Milk Duds.  I have to admit it.  I like them.  It seems like Halloween is the time of year that thoughts of Milk Duds come up.  My favorite recollection of Milk Duds was when I was a kid, I could go into Sauders Store on main street Kennebec, South Dakota and charge a box of them to my folks account and eat them after school.

Saunders store had a spot in the entry to their store that  kids would sit and eat their afternoon snacks like Milk Duds while busy Lyman County residents would come into pick up an item or two for dinner.

I miss Saunders store. I miss the  creaky floorboards and the cereal boxes lined up on the back wall and the rotary dial phone in the far right corner we would use to call home if we missed the bus.

Oh, and I miss Milk Duds too.  So when we started our Halloween Candy Smackdown to find the perfect handout for kids this Halloween it got me thinking about Milk Duds.

My journey down candy lane took me to HyVee at 57th and Cliff  on Wednesday morning.  I wanted to take a few pictures of candy for our website with the Galaxy S3 I'm using courtesy of Sprint here in Sioux Falls.  As I was clicking pictures of candy using smart phone technology my mind drifted back to that small town on main street in Kennebec and Milk Duds.

I thought of my Dad saying,"be careful with those, they'll pull a filling out, or give you a filling sooner than you need one."  I thought about how then you could get a pretty good sized box for about a dime.  Not those small boxes that hold two or three Milk Duds.

Milk Duds.  What a name. But, who on earth would take a candy and call it a Dud.  So THAT got me wondering how in the world they came up with the name Milk Duds.

Back in the day, I would have had to stroll down main street to the south to the Library to read up on the subject.  Today, things are a bit easier and I just pull it up on the computer under Wikipedia and it says:

Milk Duds are a slightly salty caramelcandy, historically enrobed with milk chocolate and currently enrobed with a confectionery coating made from cocoa and vegetable oil. They are currently manufactured by The Hershey Company. Milk Duds are currently merchandised in a yellow box.

Yes, I get it but what about the name!

According to the manufacturer, the word "Milk" in the name refers to the large amount of milk in the product; the use of "dud" came about because the original aim of having a perfectly round piece was found to be impossible. Milk Duds were first created in 1926 by S. le Noble.

I'm 51 years old now and I finally get it.  The name of this candy came from the fact that they couldn't make it look perfect.  Come to think of it another candy has perfected that process and come up with a perfect design every time.  Rollo.

I'm all for Milk Duds and I'm all for the Halloween Candy Smackdown.  Log on and vote your favorite.

And while we're at it, when you get a chance to vote for Milk Duds, think it through carefully.

 

More From KIKN-FM / Kickin' Country 99.1/100.5