Stuff You Should Know - Short Stuff: Candy Corn

Episode Date: October 18, 2023

Is it vile? Is it delicious? It seems to be both! Hear all about the history of candy corn, how it’s made, and who likes it in this pre-Halloween episode!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A brand new historical true crime podcast. When you lay suffering a sudden brutal death, starring Allison Williams, I hope you'll think of me. Erased, the murder of Elma Sands. She was a sweet, happy, virtuous girl. Let's go up here! Until she met that man right there.

Written and created by me, Allison Flop. Is it possible, sir? We're standing by for your answer. Erased, the murder of Elma Sands. the I Heart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Hey, and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh and there's Chuck and Jerry's here to a Dax here in Spirit, which is appropriate because this is a kind of a Halloween themed episode of short stuff.

Is it not Chuck? It's spooopy. Spooopy? Spooopy. Is that what you said for real? Yeah. Are you going to do this bit every year? I don't remember you saying it.

So yes, as long as I forget the next day, yes, every year I'm going to do this. Spoopy, S-P-O-O-P-Y is a lighthearted spooky. Okay, is that your own trademark slogan? No, look it up. Okay, I will look it up. I'll actually all forget all about it and won't look it up. And then next year I'll agree to look it up again. Now we should all pause, let you look it up.. Now we should all pause. Let's you look it up.

Okay. Since this is short stuff, we'll just let the tape roll. All right. T-t-t-'s one of the most divisive candies. Probably the most divisive holiday candy of all time. Where do you land? Oh, I don't like it at all. Okay. Do you like it? I mean, there's a bit of a nostalgia play. I don't, I definitely can't say that I think it's like, oh boy, this tastes great. I can't wait to eat it. But like if someone throws a candy corn in my mouth

and I happen to be chewing, I'll be like, oh, that old memory. But I don't go, puh, puh. I got you. We need to get one of those house divided license plates. Right. Sure. So candy corn is actually super old. We know it's at least coming up on 150 years old. They think it came out in the 1880s. And by

the way, thanks big time to history.com, better homes and gardens, always a treat.com. is always a treat.com, mbhenry.com, and candy store.com. A lot of dot coms in there, but one of the things about candy corn is its origins are murky, so people just generally say, yeah, this guy is the inventor. Yeah, exactly. I mean, are we going to that guy? No, let's talk about where it came from originally, we think. Yeah, because previous to the actual corn, they were making these kinds of candies, and that's not to say the ones that were shaped that way and colored that way, but we're talking about melochrome. Yeah.

You know those candy pumpkins? Yeah, that's melochrome, right? Exactly. That to me is quintessential melochrome, even more those candy pumpkins. Yeah, that's melochrome right exactly that to me is quintessential melochrome even more than candy corn Yeah, and apparently they used to make all sorts of phony vegetables made out of that junk Because Americans were still farming and they could you know if you had a little Seven-year-old you could be like you got to work in the field all day when you come home You're gonna get this meloch cream sparigas tip. Or mellow cream bok choy.

Yeah, boy. You would think these little kids who were being forced into child labor, the last thing they would want to see in their candy were agricultural products, but apparently that's all they had to choose from. The other thing to know about this, this context that Candy Corn emerged from is that these candies

were available year round. The thing that made Candy Corn stand out among its peers is that it had three colors, technically two colors and the presence of all color. Yeah, I like that. I like the way you put it. So let's talk about the guy who actually is credited with inventing this. Probably is, who cares at this point? He's been credited for so long. It doesn't really matter. Yeah, and he's from Philadelphia and they like to take credit for everything.

So we're talking about George Rinninger is how I would pronounce it, or Rinninger maybe. He worked at the Wonderly Candy Company in Philly, the brotherly love city. The reason why he's credited is that he was an employee there and they are known to be the first company to start producing these. I guess he was a candy designer there. Wonderly Candy Company was the first to put these out. They were out for a little while.

