Favorite childhood candy?

My dad owned a pharmacy in Chicago with a gigantic candy counter. I went to work with him every Saturday & Sunday from 1953-1961 and ate all the candy I wanted for FREE! Fortunately, there was a dental office on the 2nd floor.

Bit O Honey
Nickel Nips
Chunky
Snaps
Bull's Eyes-licorice roll with a hard candy in the center
Tootsie Pops
Slow Pokes
Charms Pops
Charms
Charleston Chew
Dots
JuJuBees
BlackJack Gum
Beeman's Pepsin Gum
Double Bubble Gum
Original Kit Kat-Made in England
Fan Tan Gum
Mason Mints
Lik M Aid
Pez

Growing up in a family restaurant business had its priviledges. At any given time there were a couple dozen choices of candy bars for sale. I would favor one for a while and then another. The one I most enjoyed over the years was 5th Avenue. I also loved loose sticks of horehound candy which were sold at a nearby country store.

My favorites from childhood (and now) are:

Lemonheads!
Necco Wafers (all kinds)
Idaho Spuds-look like a potato, but filled with chocolate nougat-delish
Sugar babies
Fun Dip
Wax lips

My favorites were Slo-Pokes and Freshen-Up gum.I had given up on finding them anymore when one day me and my hubby decided to take a drive and got lost,we stopped at a little gas station and lo and behold they had boxes and boxes of Freshen-Up gum! The guy looked at me funny when I brought them up to him to get rung out,I had so many! Now if only I could remember where we got lost! For the Slo-Pokes lollipops,I found them again and bought,ahem,4 pounds of them!

don't know that i can remember a favorite childhood candy-- being a kid my friends and i usually ate just about any and all candy that we could! :) BUT i have a memory of one of the ones that i liked a LOT-- frozen milky ways/three muskateers.. my father used to keep a stash of them in the freezer and it was a MAJOR treat if you got to have one too!. other than that.......... neco wafers (which i now think are nasty!) and good and plenty.... who could not like "choo choo charlie"??? :)

quote:

Originally posted by JimInKy

Growing up in a family restaurant business had its priviledges. At any given time there were a couple dozen choices of candy bars for sale. I would favor one for a while and then another. The one I most enjoyed over the years was 5th Avenue. I also loved loose sticks of horehound candy which were sold at a nearby country store.

I just had one of those extra large size versions of a 5th Avenue made by Hershey's... yum!

I always loved Rolos. Something about a whole bunch of chocalate caramels. While my firneds devoured their candy, i still had one or two left to savor.

They still make em. But i have not had any in a while.

When I was a teen-ager in the late 1980's, they brought back Blackjack gum for a few years and I really loved it. Now I can't find it anywhere. Is it still available?

LIKETOEAT

I AM NOT SURE IF YOU ARE STILL FOLLOWING THIS THREAD BUT I FINALY FOUND THE RECIPE FOR THE BRITTLE TAFFY. HERE IT IS.

2 CUPS WHITE SUGAR
1/2 CUP VINEGAR
1/4 CUP WATER

COOK OVER MEDIUM HEAT UNTIL REACHES 310 ON CANDY THERMOMETER. POUR ON TO MARGARINE BUTTERED PAN. AS IT STARTS TO COOL START TURNING THE EDGES IN. WHEN IT IS OK TO HANDLE START STRETCHING. NEVER TOUCH WHERE YOU HAVE STRETCHED. ONLY USE FINGERTIPS. WHEN IT IS HARD TO STRETCH PULL AS FAR AS YOU CAN THEN LAY IT DOWN ON TABLE. LET COOL FOR JUST A FEW MINUTES. THEN BREAK INTO PIECES. MAKE SURE TO PUT IN BAGS AS SOON AS YOU BREAK IT.

I TRIED THIS AND IT WAS EASY AND GREAT TASTING.

JILLCAMP

All this candy talk is making me drool...

I loved Charleston Chews- the vanilla ones with chocolate coating- frozen in the summer time, so they would break off when you bit them. My mom always bought a bag of spearmint leaves (the gummy ones- they were so THICK) or a bay of the multi-colored chocolate covered mints whenever she visited the Mennonite store.

My childhood favorites-
Black jelly beans
PayDay bars
Horlicks tablets
Milkshake bars
BIG Sweet Tarts (about the size of a half dollar if I rememeber right-and about 1/2" thick.

