Eva Buto

evie@psu.edu

Staff Writer

Candy corn is up there with pineapple on pizza and cilantro for the most controversial food. The tooth-rotting sweet has been a Halloween staple for years. However, it initially wasn’t related to the holiday at all! It was created in Philadelphia in the late 19th century, but remained obscure until the Goelitz Confectionery Company in Cincinnati bought the recipe in 1898. Goelitz eventually became the Jelly Belly Company. Candy corn was marketed under the playful name of “chicken feed”, as corn had not yet entered the common American diet and was only known for feeding livestock. World War 1 is actually what made corn a more common staple of the American diet; during times of poverty and food shortages, people were forced to consider alternative food sources. 

Candy corn’s biggest success came in the 1950s. Now being the candy corn we know and love today, companies began to market it for the autumn months as a seasonal and festive treat. This worked! Adults began to hand it out for trick-or-treating, and the orange and yellow coloring was already reminiscent of the season. Today, the biggest producer of candy corn is Brach’s, who have nailed the classic look and flavor of the candy. They make up 89% of the candy corn sold in America. However, the market for the niche treat is not doing well- sales have fallen 8% this past year according to the NielsonIQ, which tracks what consumers are purchasing.

One reason people don’t like candy corn is that it’s “too sweet”, and it is certainly made almost entirely of sugar. Sugar, honey, and corn syrup can all be found in the food, as well as some other ingredients that people may not know about. For example, “confectioner’s glaze” hardly stands out on an ingredient list, but it as well as gelatin make the food unsafe for vegetarians or vegans. This is because gelatin is made of animal bones, commonly of pork, while confectioner’s glaze is made from shellac, a secretion from bugs. The lac bugs are parasites that secrete a waxy substance for their protection, and this can be harvested and added to candy to give it its well known shine. Although it doesn’t sound appetizing, shellac is entirely safe to eat. The sugar in candy corn poses more of a danger to your health, but eating the sweet treat in moderation is just fine.

Despite candy corn’s decreasing sales, more and more flavors and varieties are available. Mellowcreme pumpkins, a pumpkin-shaped treat with a very similar flavor and texture to candy corn, is a widely available and quite festive alternative. The autumn harvest variation by Brach’s is the same shape, but darker and contains cocoa powder to give a more rich and complex flavor. Caramel apple is slowly entering the scene as a candy corn flavor, and may one day be as popular as the autumn harvest flavor. There have likely been hundreds of candy corn flavors made, with Brach’s coming out with variations like funnel cake and Thanksgiving turkey. Blackberry cobbler is also becoming a popular choice with a darker purple and black look, originating from Canada. Love or hate candy corn, it’s clear that it’s not going away any time soon.