In any case, I can’t read those words without thinking of this cartoon.
But the reason we’re discussing this is because Fluffy Stuff’s Witches Brew Cotton Candy is our treat of the day. Modern cotton candy was invented by a dentist (I’m not making this up) in 1897. It’s known as “candy floss” in the UK, and in France it goes by the rather disgusting sobriquet “daddy’s beard.”
Conceptual Soundness: Cotton candy strikes me as one of those accidental inventions that no one ever asked for, but which was widely embraced nonetheless. Objectively, there’s nothing especially appealing about eating pure sugar that’s been spun into something with the shape and texture of a dryer lint. But there’s something magical about the sensation of biting off a hunk of cotton candy and immediately feeling it melt into nothingness in your mouth. Its fun factor is further enhanced by its association with fairs and circuses and childhood. Let’s give it the full 4 points.
Appearance of the Treat. This product is sold in a foil bag featuring the silhouette of a slim and possibly hot witch, a black cat with Anime eyes, and scary “Witches brew” lettering. But open the bag and you see that this looks even more like dryer lint than you’d thought possible. It has a disgusting, dirty color and texture. Zero points.
This is an unretouched photograph of the actual “treat” once removed from the bag.
By way of comparison: Here’s some actual dryer lint. To my eye, it looks slightly more appealing than the cotton candy.
Taste: Not only does it look like dryer lint; it also tastes like it. Zero points.
Value: It was only a buck for a 2.1 ounce bag. Which isn’t bad. If you actually wanted to eat it. Which I don’t. Zero points.
Total Treat Score: 4/16 points
But wait! There’s a slight chance of redemption available from the “Witches Brew Berry Magic Punch” recipe on the back of the bag. Combine 1 cup cotton candy, 1/2 cup berry sparkling water, and 1/2 cup cran-raspberry juice. Watch the video:
October is my favorite month, for a number of reasons–the change in weather, the availability of darker and heavier beers on tap, and of course the approach of Halloween. Somehow all three of those come into play at the annual Poe Fest in Baltimore. The two-day festival is always held on the weekend closest to October 7, which of course is the date Poe died in Baltimore, under mysterious circumstances, in 1849. This year therefore marks the 175th anniversary of Poe’s death. Astute readers will recall I visited Poe Fest in 2019, and I’m returning this year for a very special reason. Let me explain:
Remember the story (“A Dying Wish”) I presented in serial form as part of last year’s October blog posts? I’m pleased to report that it’s been nominated as a finalist in Poe Fest’s literary contest called The Saturday ‘Visiter’ Awards. So I will be attending the Festival, where the winner of the contest will be revealed at the Black Cat Ball on the night of October 5. I will of course report on the outcome, along with photos, the next day.
Meanwhile, as has become our tradition here at Chasing Phantoms, we’ll be making daily Halloween-themed posts throughout the month of October. This year we’re bringing back a fan favorite: Daily reviews of seasonal treats.
Just part of the day’s work here at Chasing Phantoms.
Now, I’m aware there’s been some controversy over how we’ve defined “seasonal treats” in the past. This year we’ll be expanding the concept to its breaking point, like a Nerd Rope that’s stretched until it snaps and scatters little Nerd candies all over the carpet.
So let me be perfectly clear: We are defining “seasonal treats” as any nutritionally-suspect foodstuffs traditionally associated with the month of October. Specifically, we will be reviewing treats in four categories, with (roughly) a week devoted to each category.
Week 1: Seasonal offerings from chain coffee shops (Starbucks, etc)
Week 2: Halloween candy
Week 3: Seasonal offerings from ice cream and donut chains (BR, Winchell’s)
Week 4: Seasonal alcoholic beverages
Yes, we here at Chasing Phantoms are willing to conduct this research for the benefit and edification of our loyal readership. Think of us as a Halloween-themed version of Consumer Reports, just without the standards or credibility.
The fun kicks off tomorrow. Be sure to share the news with your friends!
In the spirit of the holiday, we have a special treat for you today. After the daily review (which appears immediately below), we’re going to summarize the top entries in each of my four categories, and then select a winner from each. I can almost hear the cheers from my far-flung readership….
Today’s treat is perhaps the most questionable of all the month’s entries. That’s because it has no added sugar. In fact, it isn’t processed at all. It’s just a naturally-occurring food that’s been stuck in a bag and cynically labeled as a Halloween treat. So yes, I’m obviously talking about Hobgoblin Grapes!