I can't remember the name of my favorite candy. We called them chicken bones,they were about 3 or 4 inches long, the outer part was shiny and brittle, it splintered like chicken bones. The inside was chewy. They kind of tasted like peanuts. Atkinson makes a peanut candy that is brittle and splintery but it's not anything like chicken bones. They were sold in bags, always near the check-out. Other favorites were Good n'Plenty and Sugar Babies, Bub's Daddy and Big Buddy gum...and Slo-pokes, can't forget Slo-pokes!

adams sour apple gum. anything close to that now?
Matt

I remember the candy cherries that only came out around Washington's Birthday eevry year. They were two sour cherry balls stuck on a piece of green plastic to resemble real cherries.

Seafoam Candy one of my many favorites, grainy like the fudge that was a "mistake" but I preferred it to the smooth texture. "Honeycomb" was one of my least favorites; does anyone remember it? I would walk downtown on lunch hour in first grade to Mrs. Keller's store with a huge bird cage that seemed to reach to the ceiling and I got rock candy. I'm lucky I still have teeth today.

Try a Cracker Barrel -They usually have the Blackjack and Clove gums at their checkout registers

quote:

Originally posted by danimal15

When I was a teen-ager in the late 1980's, they brought back Blackjack gum for a few years and I really loved it. Now I can't find it anywhere. Is it still available?

I always liked the Toms Peanut Butter Logs with the brown stripes on them. Now if you are able to find them , they are the small ones and the brown stripes are printed on the cellophane wrapper instead of the candy.
I also liked the Mallo Cups with the marshmellow filling

Also, we used to buy cans of Golden Crumbles ( I think thats the name)
They were little golden pillows of candy with a peanut butter crunchy
filling and coated with a hard candy coating.

Does anyone remember the little boxes called Grab Boxes. They usually contained a couple pieces of candy something like taffy and then a little prize.

I had a thing for Clark Bars... never even looked at Butterfinger .. I also loved Uno Bars which remain my absolute favorite to this day.
When I was in Jr. high it was jawbreakers, gold rush gum, and their cherry flavored non gum equivalent (it came in the same type of cloth bag)
In high school I had a thing for Lifesavers Suckers (don't know if they even still exist)
The service station where my pop worked sold Tom's products.. my mother loved Tom's divinity and those strange red colored peanut disks. I also liked the coconut slices candy that came in different colors. Also loved the jellied fruit slices from Sears candy counter.

quote:

Originally posted by Bushie

Tootsie Rolls.

Rock candy (who remembers that?) was an occasional treat.

Tootsie Roll Pops were wonderful, but I don't remember having those as much (we were poor folks).

Halloween was great back then, because we got lots of stuff our parents wouldn't buy.

I too remember rock candy as a special treat.. the idea of eating gigantic sugar crystals these days makes me a little ill..

Wacky Packages (not candy...the satirical collector cards & rumored to be making a comeback!)

*Space Food Sticks- a nutritional try in the late 60s (Apollo)
*Koogle Peanut butter-I liked banana kind and the cinnamon kind.
* 7-UP candy bar---similar to skyybar
*Atomic Fireball
*Bag-O-Gold-gum
*Bazooka Gum
*BB Bat
*Bit-O-Honey
*Black Cow sucker- choc/caramel sucker
*Butternut bar
*Boston Baked Beans
*Bottle Caps
*Bubble Gum Cigar
*Bubble Gum Cigarettes
*Candy(chalky) Cigarettes
*Candy Necklace
*Chick-O-Stick
*Charms square candy
*Chiclets
*Chuckles
*Cinnamon Toothpicks
*Fun Dip
*Giant Taffy
*Good & Plenty
*Jujubes
*Jujyfruit
*Lemonheads
*Mary Jane
*Necco Wafers
*Nik-L-Lip - waxed koolaid
*Now & Later
*Pixie Stix
*Pop Rocks
*Razzles
*Red Hots
*Red Pipe Licorice
*Smarties
*Sugar Babies
*Sugar Daddy
*Sweet Tarts-NOT that chewy new stuff
*Wax Lips /Harmonicas
*Zotz

I mentioned Honeycomb candy earlier....National Public Radio just spoke on favorite childhood candy....and chocoate-covered "sponge" candy was mentioed....maybe the same thing only what we got in the Midwest was not chocolate-covered, ever. It was golden yellow and it makes my teeth hurt just to think about it.

quote:

Originally posted by Jennifer_4

I too remember rock candy as a special treat.. the idea of eating gigantic sugar crystals these days makes me a little ill..

