Have you already eaten so much candy you’ve had enough epic sugar highs for one holiday season? Or maybe you’re already tired of your kids digging into their bounty of Halloween goodies and subsequently bouncing off the walls. Well, worry no more! There are plenty of ways to enjoy your leftover Halloween candy other than simply eating it. We tackled the leftover Halloween candy issue in 2005, but the Internet is always offering us new solutions.

A lot of people claim they throw away excess candy, but there’s no way you guys would do that. I mean, you wouldn’t be reading Candy Addict if you were the type of person who could just throw candy away, right? Try these ideas instead.

• Donating is always a good thing. Why not donate your masses of leftover candy to a school, church, food bank or other organization that might possibly need candy?
• HubPages suggests donating non-chocolate candy to soldiers serving in Iraq (or elsewhere) and creating collages, picture frames and sculptures using leftover candy.
• Squidoo’s Leftover Halloween Candy Recipes – try their homemade fudge and tell us how it turns out!
• Two words: Gingerbread House. If you haven’t started the tradition of decorating a gingerbread house for the holidays, now is a great time to do so. You can buy a cheap kit at just about any grocery store (or bake your own), and use your leftover Halloween candy to decorate it. Then, take pictures and send them to us.
• Science Mom suggests Top 10 Scientific Uses for Leftover Halloween Candy, which includes blowing up marshmallows in the microwave, hosting M&M duels and creating a Mentos geyser.

Halloween, leftover, recipes, DIY, holiday

Armed with an Xacto knife, drinking straws and a protractor, Daniel and friend Jonathan set out to solve one of life’s greatest mysteries: why the smallest Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups are tastier than their bigger counterparts.

The two found that the larger the Reese’s cup, the more “unflavorable” it was. As Daniel says on his blog, “I won’t lie, this paradox troubled Jonathan and I for many a year.”

As a result, they stocked up on Reese’s cups of all sizes and approached the conundrum from a scientific perspective, launching “The Great Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Size/Taste Differential Experiment.” After a taste test, dissection, core sample and data gathering, they discovered the secret to miniature Reese’s cups’ superiority. Think you know what it is? Head on over to Daniel’s blog to see if you’re right. You might want to stock up on Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups while you’re at it, so you can do a little taste testing yourself. All in the name of science, of course.

• The Great Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Size/Taste Differential Experiment

reese’s, reeses, peanut butter, chocolate, experiment, science

Trying to cut sugar from your diet can get difficult when chocolate cravings hit. I had a sliver of time between work and class one night, and I stopped at Walgreens for a snack – the chocolate demon was attacking, and I had nothing to bolster my defenses. I headed for the small sugar-free section on the candy aisle and went through the internal debate – do I want real chocolate? Chocolate-flavored hard candy? Something new, or something tried and true?

I wanted something new, it seems. After about five minutes of staring down the sugar free chocolates, Dove’s latest caught my attention. The velvety brown bag with tantalizing raspberries and chocolate shavings drew my eyes in, and the adjectives in the candy’s name hooked me. Sugar Free Dove Rich Dark Chocolates with Raspberry Creme; not only is this chocolate dark, but also rich and infused with raspberry goodness.

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Nothing screams autumn like a steaming cup of sweet, spicy cider on a crisp, chilly evening. Luckily for Candy Addicts, there’s a way for you to get both a cider fix and a candy fix at the same time with Red Hots cider. You don’t even need to measure anything.

Photo by djking

Here’s how you do it:

Pour a jug of store-bought apple cider into a crock pot. Add a bag of Red Hots (a big bag if you’re craving something extra sweet and spicy, or a smaller amount if you want something more mellow). Let it heat slowly throughout the day, stirring occasionally to help the candies dissolve into the juice. This has the awesome side effect of filling your entire home with the cinnamon-infused scent of Red Hots – it’s better than any candle!

If you’re feeling adventurous, expand the recipe by tossing in some of your favorite cider additives, like sliced oranges, cinnamon sticks and cloves – get as creative as you’d like. And if you’re a Candy Addict who’s of age, spike it with the rum of your choice.

There’s no better way to cap off a chill autumn evening!

• The Official Red Hots Website

Buy Red Hots online:

• at Candy Crate
• at Old Time Candy
• at Amazon.com
• in bulk at CandyDirect.Com

red hots, drink, recipe, cinnamon

Swearing off sugar isn’t hard when you have alternatives like these.

I was happy to see the postal worker today, because Hillside Candy sent me a package of their Golightly Sugar Free Candy to sample, and my teeth were ready to do some chewing. You see, I can find plenty of sugar free chocolate and hard candy to enjoy, but sugar free chewy candies never seem quite right. And sometimes, chewy candy is the only thing that’ll hit the spot. Because I can’t turn to Laffy Taffy and Tootsie Rolls anymore, I hoped I could find an alternative in these Golightly candies, which can be found in Walgreens stores nationwide.

I wasn’t disappointed.

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