Packaging. We start off with the usual point for transparent packaging. But then we notice the nods to Halloween:
They’ve taken black, seedless grapes and re-branded them as “Harvest Hobgoblin Grapes.”
They include an illustration of what’s purportedly a hobgoblin, but which seems more like one of Santa’s elves gone bad.
There’s a cauldron of bats flying in front of a harvest moon. That’s always a sure-fire Halloween cliche.
The PLU (price look-up) code is on a pumpkin.
There’s (somewhat incongruously) a ghost behind the “Harvest Hobgoblin” title.
There’s a reference to trick or treat, with the self-congratulatory “no trick, all treat!”
Altogether, it’s a pretty good effort. I’ll give it three points.
2. Appearance of the Treat. Let’s face it. These are grapes. As such, they look like grapes. There’s really nothing especially appealing or Halloween-y about these. I suppose, to be generous, I could give a point for their being black, which is one of the two traditional Halloween colors. And since I’m indeed a generous guy, I will in fact award that one point.
3. Taste. Not only do these look like grapes; they taste like grapes. (I’m suddenly reminded of an old Cheech and Chong routine that all the middle-school kids had memorized in the 1970s.) Given that they have lots of natural sugar, I guess you could consider them a decent treat. But I can’t give more than one point when there’s no chocolate, nougat, sprinkles, icing, or other components of a self-respecting treat.
4. Value. My local grocery store had these for $1.79 per pound, which works out to about 11 cents per ounce. That’s among the least expensive of the treats that we’ve reviewed this month. On the other hand, if value is at all affected by the Treat Satisfaction Index (which is something I just made up), then the value declines. Let’s call it 2 points.
Steve’s Spooktoberfest Score: 7 out of 12 points, making it a minor TREAT. Get some for the neighborhood kid who’s allergic to real treats.
PART II: GREATEST HITS
We now move to the second look at the winners in each of the four categories over the course of the month. We start with packaging. There were 7 treats getting a full 3 points in this category:
PACKAGING WINNERS:
Oct 13: Frankenberry
Oct 16: Pumpkin beer
Oct 17: Monster pop
Oct 20: Cheetos Bag o’ Bones
Oct 24: Kettle corn
Oct 28: Cap’n Crunch’s Halloween Crunch
Oct 31: Hobgoblin grapes
Applying my usual carefully-controlled measurements and objective criteria (which involves a dart board and a blindfold), I have to hold up the Cap’n Crunch as the treat with the most Halloween-y packaging. It seems they didn’t leave any space on the box undecorated. If nothing else, the appearance of the good Cap’n as a tattered, luminescent ghost makes this a worthy packaging effort.
Moving on to APPEARANCE OF THE TREAT:
Oct 9: Mummy cookie
Oct 14: Spider donut
Oct 15: Frankenstein cookie
Oct 17: Monster pop
Oct 19: Caramel apple
Oct 21: Candy corn cookie
Oct 22: Halloween oreos
Oct 28: Cap’n Crunch
Oct 30: Cinnamon roll
This is a tough one. All these treats are a delight to behold. But I have to give the award to the spider donut. The vibrant colors and creative design are whimsical and festive. If there were a Nobel Prize for Halloween Treat design, it would go to the spider donut.
Turning now to the all-important category of TASTE:
Oct 7: Nerd rope
Oct 10: See’s pumpkin
Oct 14: Spider donut
Oct 17: Monster pop
Oct 19: Caramel apple
Oct 22: Halloween oreos
Oct 23: Reese’s white chocolate pumpkin
Oct 24: Kettle corn
Oct 26: Russell Stover candy corn pumpkin
This is another tough choice. To select a winner, I thought about which treat I’d most like to have if I were stuck on a desert island with no other treats for a month. Framed in this way, the answer is obvious: it’s the Russell Stover candy corn pumpkin. You’ll recall that the candy corn part isn’t really the decisive factor here; instead, it’s the white fudge, enveloped in white chocolate. Never let it be said that I’m snobbish about my treats–I mean, Russell Stover?!
Now for the little matter of VALUE:
Oct 2: Russell Stover marshmallow pumpkin
Oct 3: Russell Stover peanut butter pumpkin
Oct 7: Nerd Rope
Oct 8: Popcorn ball
Oct 14: Spider donut
Oct 19: Caramel apple
Oct 26: Russell Stover candy corn pumpkin
Oct 30: Cinnamon roll
To identify a winner, I used a complicated and proprietary formula that combines cost-per-ounce with bliss factor and Halloweeniness. I plugged the data into my computer and the winner was revealed to be the caramel apple. It’s an old-timey Halloween treat that appeals to my nostalgia, plus it’s decorated in fall colors and it has a really nifty ghost ring. If I really wanted to justify this choice, I could note that there’s even some nutritional value to an apple.
