Stephanie Haines
When I write these articles, I try to serve up my experiences with a side dish of humor. I generally stay away from editorials, controversy and opinion pieces. Be forewarned that this topic may ruffle some feathers. My provocative question for the week: Why does Easter have the worst candy of all holidays?
Granted, there are some holidays that don’t seem to have any special candies associated with them. St. Patrick’s Day doesn’t generate an uptick in candy sales, from what I can see. The only treat that comes to mind are the mint-flavored shamrock shakes from McDonalds.
Independence Day desserts allow you to get creative — anything goes, as long as it’s red, white, and blue. You’d think apple pie would be required here, seeing as it’s one of those quintessential American things. But since apples don’t show up until months later, it would be kind of weird to bring this to a midsummer gathering.
One holiday that’s all about candy — Valentine’s Day — brings out the good quality stuff. That’s when you see the fancy dark chocolates, white chocolates and hand-crafted confections. And even better than candy? It’s the one day of the year you can get a heart-shaped pizza!
But Easter has specific candy — lots of different kinds. And they’re all bad. I get it; you need hard candies like jelly beans or skittles to put into plastic eggs for the kids. You can’t use chocolate because it will melt while sitting in the sun waiting for the egg hunt to begin.
But even the stuff that’s too big to fit into the eggs isn’t any good either. Like Peeps. They are marshmallows, which is basically a viscous form of sugar, that are then topped with crispy sugar. And food dye. Peeps are useful for clever art projects though. (Go on, do a search for this.)
If you do get chocolate for Easter, it’s in the shape of a bunny, which does not stimulate my appetite. Then in order to get the chocolate payoff you have to risk breaking a tooth on a rock solid rabbit. While you are trying to gnaw off a chunk, you end up drooling all over the chocolate carcass. I guess the upside is that no one is going to want to steal your candy.
Then there’s a newcomer to Easter baskets everywhere: Bunnycorn. If you’re not familiar with this one, it’s the worst confection (candy corn) from a holiday that normally has pretty good candy (Halloween) that’s then given a makeover in the form of pretty colors, and then has a cute name slapped on it.
The Grand Champion of Worst Easter Candy goes to Cadbury Creme Eggs. Even an outer shell of milk chocolate can’t redeem them. When you bite into one your mouth is assaulted with a runny goo that’s supposed to look like the innards of an egg. I don’t find raw eggs appealing, so why would I want to eat something gross that mimics some other gross thing?
Clearly, the best solution to this dilemma is to take matters into your own hands. Throughout my childhood, my mom would attempt a bunny cake. She would bake a couple of different round cakes, then cut and cobble them together, using white frosting as the adhesive mortar.
It would then be served on a bed of coconut, dyed green to resemble grass. It was pretty good, if you could get past the disappointment of a non-chocolate cake. But no matter how she would tweak it every year, it always resembled a Volkswagen Beetle. At least I had no problem chowing down on an edible automobile.
Stephanie Haines enjoys looking at life a little differently. She can be contacted through her website: www.stephaniehaines.
