Impulse Buy – Candy Corn and Bat Dots

I adore Dots. Those little gumdrop knobs of goodness have been a friend for a mighty long time, dating back to my moviegoing youth where it was the candy of choice. The tooth-melter above all tooth-melters. Amazingly, eating a lime-flavored Dot today provides a sense of time-travel back to those salad days of matinees and PG-13 classics. Actual movement from such a small button of sugar. Few confections can claim the same sensation.

To celebrate Halloween, Dots has issued two new flavors to add a twist to the candy distribution blahs of the season. Instead of passing out classic Dots or irradiated-looking Ghost Dots, why not wow the neighborhood kids with a fresh generation of treats?

Bat Dots are perhaps the most ghoulish of the novelty flavors, not because of the taste, but the box art, which shows the candy in its true appearance: as a bloodsucking, winged demon of the night. Keeping up the theme of looming death, the Bat Dots contain the flavor of blood orange, not a vile anise licorice taste as their none-more-black color promises. Thank heavens. Instead, the concoction holds a sweet, fruity flavor that’s not very scary, but actually quite pleasant. 

Blood orange. Huh. The fruit also inspired the “Terminator Salvation” flavor of Slurpee last summer at 7-Eleven, so perhaps I’m unaware of a trend here. Blood orange is sweeping the nation! All the kids want it, but few understand it.

Just ask “star” Leighton Meester.

Candy Corn Dots are more on the bizarre side. I realize the financial need to brand everything candy corn for the Halloween season, but, come on, it’s such a specific taste tied to a specific treat. From sodas to cake, I’ve ingested many hideous attempts to recreate candy corn outside of the box. It never works. The effort from Dots is admirable, but eventually fails. While actually edible, with a strange caramel tang and traditional smooth texture, this is not something I’d eat by the handful. Maybe one Dot per year, just to enjoy the holiday. Maybe. Anything more is demanding nausea.