OK, now to cut it another way, we can look at the total points earned by each treat. All the month’s treats are listed below, with their total scores. Note that two treats tied for first place.
Oct 1 Frankencup: 7 points
Oct 2: Russell Stover marshmallow pumpkin: 5 points
Oct 3: Russell Stover peanut butter pumpkin: 5 points
Oct 4: Jelly belly pumpkins: 2 points
Oct 5: Kinder egg: 6 points
Oct 6: Reese’s regular pumpkin: 7 points
Oct 7: Nerd rope: 9 points
Oct 8: Popcorn ball: 10 points
Oct 9: Mummy cookie: 6 points
Oct 10: See’s pumpkin: 6 points
Oct 11: Pop tarts: 6 points
Oct 12: Pepperidge farm cookies: 2 points
Oct 13: Frankenberry: 5 points
Oct 14: Spider donut: 10 points
Oct 14: Ghost pepper donut: 3 points
Oct 15: Frankenstein cookie: 5 points
Oct 16: Pumpkin beer: 5 points
Oct 17: Monster pop: 11 points
Oct 18: Jelly Belly Monster Mash: 2 points
Oct 19: Caramel apple: 11 points
Oct 20: Cheeto’s Bag o’ Bones: 7 points
Oct 21: Candy corn cookie: 7 points
Oct 22: Halloween Oreos: 10 points
Oct 23: Reese’s White Chocolate pumpkin: 7 points
Oct 24: Kettle corn: 10 points
Oct 25: Pumpkin chips: 2 points
Oct 26: Russell Stover candy corn pumpkin: 9 points
Oct 27: Kit Kat: 4 points
Oct 28: Cap’n Crunch’s Halloween Crunch: 9 points
Oct 29: Spooky Lips: 2 points
Oct 30: Cinnamon roll: 9 points
Oct 31: Hobgoblin grapes: 7 points
Finally, like a graduate student showing off statistical operations toward no real meaningful purpose, I’d like to point out that there were three treats that each earned perfect scores of 3 points in three categories. They are:
Oct 14; Spider donut
Oct 17: Monster pop
Oct 19: Caramel apple
So there you have it. I hope you appreciate my eating 31 different Halloween treats (actually, it was 32, since I sampled two different donuts on October 14) on your behalf. I hope you all have a wonderful Halloween, and stay tuned for next October when I review classic scary movies. In the meantime, this blog will return to chronicling my travel adventures around California and beyond.
And now, in the spirit of Halloween, I’ll leave you with not just one “Boo!”, but two:
One of the best things about doing this treat blog in October is that I feel obligated to purchase and consume sweets on a daily basis. (Don’t try this at home; I’m a trained professional.) This morning, for example, I was feeling a bit peckish for a baked good. The treat gods were apparently smiling on me, for when I got to the grocery store there was a Halloween-themed cinnamon roll staring back at me from the bakery case.
Cinnamon rolls, I think we can all agree, are basically a delivery system for icing. No one really cares about the relatively-bland, sometimes-dry bread that serves as the foundation for the cinnamon roll. In fact, if that bread didn’t have cinnamon, I’m pretty sure it would indistinguishable from a slice of Wonder Bread. But something magical happens with you add the icing. The genius of the cinnamon roll is the “roll” part; that is, you get icing not just coating its exterior surface, but you also get icing (or sometimes a cinnamon-sugar goo) lining the interior spiral.
I’ll admit that you don’t normally think of cinnamon rolls as part of the Halloween Treat Pantheon. But the good people at Ralph’s decided to drizzle an orange icing on top of the traditional white icing, instantly turning it into a Halloween Treat. This might be classified as gilding the lily, but I’d call it inspired. You can’t have too much icing. (Refer to the previous paragraph.)
So let’s get on with the review!
Packaging. The packaging consists solely of a clear plastic clamshell. There’s no brand name, no cute mascot, no description, no “nutrition facts,” no nothing. But even though I can’t give the packaging any points for Halloween imagery, I will, per tradition, award 1 point for letting me see the actual treat prior to purchase.
