Babish Picks the Best Halloween Candy of All-Time

It's just sugar paste molded into something

that doesn't resemble candy or corn.

It's so sweet.

It's sweeter than if you just ate pure sugar.

I don't know how.

[cheerful music]

Hey there, folks.

I'm Andrew Rea, a.k.a. Binging with Babish

and I'm here today to taste and judge

32 different kinds of Halloween candy.

This is a head-to-head tournament.

Each round, two candies are gonna face off,

and at the end, we're gonna determine

which is the very best Halloween candy.

We have two divisions and we're gonna start

with the chocolate division.

Trick or treat, smell my feet.

Give me something good to eat.

[bell dings]

We rehearsed that.

First up, Baby Ruth versus Snickers.

I haven't had a Baby Ruth, I don't remember when.

It's described as dry roasted peanuts,

rich caramel, and smooth nougat.

Whereas Snickers is caramel, nougat, peanuts,

chocolate, are these the same thing?

Are these direct competitors perfectly?

You matched these up, that makes sense.

First up, the Baby Ruth.

Rough and tumble around the edges here.

We got some exposed peanuts.

Not sure how I feel about that.

Unwrap the Snickers.

Ooh.

Ooh.

The chocolate is what I'm expecting.

It's kind of waxy, kind of, you know, mass-produced.

I don't taste the caramel at all.

Definitely getting nougat and definitely getting peanuts.

Let's see what happens with the Snickers.

Knee-jerk reaction, giving it to the Snickers.

Caramel is much more prevalent.

There's less nougat, which, you know, I think that's filler

and the peanuts are more finely chopped.

You don't have these big old chunkers of peanuts.

They're integrated into the candy itself.

Right off the bat, Snickers takes the cake.

We have Twix and 100 Grand.

Start with the Twix.

I have a left bar here.

Good stretchy, chewy caramel.

Dig that, nice big old cookie.

Now 100 Grand, ooh, we have a much more

imposing form factor here.

It's a larger piece of candy and it's bespeckled

with what I imagine is puffed rice

or crispy crunchies as they're described on the wrapper.

Oh my, this is like revelatory.

Immediately going 100 Grand.

I am a Twix apologist.

I did not think that this was gonna go this way.

But this thing is like pure caramel

and it's got crispy crunchies that are crispier

and crunchier than the Twix cookie.

I would call this an upset.

Absolutely, 100 Grand takes it.

I believe Milky Way has the added benefit

of caramel over 3 Musketeers.

It's like 60-40 nougat, caramel.

Into that.

That's the age old question, isn't it?

What is nougat?

I think nougat's a filler.

I think that like it's very inexpensive to make

and it was bold of 3 Musketeers

to make a candy bar that's only nougat.

It's like this fluffy,

semi-chocolatey, compressible insulation.

Ugh.

I think you have to agree that the addition

of caramel makes it a much more interesting,

much more delicious candy experience.

So I'm gonna have to go Milky Way over 3 Musketeers.

Battle of the plain chocolate

versus the almost plain chocolate.

I don't like milk chocolate in general

but especially Hershey's, which to me tastes like

the wrapper that it comes in.

Ugh.

So it stands to reason that if you take

the same exact chocolate style product

and add crunchy puffed rice to it,

it's just gonna enhance the experience.

The Crunch takes it because Hershey's,

it needs something else.

It needs peanut butter or a marshmallow or a different

kind of bar of chocolate to really make it work.

We have Butterfinger versus Kitted Kats.

We have crispy wafers in chocolate.

These ones are peanut butter flavored

and they're like candy shards in there

whereas these are more like a cookie wafer.

I'm gonna start with the Kit Kat

'cause frankly I wanna leave this flavor in my mouth.

The preference is here.

I love Kit Kat, but it made the mistake

of getting in the thunder dome with the Butterfinger.

It's so good.

I mean, I love chocolate and peanut butter.

It's gotta be my favorite flavor combination on the planet.

But then they added all this like crispy crunchy

is the only way to describe it.

They really chose apt descriptors.

It takes it by a mile.

Like, I'm sorry, there's a huge mismatch.

M&M's and Reese's Pieces.

This is really tough because

I love both of these individually.

I love them the most when they're together.

