Extreme Treats

It’s that time again--time for kids to dress up, pig out and ruin their digestion for days. (No, not Thanksgiving. That’s when grown-ups do those things.)

Some ambitious people will make homemade treats this Halloween and some killjoys will hand out health food. The rest of us will stock up on the usual year-round candies in treat-size portions, plus candy corn, wax fangs and Marshmallow Peeps shaped like ghosts and pumpkins.

But there are a lot of other candy possibilities. Party stores and supermarkets cater generously to the current kid taste for extremely sour candies, candies that color the tongue alarming colors and “Star Wars” and Pokemon tie-ins. And stranger things still are lurking out there if you want to look.

There are blameless classics such as the traditional Candy Necklace (Casa de Dulce), available at many supermarkets and now in hipper colors, and party store reliables such as Ouch Gum (packaged like Band-Aids) and Bubble Tape (dispensed from a tape roller; both from Amurol Confections). Bubble gum also comes whimsically packaged as Bubble Gum Crayons and Sidewalk Chalk Bubble Gum (both from the Foreign Candy Co.), most easily found at party supply stores.

In the odd but good category, Caramel Apple Candy Corn (Brach’s) has a good apple flavor and looks pleasantly gross, like nicotine-stained teeth pulled out by the roots. And larger Asian markets regularly stock Haw Flakes (Shandong Foodstuffs), a Chinese snack made from haw fruits, otherwise known as acerola, the famous source of Vitamin C. Haw Flakes taste like slightly tart Necco wafers.

The coolest candy is the hardest to find. Whistle Candy (Coris) is available only at Hong Kong Supermarkets in San Gabriel, Monterey Park and Rowland Heights, though it’s not always in stock. These Japanese-made candies look like Life Savers but they’re hollow, so if you place one of the candies between your lips and blow, it makes a bright, shrill whistling sound. It comes in two flavors, lemonade and mellow yogurt. Each pack of eight includes a tiny prize such as a barrette or a miniature spinning top.

(Party stores often carry Melody Pops from Chupa Chups, which are lollipops shaped like a referee’s whistle. They come in fruit flavors and last a lot longer than Whistle Candy, but their tone is nowhere near as clear and piercing. Of course, some grown-ups might consider this an asset.)

Still pretty cool are Mini Burgers (Trolli)--gummy candies that look like tiny burgers; they’re at many supermarkets. You’ll have to go to a party store for Yo Yo’s (a plastic yo-yo filled with tiny candies; from Au Some Candies) or the Bubble Beeper (Amurol Confections), a beeper-shaped box full of sticks of bubble gum. Not only is the plastic box a stylish way to carry one’s gum, but the sticks also have ever so grown-up messages on them, such as “Urgent,” “Sorry--line’s busy” and “Call me at . . . . “ For that LA Marathon look, party stores stock the Squeeze Pop Sports Bottle Candy (Amurol Confections), which looks like a sports gel dispenser. Actually, what squeezes out is like mild Kool-Aid with the gooey texture of glue.

Monsters continue to be a reliable candy category. At supermarkets you can find rather good lollipops called Mutant Fruitants (Tootsie) which change their flavor (and the color of your tongue) as you suck on them. Party stores also carry dinosaur bubble gum in mottled lumps called Reptar Eggs (Au Some Candies). Brite Crawler Eggs (Trolli), available at many candy stores and even Asian markets, look much the same but are more like jelly beans.

In the really gross department we find Creepy Peepers (Palmer), caramel-filled chocolate balls in gory eyeball-motif foil wrapping. Severed Fingers and Toes (Gasworks) are extremely loathesome-looking gummy chews, available at party stores. And also at party stores you have a choice of three Bug a Boo Lollipop Holders (Fiesta). Ours is a rubber tongue with a spider on the tip, and it’s a practical idea--lollipop handles tend to get messy and dirty. So this disgusting spider tongue thing can be used over and over and over, unfortunately.

The price range for the products mentioned is 89 cents (Whistle Candy) to $1.99 (Severed Fingers and Toes). We shopped at Ralphs and Vons supermarkets, Target Stores, Party America (Burbank), Hawaii Supermarket, 99 Ranch Market and Hong Kong Supermarket (last three in San Gabriel, but 99 Ranch and Hong Kong have other branches).