Your Candy Corn's Shiny Shell Is Secreted by Bugs
Just Noting That Your Candy Corn Is Made of Bug Secretions
That glossy coating on candy corn, jelly beans, Milk Duds, Junior Mints, Whoppers, Lemonheads, and Sugar Babies is shellac — a resin secreted by female lac bugs as they suck sap and build a protective cocoon. Listed on labels as "confectioner's glaze," it hardens on contact with air much like a candy shell. So anyone who thinks they've dodged the bug-eating by hating candy corn is out of luck.
If this fact alarms you—or if you're an inveterate hater of candy corn and thus think that you have been spared—I regret to inform you that by eating many classic Halloween candies, you are, to some extent, eating bugs.
- SAI_Peregrinus
Just noting that your honey is made of bug secretions.
Just noting that your milk is made of cow secretions.
Etc.
- theflyingelvis
Honey is too, no?
- mmsc
Candy corn. Farm corn to create HFCS in order to build candy that looks like corn.
I do wonder how the USA, historically speaking, came to be the creators of this stuff
- zdragnar
Quite a few candies still use it, including I think jelly beans, gums and chocolates. Candy corn is far from the standout here.
- phkahler
How is it possible to collect enough of this stuff? Seems like it would not be financially viable product.