In the specific context of Halloween,

we gotta go Reese's because this has gotta be

the most common candy handout.

Reese's takes it by a nose.

Almond Joy versus York Peppermint Patties.

Coconut versus mint goo.

It was always a very funny form factor to me,

this kind of piece of modern art here.

Sweetened coconut, chocolate, almond,

it's a wonderful combination.

And with York Peppermint Patties, we're dealing with

a much simpler combination but I think a more effective one.

We got dark chocolate, which big win for me,

and you've got the same sort of icy white paste

in the center but this one is imbued with mint.

It is refreshing.

I feel as though I just brushed my teeth.

I gotta go York.

This is ticking all different kinds

of boxes for me, namely dark chocolate.

[bell dings]

Whoa.

This is the last one in the round,

so they just took the last two

and they were like, figure these out.

I mean, I don't even have to taste it.

I'm Reese's Cup all the way.

I love chocolate and peanut butter more than anything.

This is kind of like chocolate clay, but this is science.

It does not even taste like chocolate.

What is this flavored?

Brown flavored.

And this.

Reese's Peanut Butter Cups takes it by a mile.

Time to move into the candy division.

Airheads versus Laffy Taffy.

Both of these, you could get

for five tickets at Chuck E. Cheese's.

This is the plainly worse one.

Airheads, not only are you getting better flavors,

you get White Mystery.

This was my favorite when I was a kid.

I still don't know if every one of 'em is different

or if White Mystery is all the same flavor.

Cherry, sour apple, and banana,

what are these, vegetables?

Was not prepared for the electric color

underneath the sun-faded wrapper.

Candied apple or sour green apple.

Not sour first of all.

Versus the GOAT, White Mystery.

This is not nearly as good as I remember.

The texture's not great.

It's like grainy.

Laffy Taffy's super smooth.

Okay, we have another upset on our hands, folks.

Laffy Taffy takes it in the taffy-off.

These are Now and Laters?

Have I just never seen Now and Laters?

I love Starburst, particularly pink Starburst.

Let's see if I get lucky.

Nope.

The Battle of the strawberries.

This is a very hot pink artificial looking strawberry.

This looks like it has chunks of strawberry in it,

so I'm very excited to see what happens here.

Oh god.

That one's got some rings on it.

It's been around for a while.

Onto the Now and Later, strawberry.

It's almost a dead heat honestly, in terms of flavor,

texture and appearance, whatever on both parts.

I'm giving it Starburst for sheer nostalgia factor.

Ooh, what?

What the hell? [laughs]

I do not know how to objectively

match these against one another.

I love raspberry Tootsie Roll Pops and I love Milk Duds

and I think this is gonna come down to freshness.

Milk Duds can really go bad.

Medium freshness.

Medium well.

Just a big old hunk of caramel wrapped in chocolate.

Tootsie Roll Pops.

These are timeless.

This thing could be 20 years old, I would've no idea.

That's the stuff.

For sheer variety's sake in both flavor

and texture and consistency of quality,

again, these could be 10 years old and they'd be fine.

If this was a year old,

I would not even be able to eat them.

Gotta go Tootsie Roll Pops

in spite of my venomously anti-Tootsie Roll rhetoric.

What am I, 100 years old?

What are these?

I've never met anyone who's purchased this product.

I've never met anyone who's tried this product.

I think they're all dead.

These feel hard as rocks.

These are ancient, so this is gonna be

a fantastically informative, really, experience.

They smell like chemicals or styrofoam or something.

They feel and look like styrofoam.

Good & Plenty.

Not something I think I've ever tried

because it's licorice pills.

Tastes like star anise.

Not into it.

What is this?

What flavor is it?

Sugar, corn syrup, gelatin, high fructose corn syrup,

yellow six, artificial flavor.

What is the flavor?

I might not like licorice,

but I love that these are candy coated.

I love that they're crunchy on the outside,

chewy on the inside.

These are just awful in every way.

So we're going Good & Plenty for this round.

Again, don't need to try this one

because I know that Nerds are gonna trounce Smarties.

I do like Smarties even though

they're sort of unflavored sugar pellet.

Yeah.

Lightly sour, mostly sugar, very little flavor.

