Ghosts.
Goblins.
And… candy corn?
Think of candy corn as comic relief from Halloween.
It’s cute, it’s yummy, and it’s not the slightest bit scary.
That is, until you look at the ingredients. Gelatin, corn syrup, FDC Yellow 6 Lake, Red 40, Blue 1 Lake…
Are you scared yet?
I’ve always loved candy corn, more for its festiveness and adorableness than for the actual taste.
So when I made these candies I wasn’t going for an exact copycat, but more of a fun and healthier and vegan candy corn substitute.
You might like them even better than real candy corn!
Vegan Candy Corn
- 1/4 cup raw cashew butter (or peanut butter if you want pb-flavored candy corn. Who knows… it might be fun!) (58g)
- tiny dash salt
- 1/4 cup powdered sugar or Sugar-Free Powdered Sugar (28g)
- Either red and yellow food coloring (you can purchase natural food coloring at Whole Foods), or a tiny pinch turmeric and a few drops beet juice
Mix the first three ingredients together in a bowl until it becomes a crumbly dough. (Note: if your nut butter is from the fridge, let it sit awhile or heat it up so it’s easier to mix.) If dough is too gooey (mine wasn’t), you can add a little extra sugar/sf sugar. Taste the dough and add a little more salt if desired. Now transfer the crumbles to a plastic bag and smush very hard into a ball. Remove from the bag and form three little balls, then add a few drops yellow food coloring or the turmeric to one ball and knead until it’s all one color. Do the same with the red. (For my un-edited “in process” photos, see the nutrition link below.) Roll balls into skinny strips—the skinnier the strips, the smaller the resulting candy corns, and press strips together. Cut into triangles or other shapes. As stated above in the post, these aren’t supposed to taste exactly like store-bought candy corn; they’re yummy in their own right. You can store in the fridge, but my roommate—the candy nut—says they taste best straight from the freezer. Or you can even bake them: 350 F for 3-5 minutes, then allow to cool for at least 10 minutes before removing from tray.
View Nutrition Facts + Step-By-Step Photos
What are you doing for Halloween this year?
Are you dressing up? Or staying home and handing out candy? Or trying to console a dog who goes berserk every time the doorbell rings? Guess I just gave away my Halloween plans…
Link Of The Day:
I so often see recipes with cashew butter, but I am allergic to most nuts (including cashews and peanuts). Is there any good substitute like sun butter etc?
Also, there are three nuts I *can* eat: hazelnuts, almonds, and macadamia. For some reason, I think a homemade macadamia butter might be my solution. What do you think? Any advice would be much appreciated.
You can always experiment, and if you do, be sure to report back! 🙂
So pretty! I just love the heart shapes. Who knew you could make healthy candy corn, amazing!
Today I made the sugar-free version substituting xylitol and they are just terrible and make my stomach queasy. I know it’s the xylitol but I’m new to cutting refined sugar and most carbs out of my diet (about 6 weeks) and the only thing that’s killing me is I like desserts. I found some chocolate bars sweetened with stevia that are really great and actually don’t have a stevia aftertaste (for once the claim on the packaging is actually true!) which I usually snack on with a handful of macadamia nuts, but I’m actually not a huge chocolate person, I prefer cinnamony, buttery and sugary desserts ?. I’ve been following your blog for a while now and this is the first thing I’ve made off of it (I thought it would be a fun project to do with my 3 year old and it was that) because I haven’t traditionally kept a lot of the ingredients you use on hand and I’ve been a little skeptical that healthy desserts can be good, but I have a handful of other recipes I’m going to try and I hope I can find some that I love!
Hi Kate, the vegan candy corn’s were very tasty, but my colors didn’t come out looking like yours. Used the yellow food coloring and orange, but my dough was tan instead of white. ( I used sunbutter and powdered stevia sugar). Tasted good, but sure didn’t look yours?….any suggestions. Yours are so cute! Lisa in Arizona?
are they actually healthy?
I’m allergic to cashews and my family is not big on peanut butter. Is there any alternative to the raw cashew butter?