And you could, like I said, they were available year round, all of these things were, and they weren't associated with Halloween. You could find them at just about any celebration where they had candy treats. But the thing to know about them is they were, so you know, like candy cigarettes or little candy people that you eat or candy things that look like other stuff.

That's what candy corn was originally meant to be. And of course candy corn, it's in the name. But we think of it today as like little kernels of corn that you would like eat. It was originally marketed as candy corn in the sense that corn was chicken feet. So this was basically candy chicken feet is how candy corn started out. Yeah, because apparently, and this is something that I didn't know, to me is the fact of the show,

is that including a little bit after World War I, but previous to that, and in a few years after, apparently corn was kind of like a, it's not a vegetable to start, right? Yes. It was a garbage starch. Like people, it wasn't on the plates of most Americans and you had to have been really hard up for food apparently

to eat corn as a human. And it was just for chickens. Exactly. So this is what kids were eating. They would go to the store and get a box of chicken feed from the Golets candy company. So this is the company that really exposed candy corn to the world. Which is, I love corn. Do you like corn? Yeah. I like corn on the cob. For some reason, once you take it off the cob, I think it's disgusting. Oh, even in like a dish like Ilo te or like a salad or something? It depends.

It really depends on the dish. But like if it's canned, I mean, oh god, I can barely like talk about it. You know the old story of when I was missing that front tooth and I would eat corn and that would be little rows of Ine un eaten corn every like two inches. That was a magazine cover too. I think it was. So candy corn's out there. The genies out of the bottle is they say,

kids are eating this candy chicken feed. But then by like the mid 20th century, people ate corn normally. And by the mid 20th century, Halloween was very much associated with candy. Yeah. I think around this time is when candy corn really became linked to Halloween. Like, it would be weird to see candy corn at Easter.

But that's how it used to be, friends. Yeah, but now it's linked. Starting in the mid-20th century, like you said, to Halloween and we will take a break, yeah? Yeah. And we'll talk about how you make this stuff right after this. The Year is 1800, a city hall, New York. The first murder trial in the American Judicial System.

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And even though this Hollywood couple finally found each other, they don't have all the answers. Hold on a second! Well, that's where I come in. I'm prepared to guide you, or listeners, through some of life's funniest, awkward, or difficult moments. Listen to Old-ish on the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you Get your podcasts. All right. You went to that website, alwaysatreech.com. They had a pretty good story there about how they used to manufacture this.

It's not a whole lot different than they do it today. Obviously, it's automated today, but back then, you would get a bunch of dudes and they would get sugar and corn syrup and some other, you know, magical ingredients. And they would cook it in these big kettles and boil it all up. They would add a little marshmallow, maybe a little fondant to smooth it out a little bit. And 45 pounds at a time, they would make this warm slurry, and they would pour it into buckets called runners,

and then these guys called stringers would walk backwards down a line and pour this candy into these little molds, these little trays in that classic iconic kernel shape. Yeah, and the trays were made of cornstarch, and it would take three passes. And for some reason, I don't understand why the stringers, the guys pouring the candy corn slurry into the mold

would walk backwards, do you? Mm. No, I don't. No, it was trying to think it might be easier to pour. I mean, it was probably had something to do with the setup. I mean, I could understand if you're left handed, you're walking backwards. But if you're right handed, yeah, I think right handed,

you'd be walking backwards if the thing was on your left. There's no explanation I can find for why they would walk backwards. Well, they are from Philly, so maybe they were just like, we're candy corn stringers, we walk backwards. Yeah, probably. That's the answer is as good as any. But the whole thing is that we take three passes because they would put the white in, then the yellow, and then the orange. And that's how it was originally made. And basically, nothing has changed except like you said it's become automated They use essentially the same ingredients, which are you ready for this?

It's like you said made with sugar It's made with fondant which is sugar water and corn syrup It's made with corn syrup, which is a whole bunch of different sugars mostly glucose The nila flavoring and marshmallow cream which is made from corn syrup, sugar, water, and eggs. There's a lot of sugar in these things. And they melt them into a slurry, all those ingredients, and they pour them into cornstarch molds, just like they did 100 something years ago. Yeah, boom, boom, boom. They just layer up the colors just like that. More than, and this is, according to the National Confectioners Association, the NCA says, 35 million pounds of this stuff, which amounts to 9 billion pieces of candy corn are produced annually in modern times.

