I've always associated horror films with food. If my father was taking me to see a scary movie in the theater, he made sure we had the ultra industrial, added cholesterol, dyed with a glow in the dark compound that doesn't exist in nature and never should-who do think you're fooling by calling that butter? comes with its own rib spreader tub of popcorn and a big ass doesn't this look strangely like anti-freeze? Mountain Dew. If we found out there was a particular scary movie on TV, we would immediately leap into the car (that old freakin' datsun with more rust than paint on it) and zip up to the 24 hour store, which was located on the top of the hill-pratically the only conveniently located thing in town. We would load up on Mellow Yellow, Slush Puppies, pretzels, safety orange "cheese" popcorn, chocolate covered raisins, sour patch kids, and whatever else struck our fancy. As soon as "creepy" candy like gummy pet tarantulas and pet rats came out, my father would buy those too.


So I couldn't very well spend five days sitting in a dark theater without my spooky snacks. Wednesday I stopped at Dylan's Candy Bar and picked up supplies. Filmgoers kept asking me why I was dragging around bags of candy, and I had to explain that candy is part of the spooky movie ritual for me. I couldn't just sit and watch the movie, and, of course, the candy is meant to share. Besides how better to really test your metal than to watch a vampire movie while sucking on a gummy frog leg or licking on a pig snout lollie while watching a zombie movie? My candy offerings were so successful, I had to make another run to the local Duane Reade. Considering it is the season of candy and spooky, I thought I would offer some quick candy reviews.

Ice Mice (Harry Potter) Blueberry flavored hard candies with teeny candy mice inside. Tasty but would have liked them better if the mice inside had been little plastic ones rather than the somewhat unfortunately flavored candy.
Frog Legs with Bloody Dipping Sauce (Fear Factor) Not a whole lot of flavor, but WOW a lot of sugar. Especially fun for vampire films. If you use them correctly, you have blood sauce left over (sweet like Karo syrup) which you may pour over the victim of your choice and lick off at your leisure.
Jelly Slugs (Harry Potter) Nicely flavored and good decent texture.
Caramel Kisses (Hershey's) BIG CROWD PLEASER. If you are hosting a party, a must have.
Sour Crawlers (generic) Another big crowd pleasure-fusing gummy with sour in the form of a worm-how can one go wrong with that? (Also you can get three bags for two bucks at Duane Reade.)
CoCo Cats (Peeps) Didn't go over with the crowd as well as expected. I don't why people were so afraid of mocha flavored sugar coated marshmallow cats. I thought them a nice alternative to the regular Halloween Peeps.
Delightfulls (Peeps) Pumpkin shaped peeps filled with a creamy chocolate. Absolutely delicious. Breakfast of Vampire Slayers.
Gummi Parts (Frankford) Noes, toes, ears, and eyes made out of gummy. Acceptably palatable, but I like the gummy brains at Dylan's better.
Gummy Brains (Dylan's) Although Bakerina was originally a bit circumspect about them, she discovered, as did many of the filmgoers, that these gummies were appetizing. A very pleasing fruity flavor. Big crowd pleaser although you might have to talk them into trying it.
Gummy Fangs (Dylan's) Unlike the brains which are sweet, the fangs are like the sour crawlers they are both gummy and sour. Still very appealing.