Friday, January 25, 2013

Retro Friday: Tangy Taffy!

Pregnancy aches and pains plus allergies plus a nasty little virus that has worked its way through our family equals me not blogging for a while.  But I'm feeling better today & want to share something sweet.
Did anyone out there eat Tangy Taffy as a kid?  I used to save up my change and buy it at 7-11 when I was a kid.  Then in college, there was a gas station just down the block from my apartment where they sold it, plus a cute boy often worked the cash register.  So I started saving my change for them again.  Anyway, they used to look like this:
Then at some point, the brand was purchased by Wonka (owned by Nestle), and now it looks like this:
Don't be fooled, though!  Not all candy labeled Laffy Taffy tastes as good as the original Tangy Taffy.  Laffy Taffys come in small bite sized pieces (which taste gross) and long ropes (which taste gross).  The only ones that taste tangy (and good) are the flat bar-shaped Laffy Taffy.  And of those, I've only tried grape and cherry, which are the ones I ate as a kid.
Since our recent reading of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, my kids have been fascinated with candies that carry the Wonka label.  I picked up two of these grape taffy bars while grocery shopping solo yesterday, and I ate one in one sitting.  Then I took a look at the label and learned that one bar contains 19 grams, or about FIVE teaspoons, of sugar.  Then I took a look at the calendar and learned that I'm scheduled for my routine gestational diabetes screening in about three weeks.  So maybe I'll reschedule this trip down memory lane until sometime after May.

3 comments:

  1. The gestational diabetes test is misery upon misery. The idea of starving a pregnant woman and then stuffing her full of nothing but foul-tasting sugar drink must have been the brilliant idea of someone who had never been pregnant.

    I recognize the label of the Tangy Taffy, but ever since I learned was candy was my philosphy has been that if it's not chocolate it's not worth it unless all the other kids are eatting candy and there's no chocolate available in which case only the pink and purple candies are worthy of being consumed. I'd rather be the only kid without candy than have to eat something yellow (lemon) or green (lime).

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  2. I'm totally with you Janell. Yellow and green candies are gross, pink and purple are good, but chocolate trumps them all.

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  3. In my experiences tangy taffy was the best, had no idea it had been sold, and just thought it was a regional thing. I grew up in CA but live in MN. Thought maybe it was just more popular on the west coast. But alas now knowing this I can stop looking for tang taffy! So, the grape is still excellent and I haven’t seen a cherry yet! The banana Laffy taffy is terrible and unfortunately I can’t eat chocolate.

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