2021’s Best Halloween Junk Food, Part 3!
This is the third edition of 2021’s Best Halloween Junk Food, and I bet I can do another three before October 31st. As I’ve been saying, this is a crazy year for Halloween snacks — like to the point where I can barely keep up.
Compare this year to most years, when the well seemed dry by the second week of September. 2021 is one of the books! Enjoy it while you can, and worry about the extra pounds in 2022.
Ghost White Ding Dongs!
(Found at Stop & Shop)
Recentism is surely shading my perspective, but frig it: This genuinely might be my favorite snack of the 2021 season. Ghost White Ding Dongs smother cream-filled cakes with white fudge, and they are DIVINE. They look like albino hockey pucks and smell like a birthday party.
It’s a big surprise from Hostess, which has spent the last several Halloweens only offering repeats. Nothing against ScaryCakes and Chocolate S’cream Twinkies, but if I’m gonna eat 42 grams of carbs in 4.2 seconds, I need it to be on something worth Instagramming.
GRADE: A+. They taste orgasmic — I don’t know how else to put it — and their cellophane wrappers are adorned with witches and dead trees. Add that gothic box and a solid euphemism for my junk, and yeah, this is an easy A+. Read More…
Classic Creepy Commercials, Volume 31!
This edition of Classic Creepy Commercials features everything from candy to Candyman. It’s kind of my “cleanout special,” as I’ve been sitting on some of these spots since last year.
What I like about this particular assortment is how off-the-nose it is. When you want to dig up memories that you haven’t already processed a billion times, sometimes you gotta look sideways. I hope this batch sparks a few for you:
Beetlejuice HBO Movie Intro! (1989)
Make sure you watch the whole video, which not only includes a Beetlejuice promo, but the whole dang HBO intro that played before the movie. God, HBO used to be so good at that shit. I still get goosebumps!
I’m thinking back to those long, boring days when I mindlessly flipped through the channels looking for an oasis. There was nothing like catching a comfort movie on HBO right when it was starting, and knowing that you were covered for a solid 90 minutes. The overindulgent intros were a big part of it.
Say it was a Saturday afternoon. You remember what Saturday afternoon TV was like, right? In everything from the sad programming to the even sadder commercials, it was just a constant reminder that you should’ve been outside. A packaged HBO movie was a whole different story. It was permission to be a slug.
The Great Pumpkin Sponsors! (1980s)
These sponsorship pages aired during It’s The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. Generally speaking, they were “added value” for companies who ran commercials during the special.
Looking back, those short shoutouts were often more effective than the actual commercials. A regular Almond Joy spot was easily ignored, but you put a photo of the candy over *official Peanuts music*, and suddenly coconut bars seemed like the chicest thing in the world. This was basically Snoopy knighting Almond Joy.
(Are fun-sized Almond Joy and Mounds bars still a big trick-or-treat thing? They already seemed fogeyish when I was a kid, and that was a hundred years ago.) Read More…
2021’s Best Halloween Junk Food, Part 2!
Just judging by what we’ve already seen, this is one of the greatest years ever for Halloween junk food. There’s so much of it! New stuff and returning favorites. I’m overwhelmed in the best way.
I figured I’d better get to the second edition of 2021’s Best Halloween Junk Food *now*, because with the way things are going, it’ll be April before I’ve covered it all. Enjoy this look at everything from candy corn to cat treats:
Cheetos Cinnamon Sugar Bag of Bones!
(Found at Target)
These are Sweetos in everything but name. It’s a surprising twist, as Cheetos previously limited its sugary snacks to Christmas and Easter. Nobody saw this coming — least of all that skeleton on the bag, who can’t believe that he tastes like cinnamon.
I’m not a big fan of Sweetos. I don’t think they’re “bad” or anything, but I’m never gonna prefer cinnamon and sugar to cheese and salt. Still, I admit that they smell heavenly (like Eggo French Toast) and taste a-okay. For what they are, they work.
You know what’s weird? I can stare at those skeleton heads, hands and tibias without batting an eye, but the rib cages seem positively ghoulish to me. Maybe it’s because they’re less often used as inspiration for junk food, or maybe it’s because they remind me of Owen and Beru’s charred caracasses.
GRADE: B. I love Cheetos’ dedication to its “Bag of Bones” spinoff, which has been a consistent part of Halloween since 2014. Keep it up, Chester! More bone-shaped corn puffs, every September! Read More…
Dino Drac’s Spooky September Funpack!
Dino Drac’s Spooky September Funpack is here!! A box of ghoulish goodies shipped from my door to your door, filled with creepy collectibles!
(UNITED STATES ONLY!)
I gotta keep it real with you: This one is pretty much sold out! If you’re an active subscriber, you’re obviously covered. If anyone new wants in, I *may* have some spares available once I complete my counts, but the truth is that there’s already a long waitlist for this one. So, you can email me to get on the waitlist, but I can’t make any promises!
I’ll go into specifics on availability at the bottom, but first, let’s take a look at everything inside this month’s box! Read More…