Yes. And even in keeping in tradition, they make the machines work backward for some reason when they're pouring the slurry. That's right. And are we done? Of course not, because somehow you found actual survey statistics on how popular this stuff was. Yeah, because there's a thing. It's been around for almost 150 years for reason. And the reason is, there's some people out there who actually like candy corn. Yeah. I know it's weird. It's a weird thing to say, but it's true. So much so that the National Retail Federation, a font of statistics that have to do a shopping,

purchasing and consumerism in general, said that in 2019, 95% of people who shopped for Halloween stuff, bought candy corn ninety five percent i wasn't either were in that weird five percent but i can't believe it the thing is is i don't think all those people are are eating candy corn necessarily

no and it turns out if you go on to uh... crafty websites there are all kinds of uh... fun little crafts you can do with candy corn because it is a, you know, the color itself lends itself to sort of fall feelings and fall crafts so you can do all kinds of stuff. Basically, you can hot glue it on whatever you want to. Basically, yeah, I saw a cute one. I can't remember where, but if you spike a pumpkin, you can make a little candy corn pumpkin hedgehog. Oh, that's cute. That's adorable. Okay, so I found some more stats, too, Chuck.

All right, let's hear it. Like, oh, I don't know, where is it popular? Yeah, candystore.com looked over 16 years of their shipping data. That's amazing. To identify the top three favorite candies for each state. And candy corn was in the top three. It was not the first for any state, but it was in the top three favorite candies for each state. And candy corn was in the top three. It was not the first for any state, but it was in the top three for a bunch of different states from South Carolina to Maine to North Dakota to Michigan to New York.

And the nationwide, it was number eight. That's amazing. And we should thank Leslie, the tip at candystore.com that month, who they tasked with doing this. Right, for sure. Poor Leslie. Yeah, poor Leslie. That's all right. Probably wouldn't a bad job. All right. They also did a poll.

And I think Leslie was in charge of this too, because did they poll 3,000 people? 3,247. They poll 3,500? No. I guess they poll that everyone that they had their email contact for, which was like you said, 3,247. They said that, do you like it? Do you hate it?

Why? Nostalgia, which is what I mentioned, that was one of the big reasons why people get this stuff. It's something they had when they were a kid, that they might have liked the taste of when they were a kid. And then as adults, they'll say, well, you know, I got to, I got to be in that fall spirit. And let's, let's grab a bag. Yeah. And then sweetness was another one for people who like candy corn. And then conversely, sweetness was a big reason people don't like candy corn. Yeah. One of the

respondents said it was like biting into a sugar cube and that's pretty close to accurate. There's also the waxy texture that puts some people off including me. I actually don't mind that part. Oh yeah. I tell you what though, I haven't had one in years but it's an unforgettable flavor. Yeah, I have had it. I can bring that flavor to mine too. I just, I don't want it again, essentially. Yeah, I'm with you and Overall though out of that 3247 Americans they pulled 56% were fans and some 44% were not so That there are more people at least according to that poll who'd like candy corn than don't That's right and if you thought it couldn't get me better everybody Leslie drilled down even further and

Found out how people how people eat them. 51% just pop it in their mouth and crunch it like it's a piece of popcorn. 16% start with the widest bit, which is the yellow bit, and then 33% conversely flip it over and start at that little smaller white end, which is amazing to me that someone actually takes that tiny of a bite of something that small. Yeah, some people like that tiny little white part. As if it tasted any different. Right, it definitely does not. It should, no.

If it does, you might want to take it back to the store because there's something wrong with the candy. Yeah, this white part tastes good. Mm-hmm. You got anything else? I got nothing else. Well, we're getting close to Halloween, everybody, which means short stuff is apt. Stuff you should know is a production of I Heart Radio.

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