Halloween’s come and gone, but odds are you still have plenty of Halloween candy. Whether your kids brought some home or you were giving out candy, there’s so much of it you or your kids are probably tempted to eat it all in one go and get sick, let it go bad or even just throw it away.
There’s no reason to be wasteful about it: just use candy in your baking. Whether it’s recipes that call for a specific type of candy or general recipes that use all types of Halloween candy, here are tons of ideas for putting that Halloween sugar surplus to use.
17. Starburst shot glasses Starburst candies are perfect for melting and molding. The cook over at The Cookie Writer made shot glasses by melting Starbursts in shot glass molds in the stove. The end result is colorful, sweet and edible.
1. Snickers apple salad
When in doubt, don’t forget this party staple. Snickers runs as the most popular candy bar, making $3.6 billion in sales, and was the global leader in candy sales in 2012. With good reason. Odds are, you’ll have some lying around. And what’s not to love about a “salad” that combines apples, candy bars, whipped cream and dry pudding mix with no veggies in sight? You can find the recipe at food.com.
2. Skittles rainbow fudge
This white fudge recipe actually calls for tossing whole Skittles into the mix. A little bit off food coloring adds some rainbow swirls. You can find the recipe at bloglovin.com.
3. Skittles marshmallow pops
This recipe calls for ground Skittles, which you can make by grinding matching Skittles in a food processor. You may have to separate out the chunks that don’t grind by hand. Then you pour that powder over damp marshmallows. You can see the full tutorial at The Decorated Cookie.
4. Skittles poke cake
You can even use your old Skittles in cake recipes. This recipe calls for dissolving Skittles in water to create a syrup to add to the cake. You can find the full instructions at Cookie, Cupcakes and Cardio.
5. Candy popcorn
Have so much candy you don’t know what to do with it all? Throw it in with some popcorn on movie night. There are tons of possible combinations, which you can view here.
6. Roasted Starbursts
OK, this isn’t so much a recipe as a creative thing you can do with your old candy. The blogger at The V Spot found that if you roast Starbursts over a fire they become crispy on the outside and warm and gooey on the inside, like a marshmallow. You can try it over an end-of-year bonfire or an indoor marshmallow roaster.
7. Candy corn cookies
‘Tis the season for candy corn to come out of the woodwork and then lie around awaiting use. When in doubt, throw some into a white chocolate cookie batch. You can find the recipe at Averiecooks.
8. Candy corn scarecrow bars
Along the same lines, you can throw your candy corn into a dessert bar, which also calls for Chex cereal and small marshmallows. You can find the full recipe at Cookies & Cups.
9. Candy corn popcorn
Here’s another way to put your Halloween candy to use on movie night. This recipe actually fuses the candy corn and popcorn in a butter/marshmallow mixture for one delicious amalgamation. You can find the recipe at Two Sisters Crafting.
10. Candy corn M&M blondies
If you’re wondering what blondies are, they’re brown sugar and vanilla’s answer to the brownie. The recipe at Averiecooks is great for leftover M&Ms. This recipe calls for candy corn M&Ms, although regular could work, too.
11. Candy bark
Here’s another great way to use your Halloween candy if you have tons of different kinds. It’s a basic chocolate bark recipe, but you press whatever candy you happen to have lying around into the top of it. You can get the full recipe at The Whoot.
12. Candy brownies
Or, if you have a ton of candy lying around, throw it into a basic brownie batter. You’ll have fun candy brownies in no time. You can find the full instructions at Averiecooks.
13. Snickers ice cream cake
This amazing ice cream cake calls for chopped Snickers spread across two layers of the cake. You could definitely experiment with adding other types of candy bars, as well. You’ll have your candy stash used up before you know it with this recipe from Life, Love and Sugar.
14. Peanut butter Snickers cookies
Here’s another great way to use all those Snickers bars: Throw them into a basic peanut butter cookie. You can get the full recipe at Sweet Pea’s Kitchen.
15. Candy bar trifles
Another great general use for old candy bars is to throw them into a basic trifle. The customized, layered construction of a trifle means you can dump in layers of just about any candy you want, along with mouse, pudding, crumbled cookies or whatever your heart desires. There’s a good Twix trifle at Gimme Some Oven and a Halloween candy/brownie trifle at The Kitchen Magpie.
16. Twix dip
This easy three ingredient Twix dip is perfect for old candy bars. It requires cream cheese, cool whip and candy bars. It’s perfect for dipping sweet cookies into, like animal crackers or Teddy Grahams. You can get the full instructions at Just Us Four.
17. Starburst shot glasses Starburst candies are perfect for melting and molding. The cook over at The Cookie Writer made shot glasses by melting Starbursts in shot glass molds in the stove. The end result is colorful, sweet and edible.
18. KitKat cakes
A baking favorite, KitKat cakes are great for special occasions. It’s basically a regular cake surrounded in KitKats to make it look like the cake is a basket. This recipe at Recipe Girl calls for filling the “basket” with M&Ms to make the cake look like a candy bowl. It’s a great way to use KitKat bars and any multicolored candy you have around.