Halloween Candy Review: Boo Bands Candy Bracelets

Thursday, October 9, 2008 - by Laurie

Remember those plastic wrist bands that everyone was wearing a year or two ago? First available in yellow and bearing the inspirational message “Livestrong,” they were sold by the Lance Armstrong Foundation to raise money for cancer research. The campaign was so successful that other organizations also began to sell bracelets in various colors – pink for breast cancer, green for kidney donation, and so forth.

Even satirical newscaster Stephen Colbert got in on the action – after breaking his wrist, Colbert attempted to convince celebrities and fellow newscasters to wear “Wriststrong” bracelets in support of awareness against “wrist-related violence.” (The proceeds were actually donated to a fund that aids in the rehabilitation of injured American soldiers.)

Perhaps due to the wide availability of flea-market and dollar-store knockoffs, the bracelet fad has faded. However, the candy industry, usually pretty fad-conscious, has only now given us these: Boo Bands edible gummy bracelets. The individually-wrapped bracelets come in blue, red, orange, and purple, and bear the inspirational messages of “SPOOKY,” “TRICK,” “TREAT,” and, of course, “BOO!” (Oh well… who wants to be preached at by Halloween candy anyway?)

The bracelets are made of thick, chunky matte strips of gummy, thicker than the original bracelets. The texture of them is a little uneven, but the words are made up of very thick raised letters so they’re easy to read. Once removed from the bag, they stay sort of kinky. At first, I was afraid to try and stretch the kinks out, but the material is actually very elastic – they look like they’re meant to be kid-sized, but they fit easily on adult wrists as well. (I have wide hands and can never find bracelets that fit me, so I borrowed my sister’s slimmer wrist for the photo, but it turned out that this was probably unnecessary.)

They feel elastic in your teeth, too – they’re quite a tough, chewy gummy, which is a good thing if you like your gummies a little on the firm side, like I do. They smell good, like their respective flavors, except for orange, which barely has a scent at all, and it’s slightly reminiscent of floral soap or some kind of plastic, but definitely not orange.

Blue Raspberry: The blue gummy looks like the same stuff as gummy blue whales, so I was expecting them to taste like blue whales too. But though these have a strong blue raspberry scent, the flavor is actually a lot milder than you would expect.

Grape: Despite having a strong grape scent, these have a very mild flavor, actually quite similar to blue but with a bit less of a tangy edge.

Watermelon: At this point, I’d chalked this up as being a mild-flavored candy, but the red bracelet surprised me with a strong, definite fake watermelon taste – a flavor I always enjoy, even if it tastes nothing like real watermelon.

Orange: Despite its lack of nearly all aroma, this gummy surprised me by being the most strongly flavored of all, with a bright, strong Orange Crush kind of flavor.

In all, a decent-tasting candy, especially the orange and watermelon flavors. However, now that the inspirational bracelet craze has passed, I see these being popular mainly as a way for kids to sneak Halloween candy into class. Now there’s an idea that every Candy Addict can be inspired by.