2. Appearance of the Treat. Although simple in concept, the appearance of this cinnamon roll is impressive. It starts with a standard cinnamon roll with regulation white icing. It’s then drizzled with a secondary icing in that perfect shade of Halloween Confectionary Orange which both denotes Halloween and promises sugary goodness. The design of said secondary icing is evocative of a spider web, and reminds me of the logo of Boris Karloff’s “Thriller” television series from the 1960s.
So let’s review: Halloween orange, sugary goodness, Boris Karloff. That’s worth 3 points.
3. Taste. On the one hand, the bread of this cinnamon roll, like so many cinnamon rolls, was disappointingly dry. Clearly they skimped on the all-important cinnamon goo which belongs along the inner spiral. But the double-icing coating inclined me toward forgiveness. The icing was thick and fresh and gooey, and suffused my mouth, almost (but not quite) masking the dryness of the bread. So let’s do the math: 3 points for the icing, and 1 point for the bread, produces an average of 2 points.
4. Value. This fresh-baked, generously-iced treat set me back a mere 4 bits. Over time that works out to maybe $10 per cavity. It’s definitely a good value. 3 points.
Steve’s Sweetoberfest Score: 9 points out of 12, making it a solid TREAT. If you can’t find one at your local grocery store, at least you can watch Thriller on YouTube for free.
(I always look for an opportunity to use that word.) (No, not treat; antepenultimate!)
I’ve spent a good portion of this month trying to find a few old-timey Halloween treats that I remember from my misspent youth: syrup-filled wax skeletons, candy bones strung on an elastic bracelet, candy cigarettes, wax lips… I’ve failed in my efforts to locate those bygone treats, but I did find something close. Allow me to tell the tale:
Behold the “Spooky Lip Pop!” It’s not wax lips, exactly, because you could sort of eat the wax lips. I was never entirely clear whether they were intended to be edible, but technically you could bite off a chunk and chew it into a crumbly mass that, if you were lucky, would cohere sort of like chalky gum. Today’s “Spooky Lip Pop,” however, is made of entirely inedible plastic lips, to which is attached a candy bulb in the fashion of a baby’s pacifier. So let’s get down to the review.
Packaging. Alert readers know that I give points for clear packaging which allows the potential consumer to see the actual product. This is no exception. You can clearly see the plastic lips and teeth which look like they’re in need of some serious orthodontia. There’s also a drawing of a pair of creepy-looking zombie hands in desperate need of a manicure, as well as random body parts (an eyeball, some phlegm, and who knows what else). It’s definitely not appealing packaging. In fact, it evokes the old Wacky-Packages of my youth, which used disgusting wordplay and double-entendres to gross out young consumers. I’ll give it 2 points.
Appearance of the Treat. As noted above, the treat is clearly visible through the packaging. But once you liberate it from the packaging, you encounter a cute (?) cartoon face that’s demonstrating how to use the candy pacifier. As if it isn’t intuitive.
For some reason, I found it to be a clever little prop. True, the artwork is amateurish and the size is out of scale. And why would a zombie, with leaking brains and mismatched eyes, feel a need to use fake teeth to make himself look weirder? But it’s still kind of playful. The plastic lips/teeth themselves are reasonably well rendered. See how Mr. Spookybones models them:
I’ll give this a definite 2 points for appearance.
3. Taste. The business end of this treat is a bulb-shaped hunk of sugar that supposedly tastes like blue raspberry. It got me to wondering if there’s even such a fruit as blue raspberry. And evidently there is! But it’s doubtful that any Rubus leucodermis gave up their lives for this treat. Anyway, it tastes mainly just like sugar, maybe with a hint of a nondescript fake flavor you get in a Slurpee or whatever. But let’s face it: You don’t buy a plastic, lip-shaped pacifier for its culinary verisimilitude. I’m willing to give this 2 points, because I’ve been sucking on it since I started writing this review, and it’s inoffensive. (Special note: As I’ve gotten down there the end of the pop, I’ve discovered a plastic pointy-thing sticking out of the candy. I’m not sure this would be the best thing to be giving to small kids on Halloween.)
4. Value. It cost me a buck at Party City. It’s the closest thing to wax lips I’ve been able to find, so supply and demand must confer some value on this. I’ll give it 2 points.
Steve’s Spooktoberfest Score: 8 out of 12 points, which qualifies as a minor TREAT. Get yours while you can. Or take out a life insurance policy on a toddler and give this to him.
Chasing Phantoms 