Items From The Candy Expo That Shouldn’t be Allowed to Exist

Wednesday, Chicagoist spent the day at the All-Candy Expo at McCormick Place. We found some amazing new products, great boutique candy brands and even some new all-organic candies. Over the next few days, we’ll be profiling these in more detail. We also found a number of products that made us really unhappy about the state of the world – presumably because someone out there would buy them. Here are a few of the strangest, ickiest or just downright worst products that we saw this year.

1) Jelly Belly “Bean-Boozled.” Jelly Belly unveiled a number of really cool products at the expo, including new flavors inspired by Cold Stone Creamery. Bean-Boozled, however, wins the prize for the most disgusting product to be created by a candy company. Jelly Beans flavored like skunk spray, rotten eggs, baby wipes, pencil shavings and vomit co-exist with normal flavors like berry, peach and banana. The gimmick? Each “normal” bean has the same coloration as its disgusting counterpart. It’s a game! Hope you don’t lose.

2) Lollypops filled with Bugs. The “Hotlix” Company of Grover Beach California produces this line of vermin-filled treats, which includes candies filled with scorpions, mealworms, crickets and butterflies. Why ruin a nice lollypop with a bug? We guess it’s for shock value, but the idea of giving any money to this company makes us almost as sick as eating the bug-filled candies they produce.

3)Beef Jerky disguised as chewing tobacco. In addition to a full line of (actually tasty) beef snacks, Pioneer also produces this container, filled with “shredded beef jerky,” really a kind of beef-flavored sand that you’re apparently supposed to chew like tobacco. This must appeal to someone – maybe those who still want to spit disgusting brown goo but have been convinced to give up actual tobacco.

4) 100% Edible “Bubbagum” Teeth. These disfigured teeth made of gum come in many different varieties but “Santa” was the most horrifying we came across. Brown, disfigured and missing a front tooth, apparently this “Santa” had no dentist at the North Pole and was then hit with a baseball bat. These teeth make you look … well, exactly like you will look after keeping sugar-filled fake teeth on your teeth for hours on end.

5) GoGo SqueeZ Applesauce on the Go. This sealed plastic pouch reminds us of a Capri Sun, except instead of artificially flavored fruit punch it contains Applesauce! Our objection to this product is less based on taste (the applesauce is delightful) then on packaging – why in the world would you need a squirt pouch filled with pureed apples? It’s difficult to eat out of, and you inevitably get applesauce all over your nose. Maybe if you’re a runner who really needs more fruit…. Plus, the name sounds like it belongs in our masturbation post.