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What do you do with all the Halloween Candy? Fun Ideas!

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Micki is a forum friend of mine and she agreed to guest post this month.  I love her Ways To Use Up Halloween Candy ideas!!  Yum, is all I have to say. 🙂 ~Kelli

As soon as the kids walk in the door with all their Halloween candy, it gets dumped into one giant pile in the middle of our living room floor. With six kids, you can just imagine the horrifying large pile of candy. It’s enough to make any dentist think, “Cha-ching!”

Over the years we’ve had to develop a coping strategy for the candy. Luckily, we have two children with birthdays close to Halloween. We’ve used leftover Halloween candy to stuff goodie bags, decorate cakes and fill piñatas. But, the kids don’t have parties every year, so we needed to come up with other ideas to deal with the candy overload.

First, we pick through the candy. All the bubblegum and jaw breakers are immediately tossed in the garbage. Next, the kids dutifully hand over all the licorice to me. Sometimes, one will try to get on my goods side and give me a Twix or a bag of Whoppers.

Next, we separate out all the lollipops and other hard candies are sorted out. These are always eaten last. And, since they keep forever, they are usually saved as rewards through out the year. Yes, I said year. DH takes some to work to hand out as treats for his students when they get answers right.

What we have left is all the good stuff…chocolates, caramels, jelly beans…mmmmm

Then, we do something else completely horrifying: We let the kids eat as much as they want. At least one eats him or her self sick every year. Overnight, the candy makes a miraculous disappearance.

I’ve heard rumors that the Tooth Fairy sneaks into homes leaving money or gifts behind in exchange for the candy. It’s with the Tooth Fairy’s (and our dentist’s) blessing that the kids pig out on one night of candy. It’s far better for the kids to eat a large amount of candy in one sitting than to piece it out over a long period of time.

Around our house, the candy is eventually reincarnated into various desserts and sweet treats. Aside from the obvious of adding m-n-ms into cookies, you can add skittles into crispy rice treats, or use them to decorate cup cakes, cakes and cookies.

One of my favorite recipes is for Milk Dud Cookies: Peanut buttery goodness with a chocolate a caramel filling. Whoppers are great in milkshakes and Whoppers Pie. Those leftover lollipops and hard candies make beautiful stained glass window cookies (perfect for Christmas gift giving!)

The chocolate bars can be chopped up and added to any cookie recipe calling for chocolate chips. They also add a beautiful garnish when grated.

Tired of the sweets? Use the chocolate in a Mexican recipe! Mole is an amazing Mexican dish that mixes sweet and spicy by combing chocolates and chilies.

Bottom line: Halloween candy is a treat that can keep on giving and get you a head start on holiday baking!

Please go visit Micki’s website to find out more about her! http://addhousewife.blogspot.com

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Jessica Beard

Wednesday 9th of November 2011

Thanks for the idea! I love the idea of having the Tooth Fairy come in with a small gift in exchange for the candy. I think I will use that. That is great that you can use leftover candy for birthday party gift bags. My son's birthday is in April, so that probably won't work. ha ha

Mandy Mayzum

Tuesday 6th of October 2009

We do 2 things... Candy that they get on halloween night is given to the candy fairy (they may keep how ever old they are in pieces of candy, so my 7 year old keeps 7 this year). The candy fairy then leaves a gift in place of the candy. She has been stopping by our house since Kenzie was little.

Any candy that is gotten before halloween night is used for a countdown to Thanksgiving. They get to punch out the tissue paper covering the cup and take the piece of candy each day all the way to Thanksgiving. It works nicely to spread out the eating of the candy and no arguing.

We do the same with gumballs and junky candy. I prefer that chocolate be kept, since its a little better for your teeth than lollipops. But we use lollipops for airplanes, long car rides, or any other time we need to bribe the kids to be good for an extended period of time! I like your idea of using the candy in other treats. I plan to try that this year! .-= Mandy Mayzum´s last blog ..Superload =-.

Mary Grace McNamara

Tuesday 6th of October 2009

Wonderful ideas for using up Halloween candy! Thanks, Micki, for bringing back great memories of dumping the Halloween candy and going through it. I'm the 4th of 8 children and the amount of candy that came into and out of our house when we were of Trick-or-Treating age was phenomenal!

Great idea to use the candy in other things throughout the coming months. I'm thinking of what would look good on a gingerbread house, and hoping my kids get at least a small stash of that kind of candy this year!

MGM .-= Mary Grace McNamara´s last blog ..Scrappy Love Quilt Block finished =-.