It’s candy time. It’s time to indulge our sweet tooth and discuss the best, worst, and most underrated sugar sweets this country has to offer. It’s a daunting task with seemingly endless options for praise and ridicule. To keep things relatively tight I limited myself mostly to candy bars and hard or soft candy that you could purchase at your local drug store. Things like Oreo cookies, Andy Capp’s Hot Fries, or Twinkies aren’t in play on this list.
These are in no particular order.
THE BEST
Butterfinger
I’ve reached the age where Butterfinger’s are becoming increasingly too sweet for me as they lodge their wonderful little bits inside your teeth for hours. They are still hard to resist and are delightful inside of ice cream.
Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup
It’s tough to beat this champion in any of its varieties. You can choose the all-peanut butter version, the mini version, or their cousin Reese’s Pieces. The original is still king.
SnickersÂ
Here’s what I do, I will wait a long time without eating a Snickers. Then once in a blue moon buy one, stick it in the freezer for a while, and enjoy one of God’s greatest gifts.
Twizzlers
The best road-trip candy in the world.
Chewy Sprees
All of the sugar.
Perhaps the most addicting candy I’ve experienced as an adult. The regular hard Sprees are fine but not something I’d seek out. The chewy version is pure sugar heaven.
Milk Duds
The 5 ounce box these come in are the perfect size. I think I avoided these when I was little because I mixed them up with Whoppers. I am so much wiser in my older years.
Starburst
When the wife occasionally brings home something for us both to enjoy it is likely to be a variety of Starburst. Obviously, the pink ones are the best.
Milky Way
In the traditional candy bar category this is my favorite. I go back and forth between this original and the Simply Caramel variety which is absurdly good.
Swedish Fish
My only caveat for Swedish Fish is that they have to be the regular size. There’s something about the larger sized ones that don’t taste right.
Sour Patch Kids Watermelon
In high school this kid from Alaska brought an enormous bulk candy bag of these to our study halls and I must have crushed hundreds over the span of a couple weeks.
THE WORST
Almond Joy/Mounds
Here’s what you do with these coconut atrocities, gather all of them into one location for SpaceX to launch into outer space on their next mission.
Cadbury Creme Egg
Technically, Cadbury is an English company but we’ll include them because what American child hasn’t experienced the absolute terror of biting into one of these thinking it’ll be delicious and then witnessing the horrifying reaction to the putty mess of cream on the inside.
Good & Plenty
Black licorice is 100% the work of the devil.
Boston Baked Beans
These are the candies kids get in their Halloween bags that everyone throws out. There aren’t many candies in the world where actual real baked beans would be a massive improvement upon their taste.
Whoppers
Nope. Nope. Nope.
I cannot stress enough how much the malted milk center of Whoppers are a crime against humanity.
Raisinets
Look, we know candy isn’t healthy. Why would anyone waste 27 grams of sugar and 32 grams of carbohydrates eating chocolate covered raisins when we have a million other options to eat? Never in a million years would I pay for this.
Necco Wafers
I learned that the company responsible for making Necco Wafers went bankrupt in 2018 and halted production until May of this year. We almost made the world better!
Circus Peanuts
Who doesn’t want banana-flavored marshmallow shaped like a giant peanut with a texture so weird it feels like your stomach is going to melt? All of that joy for 39 grams of sugar in just 6 pieces.
Mallo Cup
It’s like if a Cadbury Egg and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup had a baby and it turned into a monster.
THE MOST UNDERRATED
PayDay
Perhaps the world’s best candy bar that you aren’t crazy about as a kid but you’ll love it when you’re an adult. Great name for a candy bar, too.
Bit-O-Honey
If your teeth can handle these, what a delight.
Charleston Chew
I’m ’bout that vanilla life.Â
The chocolate and strawberry varieties are just okay, it’s the vanilla flavor that completely owns. Bonus points for being such a unique and unmistakable shape.
Heath/Skor
Hershey makes both of these toffee delights and I actually prefer the less popular Skor bar by just a bit. These make for amazing toppings in a ice cream blizzard.
Sugar Babies
I’m not sure there can be a more chocolate sugar candy ever made. And they get stuck in your teeth for such a long time that you can enjoy them for hours.
Rolo
Great name, great shape, great packaging, and one heck of a delicious chocolate and caramel snack.