Still somehow addictive.

Still, I actively want more.

But come on, you can't beat Nerds.

There's only one way to describe Nerds.

They're a sensation.

They start sweet than sour.

They're crunchy.

Huge winner.

As craveable, as weirdly, oddly addictive

as Smarties are, gotta go Nerds.

They're one of the all time greats.

Skittles at Dots.

Dots age very poorly.

They become extremely chewy and rock hard

within minutes of being exposed to oxygen.

Oh.

It's good.

It's really dense and chewy.

But Skittles, I mean, come on.

Double grape, won't hear me complaining.

Superior flavor, texture, appearance.

Skittles is the clear winner.

We have candy corn versus Twizzlers.

I love Twizzlers.

I love being able to bite the ends off

and blow air through them.

[flute toots]

These age like fine wine.

I like opening these and just leaving 'em out,

getting 'em real chewy.

This is a classic and so are these,

but it's just sugar paste molded into something

that doesn't resemble candy or corn.

It's so sweet.

It's sweeter than if you just ate pure sugar.

I don't know how.

You eat like 10 of them, and you're like,

I don't even want any more candy.

Twizzlers, you could eat this whole bag

and be like, where are the Twixes?

For flavor, appearance, texture, longevity,

Twizzlers beats candy corn by a wide, wide margin.

Swedish Fish versus Sour Patch Kids.

I love Sour Patch Kids and I will die on that hill.

I love Swedish Fish too, but I love sour stuff, so.

Plus you only get one flavor over here,

and that flavor is red.

Whereas with Sour Patch Kids,

you get the added benefit of a little pucker.

Sour Patch Kids is better than Swedish Fish.

I'm sorry.

You get more flavors, you get sour stuff,

you get Patch Kids.

All right guys, round two, getting serious.

No more funny business.

100 Grand versus Snickers.

100 Grand really deserves a resurgence.

It deserves your attention.

Snickers has the advantage of peanuts,

but 100 Grand is packing a ton more caramel,

but also crunchies, you guys, on the outside.

It's got a denser, chewier texture.

It's more satisfying.

A huge part of Snickers marketing

is like meal replacement for some reason.

They're like, Are you hungry?

Eat a [bleep] candy bar.

100 Grand isn't doing that.

They're saying, This tastes like $100,000, and it does.

Now we're going Crunch at Milky Way.

This is a tricky one.

Beautiful simplicity versus textures and flavors.

And even though I feel like nougat is just a filler,

I'm gonna go Milky Way.

You got caramel, you got some nougat.

Milky Way takes it.

Peanut butter candy and chocolate

versus just peanut butter candy.

How about that?

I love Reese's Pieces, but Butterfinger

is adding a whole bunch of different textures and chocolate,

the most important ingredient in peanut butter.

Between these two, much as I love you,

Reese's Pieces, going Butterfinger.

Battle of the chocolate-covered goos.

This is a genuinely hard one.

I love York Peppermint Patties,

I love Reese's Peanut Butter Cups,

and they're pretty much the same form factor.

It's this kind of like whipped up

sugar goo wrapped in chocolate.

What do I do?

The whole world's watching.

Sorry, York.

Peanut butter and chocolate's gonna beat

mint and chocolate any day.

Starburst at Laffy Taffy.

Laffy Taffy was a surprising improvement

upon the Airheads form factor.

But Starburst for its variety of flavors

and the number of flavors you get in a pack,

I gotta go Starburst.

[bell dings]

Tough.

Tough matchup.

Good & Plenty is disgusting

and Tootsie Roll Pops are good.

Skittles and Nerds, worthy opponents.

Better fruit flavors, interesting textures,

sour than sweet, crunchy.

They last forever somehow too.

Like, the box never empties.

It's a tough decision, but I have to go Nerds.

Yet another, what's gonna be a contentious face-off.

I really love Sour Patch Kids.

And once I had to go to the doctor when I was a kid

'cause I ate too many Sour Patch Kids

and I like had burned my mouth and I was in wretched pain.

That's how much I love Sour Patch Kids

and I only just like Twizzlers.

You're getting more flavor variety here.

You're getting the option to chew or suck upon.

So Sour Patch Kids is taking it.

So it begins.

