Let's be honest: There's not a single piece of Halloween candy that's actually good for us. But, in the spirit of everything in moderation, we know you're likely to nibble on a few peanut butter cups or licorice sticks this season.
Still, it is possible to make smart choices when you're dipping into that trick-or-treat bounty. For starters, you can compare calories and fat. You can take a peek at the amount of total sugar. But because sugar and empty calories are going to be high in most options, you might venture further down the nutrition label to the ingredient list.
We've written before about some general rules of thumb when evaluating a list of ingredients. David Katz, M.D., director of the Yale Prevention Research Center and HuffPost blogger, says to look for "ingredients we know, recognize, can situate in some part of the plant or animal kingdom, and can pronounce."
Another good idea is to stick to foods with five or fewer ingredients; foods with paragraph-long ingredients lists are often full of preservatives, sugars and other additives.
When it comes to Halloween candies, we didn't find any that would pass the five-or-fewer test. And to make matters worse, a number of the top five ingredients in the most popular treats are sugar -- by one of its many other names.
We tallied up the ingredients in 15 classic candies, including runners up like candy corn with 14 ingredients and Reese's Peanut Butter Cups with 13. With more than 15 ingredients, here are the worst offenders.
Scary-Long Halloween Candy Ingredients Lists
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