Candy Corn: How Great Could It Be?

Candy Corn-flavored Oreos are this season's breakout hit.

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n the shelves this fall at your local grocery store, you might be lucky enough to find the special, limited edition Oreos—the filling is candy corn-flavored. Now, to us, that sounds pretty repulsive, but based on the reactions we've seen on Facebook and Twitter, we may be the only people who think that the new iteration of America's favorite sandwich cookie is gross. Everyone else seems to think it's the greatest thing since sliced bread (or perhaps, regular Oreos?) That said, what's up with how popular the candy is? It's not that great, it's so sweet it makes your teeth hurt, and it has an unbearably long shelf life, which is never a good thing.

M&Ms are also candy-corn-flavored this year.

Candy corn, as you probably know, is typically made with three colors—the top is yellow to resemble actual corn, it has an orange center, and the tip is white. The National Confectioners Association estimates the 20 million pounds of candy corn are sold each year. It's typically made with sugar, corn syrup, wax, and water—yummmmm.

And now, since 20 million pounds of standard, boring candy corn wasn't enough, manufacturers have rolled out not just candy corn Oreos, but candy corn M&Ms, too. Chock full of artificial flavor and made with enough sugar to give you a hearty case of diabetes, these products are inexplicably selling like candy-corn-flavored hotcakes (which, by the way, IHOP, if you're looking for a fall promo, here it is).

 Making your own is pretty easy, though, if you want to do so. You can even make candy-corn-infused vodka, if you feel like taking it one step further—all that's involved in that is combining a half cup of candy corn with a cup and a half of vodka, letting it sit for at least three hours in an airtight container, then straining.

As for making the actual candy, Alton Brown from the Food Network has come up with a relatively simple recipe for those of you who want to try it at home. It makes about 60-80 pieces of candy corn, which sounds like a lot to us—but then again, we don't really care for the tri-colored confections. If you do, check out the recipe here.