Ooh-wee.

This one's an easy one for me.

I've been singing the praises of 100 Grand all day.

Milky Way, nougat.

There's not even a gram of nougat in this thing.

It's all caramel.

Milky Way, I don't know how it made it later in the brackets

than Snickers because I feel like Milky Way

is like a worse Snickers.

100 Grand is the clear winner over Milky Way.

The battle of the peanut butter chocolates.

Butterfinger versus Reese's Cup.

This is a tricky one because this is

real peanut butter flavor and chocolate

versus the sort of peanut butter-flavored candy,

but a way cooler, more exciting texture.

Ah, see?

Look at this nonsense.

Look at this.

You lose a chunk of your chocolate,

and I don't know about you,

when I was a kid, this wasn't escaping.

That's an added step that I don't need.

When I could just have

the crispitty crunchitty Butterfinger.

I'm going Butterfinger.

I think it's just a better choice

for the peanut butter and chocolate mashup.

Tootsie Roll Pops versus Starburst.

I love Starburst.

I appreciate the variety of flavors, but this little packet

of two Starburst, that's gone in 30 seconds.

This is taking you a solid five minutes to polish off.

This is a much more exciting time to be had as a child.

Last one in the round.

Oh, and it's a tough one.

Both are sour than sweet.

That's appropriate because this is a bittersweet decision.

[suspenseful music]

These are what I have every time I go to the movie theater.

These were my favorite when I was a kid.

Sour Patch Kids squeaks it out.

The semi-final round, four candies enter,

only one will leave.

Who will be victorious this Halloween?

Butterfinger versus 100 Grand.

We're getting into the territory of,

I wouldn't just eat these because they're Halloween candy.

I would eat this on a daily basis.

Butterfinger, I already knew that.

I would eat these anytime of day, any day of my life.

100 Grand, I'm just learning this today.

I'm 35 years old.

You can still teach an old dog new tricks.

That being said, Butterfinger is one of

the most unique candy experiences on the market.

This sort of like fragmented sugar candy structure

in the middle that still eats like a candy bar.

I don't know how it works.

It's magic.

It always has been and it is going to

unfortunately take the crown from 100 Grand.

Tootsie Roll Pops versus Sour Patch Kids.

I would rather have one packet of Sour Patch Kids

than an entire lifetime's worth of Tootsie Roll Pops.

One of the big factors here

is craveability and snackability.

I could eat a five-pound bag of these

without even realizing what I was doing.

The final round.

Who will reign supreme this Halloween?

[bell dings]

Sour Patch Kids versus Butterfinger.

What we're dealing with here is

sour then sweet versus peanut butter and chocolate,

two of my very favorite things,

and I'm being asked to choose between them.

It's not fair to me or to you.

Let's start with flavor.

I think Butterfinger is taking the win for flavor.

These taste very good, but they're more

about the sour than sweet eating experience.

Texture.

Layer upon layer of peanut buttery candy flavor.

A nice light crunch, airy texture.

Craveability.

I feel like I could eat a lot more Sour Patch Kids

in a sitting than I could Butterfinger.

In fact, I'm sure of it.

You could eat a lot of these

and not suffer many consequences.

We're talking about, you know,

something that you'd be excited to see a lot of

in your candy bag 'cause you eat so much of it

versus something you'd be excited to see

because it's a special treat.

Ubiquity over occasion.

Light celebratory color versus deep, dark, dense intrigue.

I think I'm gonna have to give the crown

for the ultimate Halloween candy to Butterfinger.

This is such a magical candy product.

I still don't know how they do it.

It still delights me every time I have one.

This is like so distinctly Halloween,

and as much as I love Sour Patch Kids,

Butterfinger takes it home for the ultimate Halloween candy.

What have we learned here today?

Virtually nothing.

What I say about the ultimate

Halloween candy doesn't matter.

What is your ultimate Halloween candy?

Because that's what truly matters.

That's what you wanna see at the bottom of your bag.

That and Butterfinger 'cause it's really good.

[triumphant music]

This is the equivalence of, think of a metaphor, here we go.

What's a very common thing?

This is the equivalent of finding rocks in your backyard

and then this is the equivalent

of finding slightly nicer rocks.