Kotas Reviews Brach's Pumpkin Spice Candy Corn

Ah, Fall. Probably my favorite season of the year. The weather is cooling, but not freezing. The leaves on the trees are pretty colors. I can wear long pants without dying in the sweltering heat. Fall also contains two of my favorite food based holidays: Halloween and Thanksgiving. There is, however, a more sinister side to Fall, and that is the Oncoming Storm of Pumpkin Spice. Yes, the flavor that cravers love to savor is back and in full force once again. Let's see how it handles another fall favorite. Today we look at Brach's Pumpkin Spice Candy Corn.

May Glob have mercy on our souls.

I admit that I am a candy corn aficionado. Candy corn was always a staple in my house while I was growing up and though I was not a huge fan at first, I came to enjoy the subtle waxy sweetness that a good candy corn can bring, along with its cousins the mallow pumpkin and the "autumn mix". Candy corn is definitely an acquired taste and is certainly not for everyone, though they've tried broadening the market with such things as chocolate candy corn, "reindeer corn" which is just candy corn in red, green, and white, and other seasonal varieties. My preferences run toward "traditional" candy corn, because most variants are not very good or just recolors of the traditional. Not so with today's offering. Let's dive in!

Yep. It looks like candy corn. Candy corn has always had a very distinctive odor associated with it, but this stuff smells more like a Yankee Candle in the Pumpkin Spice scent. The colors are fine, being the traditional orange, white, and yellow, so it would be indistinguishable from ordinary candy corn in a bowl. Clearly, that is how they get you. But appearances aren't everything, how does it taste? 

I actually like Pumpkin Spice in myriad forms. The Starbucks Latte variety is delicious, and pumpkin doughnuts are always a treat. Pumpkin pie is one of my staple fall desserts, and who doesn't love a hint of gourdly goodness in their muffins now and again? So, as you can see, I am certainly predisposed to like these two flavors. But...how do they pair?

Have you ever smelled a candle and thought "man, that smells delicious. I wonder how it would taste?" Yeah, well, eating this so called food is exactly like what I imagine eating a pumpkin spice candle would taste like. I mean, yeah, candy corn has a bit of waxiness to it, but for Crap's Sake, this is the waxiest thing I've ever put in my mouth, and I've tried Wax Lips candy...which is real wax! The terror is exacerbated by the most nauseatingly fake pumpkin flavor imaginable, marching over the taste buds in horribly malignant saraband. There is something resembling artificial "spice", but what spice it could be I could scarcely comprehend.   I really hated this stuff, as did my long suffering mother who is also a candy corn connoisseur. 

On the FACE Rating System, this gets 3 Frownie Faces. It is just fucking awful and we would all be better off if this abomination had never escaped the lab to threaten us in our homes. Run as far as you can from this nightmare concoction and don't turn back, like I did. You may never recover from your experience. Don't wait for me, it's too late. Save yourself!