Jenne, I think the same. However, 2 or 3 weeks ago I took my usual periodic trip to Hico, TX for a "Dr. Pepper & Koffee Kup fix", and along the way stopped at this unique little "tourist trap type" place south of Hico. I'd stopped there before, but had passed it by for years.

They had a great big display of flavored rock candy, so I bought some grape, cherry, and blueberry just for fun. Not something I will do very often, but it actually was not bad! I hadn't had flavored rock candy before and hadn't eaten ANY rock candy literally since I was a kid. (About 10 years ago. )

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I had also forgotten to mention another childhood favorite, so since I'm only a couple of weeks behind at work, I'll regale.

On the downtown "square" in Springfield, MO was Heer's department store. On the mezzanine was a candy shop and bakery. My mother loved to buy their English Muffins (exotic for Springfield in the early 60's), so while we were there, I always wanted some chocolate-covered raspberry cremes. I suppose they were the only place in town that sold them, because at the time, I never got them from anywhere else.

I still buy them from time to time, probably mainly because of my memories.

Fortunatly, my father's sweet tooth was just as big as mine. He was in the scrap burlap bag business and would buy bags from Blommer Chocolate factory here in Chicago. He would bring home their chocolate bars by the box. 24 per box.

Other treats were:
Turkish Taffy
Good n Plenty
Mounds
bulls eyes
Butterfingers
candy cigarettes.

A baby sitter used to bring my brother and I chocolate covered orange peels from Dutch Mill candies. I always think of her whenever I even see one. (Or write about them.)

quote:

Originally posted by Jellybeans

Jelly babies!!! ...I would pull the fridge door open, push a chair to the fridge and climb on it to grab the candy. My sister would hold the chair steady while I did it.

Teamwork at it's finest!

small football-shaped milk chocolates, in foil;
3 musketeers;
zero bars;
nik-l-nips, orginally individually in a 3x2 cardboard 6-pack like regular sodas, now 5 across in 1 row (how everything cheapens with time!);
foil-covered chocolate coins;
root beer barrel hard candy;
"stick" sugar candy, root beer, sarsapariolla, grape flavors my faves;
SOFT peppermint sticks (heavenly feel as the soft sugar fills in every open micron of your teeth enamel!);
bon-bons, the airy confections about the size of a pecan, ottoman-shaped, which would melt in your mouth when fresh, and which would practically turn into inedible fiberglass in your mouth when stale;
the SMALL reese's pb cups - different choc/pb ratio than the big cups;
mary janes and bit-o-honey's only very occasionally.

droolicious.

Squirrel Nut Zippers, Coconut Long Boys,Candy Cigarettes,Coconut Haystacks,Sugar Daddy [one of those would last all day ]Teaberry Gum,Mary Janes,.I still can't go to the movies & have popcorn without getting a box of Milk Duds to eat with it.The combo of salty popcorn [butter of course!] and the sweet chocolate & caramel is heavenly! Also used to get a kind of cherry lollipop,that was intensely flavored.It had a lollipop on each end of the stick ,sorta like a dumbell.As to current things , does any one know where you can get Stick-Free gum? Not Freedent,the brand is called Stick-Free.I used to buy it in Oklahoma ,& then it disappeared , but I could still find it here in Georgia.Now it has disappeared from here too.

I used to LOVE vanilla Bun bars. Don't know if they are made anymore, but if they were, I'd stock up! As a kid, I liked Spree, Zotz, and Sugar Babies.

quote:

Originally posted by joanie41

I used to LOVE vanilla Bun bars. Don't know if they are made anymore, but if they were, I'd stock up! As a kid, I liked Spree, Zotz, and Sugar Babies.

Here you go joanie: Vanilla Bun bars for about 55 cents each in a case of 24 at: http://www.favoritesof.com/products/pearsonsframe1.html
Just scroll down the lower half of the page to find them!

quote:

Originally posted by MamaPoo

As to current things , does any one know where you can get Stick-Free gum? Not Freedent,the brand is called Stick-Free.I used to buy it in Oklahoma ,& then it disappeared , but I could still find it here in Georgia.Now it has disappeared from here too.

Here you go, MamaPoo at about $1.39 a package:
http://www.asugarfreecandystore.com/stickgum.html

Thanks very much for the info, 6star!