the same company that already owns Ghirardelli Chocolate. This makes Lindt the third largest chocolate company in the United States (behind Hershey’s and Mars, bumping Nestle out of third). It will be interesting to see what sort of changes Lindt will make, and I’m hoping they’re only improvements but they don’t lose this quirky little seasonal line.

Related Candies

1. Brach’s Apple Pie Candy Corn
2. Russell Stover Eggs: Carrot Cake, Birthday Cake and Wedding Cake
3. Dilly Dally Pickle Candy and Barrels of Yum
4. See’s Holiday Pie Truffles
5. Jelly Belly Ice Cream Parlor Mix

Brach’s has quite a few new candy products on shelves, including some for Halloween. One of the new seasonal twists on Candy Corn is Brach’s Apple Pie Candy Corn.

Brach’s Candy Corn is widely available this year in a variety of flavors and shapes. I was able to find my 4.2 ounce peg bag at the Walgreen’s near my house and on sale. The previous bags I’d seen were over 10 ounces, which is too much of a novelty flavor. (But I admit that I did buy two bags of the Halloween Mellocremes.)

There is no description on the package of what the Apple Pie flavor is supposed to be. Just a picture on the front of a slice of apple pie with a dollop of whipped cream on top. I’m amused the shape of a slice of pie and a Candy Corn piece a similar, though the stacked nature of the Candy Corn layers doesn’t say pie.

It smells like a bad candle (of course I just watched this, so maybe I have Bath & Body works on my mind).

Brach’s Candy Corn is always some of the nicest at stores. The pieces are elegant and tall, and are unusually durable. Many other Candy Corn brands are easily broken or have a problem with sticking together.

These are subtle, just a creamy white base and a caramel middle/top.

The flavor is definitely like apple, like a baked apple. It’s very sweet but has a little hint of salt as well (75 mg per serving). The apple flavor is like a hint of juice, but there’s no citrus tartness at all. The cinnamon note is very mild, but welcome.

It’s not an ideal flavor for adaptation ... though I could see a whole Pie Candy Corn series, with Chocolate Cream Pie, Lemon Meringue Pie, Cherry Pie, Pecan Pie and of course they already have Pumpkin Spice.

Like other Brach’s mellocremes, this contains gelatin so it’s not suitable for vegetarians and not kosher. Though the packaging makes note in several places that they’re America’s Candy Maker (tm), these were made in Mexico.

Related Candies

1. Brach’s Caramel Macchiato Candy Corn
2. Brach’s Carrot Cake Candy Corn
3. Brach’s S’mores Candy Corn
4. M&Ms White Chocolate Candy Corn
5. Pumpkin Pie Gourmet Candy Corn
6. Milk Maid Caramel Candy Corn
7. Brach’s Autumn Mix

There probably isn’t a store as pumpkinfused as Trader Joe’s around this time of year. They have a mix of actual pumpkin items and some that are just utilizing the pumpkin spice array. Happily here’s a new candy from Trader Joe’s that has a little of both: Trader Joe’s Pumpkin Seed Brittle Dusted with Sugar and Pumpkin Pie Spice. See, it’s not pumpkin flesh that’s in there, it’s the pumpkin seeds.

The quaint box holds a simple plastic bag filled with a stack of roughly broken brittle pieces. The picture on the box does represent the contents well.

What I found most alluring was that this list of ingredients actually said which pumpkin pie spices they were using: cinnamon, ginger, lemon peel, nutmeg, cloves and cardamom. (I find it interesting that cloves is plural.)

The smell of the brittle is dominated by cinnamon, but there’s a sugary, buttery component as well. The pieces vary in size, some as big as three inches long, others are just little shards. They’re coated in mostly-sugar dusting of spices. There are pumpkin seeds embedded in there, but not as many as I would have liked, it’s mostly candy.

The bite is easy, as the pieces are pretty thin. The sugar gets everywhere, though it does a good job of sticking to the brittle as well. The effect of the whole thing, probably because of the easy crunch and sanding is more like a cookie. It’s crunchy and sweet, with a nice balance of textures between the smooth toffee-like brittle (which contains dairy ingredients) and the chewy seeds and grainy sugar. The pumpkin spices are balanced, though it smells like cinnamon, the more nutty and woodsy flavors of the nutmeg and cardamom come through along with a light warmth from the ginger and cinnamon. The lemon keeps it all bright.

It’s simple to enjoy a piece, and it goes well with some nice strong coffee or a cup of tea, just like a cookie would. I would still like more pepitas in there.

The candy contains dairy, corn and wheat ingredients and may also contain traces of peanuts, pecans, almonds, cashews and coconut.

Related Candies

1. Trader Joe’s Dark Chocolate Pumpkin Spice Salted Caramels
2. Ovation Mint Filled & Pumpkin Spice Oranges
3. M&Ms Pumpkin Spice
4. Trader Joe’s Almondictive Bits
5. Las Trojes Pepitoria Brittles
6. See’s Pumpkin Spice & Root Beer Lollypops

Brach’s, which calls itself “America’s Candy Maker” has been busy churning out new varieties of their classic candies as well as their original line of goodies. When I saw all the fun new things they were coming out with, I search and searched my local stores. When I couldn’t find them, CandyWarehouse.com was good enough to help me out by providing some samples for me.

The new Brach’s Triple Fruit Gummies are an interesting take on the divisive seasonal icon. They’re traditional gummis in the classic candy corn shape (as the package notes with a picture to remind me how it looks) and come in three layers of flavor: lemon, orange and cherry.

Brach’s did have what they said were gummi candy corn about 5 years ago, they were really little jelly candies in different fruit flavors. That particular bag of Brach’s Gummi Candy Corn I found was available in trick or treat packaging, but I’m not certain if these Triple Fruit Gummies are available that way.

The size is the same as a standard candy corn kernel. They stand easily, as they don’t have a slight convex base, instead it’s slightly concave and creates a pretty good flat rim. The pieces are layered, just like fondant style candy corn, though these are much more vividly colored. The base is a hot pink (cherry) the middle is orange and the top is yellow (lemon). The layers are pretty diffuse, so it’s a slow mixing of the colors instead of distinct bands. The gummis smell like fruit punch and a little like cherry.

They’re soft, which is a nice texture for a gummi, but odd for these colors because they’re rather fleshy looking because of the opaque quality. The flavor is overall tart with a light fruity note. The cherry permeates the whole thing, though there is a less cherry note on the top layers, I wasn’t getting the citrus that I thought the description promised.

They’re decent, certainly fun looking, but not the flavor of gummis I actually wanted. It’s a good effort on the edge of the candy corn sphere of confections. Brach’s undeniably makes a nice candy corn, but this isn’t candy corn, except in shape. It’s missing all the other qualities in texture, subtlety and divisiveness.

Related Candies

1. Albanese Rainforest Gummi Frog
2. Candy Crush: Mixed Fruit and Sour Gummies
3. Sugarfina: The Gummis
4. Life Savers Gummies Spooky Shapes
5. Trolli Gummi Bear-Rings
6. Brach’s Gummi Candy Corn
7. Disney Pixie Perfect Gummies
8. Brach’s Chocolate Candy Corn & Halloween Mix
9. Big Bite Gummy Bear