The Trouble with Halloween

Every year I expect a ton of kids, so I buy a ton of candy. Kids just don't trick or treat in our neighborhood. Why? Because we live in an subdivision where the houses are small and old. Technically, we're not even in city limits. Two blocks over, the houses are twice the size, and built in the past 5 or so years. Besides, they give out some swanky loot over there. Mrblocko took Blockette out trick or treating in that subdivision and she came back with a My Little Pony! Talk about hitting the jackpot!

I know this, but can never recall this factoid when it comes time to purchase Halloween candy. This year I bought a large bag and 2 small bags of candy. Can you say overkill? At least this was an improvement from last year when I bought 3 large bags of candy. Next year I'll buy one large or 2 small and hopefully that will work out much better. Watch, next year will be the year we get inundated with Trick or Treaters.

So, what should I do with all the leftover candy? If I keep it in the house I'm the one who ends up eating it all. We only let Blockette eat one or two pieces at a time. If she eats any more than that in one sitting, she is bouncing off the walls, more than normal. At that rate, it would take her until New Year's to finish all the candy. My butt cannot afford to have all that candy lingering in the house that long. I don't want Halloween Candy lurking about in December. That would cut into my Christmas cookie eating.

This year, I weeded through Blockette's candy differently. As a rule, Mrblocko gets the 3 Musketeers and I get the 100 Grand and Heath bars. I took out all the really chewy and hard candy that she might have a choking issue with. She's not a huge fan of suckers so I took those out too. That cut down her candy by nearly half. Mrblocko took that to work with him on Monday.

There was still waaaay too much chocolate in the house to tempt me. I found a recipe for a bundt cake that called for 1 1/2 cups of chopped candy. I cut that up on Tuesday and stuck it in a container. If the candy is chopped I won't eat it, and when I feel like baking a cake I'll have the main ingredient all ready. I'll probably make that cake in the near future. I've been yearning to bake a bundt cake since the Food Librarian started I Like Big Bundts: 30 Days of Bundt Cakes. (Anyone who makes 30 bundt cakes in 30 days is aces in my books! Go Food Librarian!!!)

That made a dent in the candy, but not nearly enough. I remembered seeing Snicker Surprise Cookies on Joelen's blog, What's Cookin, Chicago? So on Wednesday I made Chocolate Chip Cookie dough and halved mini Snickers, Milky Way, Twix, Kit Kat and Crunch bars. I stuck the candy bar pieces inside cookie dough balls. The "surprise" cookie dough is chillin in the freezer for another day, one where we are lacking in sweets. I'll post how that went as well when I get around to baking them. These will truly be surprise cookies because I don't remember which candy is inside which cookie dough ball!

All this reduced the candy by half again. There was still so much candy. I took out a bunch of the duplicate candies and sent them to work with Mrblocko. That cut the candy by nearly half yet again. This is a much more manageable amount of candy. It still fills in a medium size bowl. I think now I'll be able to restrain myself from eating it while Blockette is at Preschool. OK, so that's a lie. The truth is I'll only eat one piece instead of five.