Caramello
This candy bar is so rich and full of sugar that’s it’s sometimes difficult to eat quickly. Just remember to take your time and understand a cavity may happen it’s totally worth it, though.
If you swap Milk Duds and Swedish Fish for Almond Joy and Cadbury Creme Eggs, you have the start of a fine article here sir!
Flagged!
I could nit pick here and there, but for the most part you nailed the categories. The only glaring omission is M&Ms
I would go Skittles and a few others before M&M’s. They are a middle of the road candy for me.
Although: Peanut Butter M&M > Peanut M&M > Regular M&M
I generally dislike peanut butter candy (despite having little problem with peanut butter and liking peanuts – I don’t understand it either). Peanut M&M’s absolutely rule, though.
Generally just happy there was no Three Musketeers slander here.
I used to love Three M’s when I was little. I am certain they changed the formula of the chocolate around 15 to 20 years ago and not for the better.
PB Twix almost made my ‘best’ list. So good.
I was incredibly hyped for PB Snickers and they didn’t live up to my high bar.
I guess I am showing my age. I have never had half of these candies. I have never heard of some of them like Charleston Chews and Chewy Sprees. If I eat candy now or even in the last 47 years, I always buy the candy in the natural food section. Saying that, the taste of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups are the best although they do have the same thing in the natural food sections now
Charleston Chews might be the one of the oldest candies on here. I’m guessing they’re named “Charleston” because of the new fangled dance the kids of the time were doing.
Also, gotta give some props to Justin’s Peanut Butter Cups – definitely doesn’t replace a RPBC, but still pretty good, and might be found in the “natural food” section
Quick research suggests Necco Wafers (1847) and Good n Plenty (1893) are the oldest in the U.S.
Charleston Chew was 1925 during the dance craze.
The Charleston dance seems like a good explanation for the name.
I guess I led a sheltered life with no Charleston Chews.
Also, gotta call out the Sugar Babies confusion….Sugar Babies are basically carmel jelly beans, no chocolate involved. Sugar Mamas were carmel suckers covered in chocolate & Sugar Daddys were just carmel suckers.
Heh, true.
Take 5 is a wildly underrated candy. One of the best.
Swedish Fish are terrible and I have no idea what it is doing in the good list.
Also dark chocolate Peanut M&Ms are freaking amazing and you can almost convince yourself they’re healthy
A couple of our writers didn’t like Swedish Fish, that’s now 3 people I’ve ever known to feel this way.
Eric- you forgot to mention that for maximum enjoyment it is critical to freeze the Charleston Chew first.
I’ve never tried this!!
It says it right on there, is that new!???
Take a frozen CC and smash it up into bite size pieces before opening the wrapper. I haven’t done it in 40 years but, that’s what I remember doing. It took a while for the CC to soften in your mouth before you could start chewing it.
I don’t think anything about a Charleston Chew could be considered “new” for the past 50 years.
Also, strawberry is the best Charleston Chew.
I am excited to try this I feel so dumb.
One of the best Egg Albumen candy bars out there!
There used to be a candy bar called the Sky Bar. it was pretty good. I looked it up and it seems it was made nearby and went back into production last year. Anyone else ever have one? It was chocolate and came in 4-5 sections with a different filling in each.
That looks delightful. Can’t say I’ve ever remembered seeing one though.
Made in Sudbury Ma.
Most underrated (or perhaps just kinda unknown candy) are the Japanese fruit chews Hi-Chews. The tropical flavors are stellar (the kiwi and dragonfruit flavors even have like flax seeds or something in them to mimic the seeds of those fruit); highly recommend for your next movie/Netflix binge experience
Looks promising!
If you got a problem with circus peanuts, then you got a problem with me. And I suggest you let that one marinate.
I also do not hate the Circus Peanut, but I understand how they’re the Cilantro of candies. Another candy, much like Twizzlers, that benefits from getting a bit stale.
I went to grade school and HS with a guy named Greg Claeys in South Bend. His dad owned Claeys Candies and I saw that he is now the CEO. I am pretty sure he graduated from ND too. We also worked summers together in construction. Good guy. I think their products were more of a regional candy though. They are mostly, if not all, hard candy.
My buddy brought over some Johnnie Walker chocolates last night…ding ding ding, we have a winner!