Butterscotch - B

25 more posts? Please tell me coming up with ideas is going to get easier.

Gather round, come one come all, as I discuss the finer points of cheap candy not really. Mmmm, butterscotch. Butterscotch? Yes.

Back in the day, there was hardly a grandparent's house across America without at least one candy dish. Beautiful glass or crystal (fancy!) dishes, with or without lids, containing hard candy. Dealer's choice of wrapped pieces or one large mass of congealed ribbon candy that required the use of a pickax. My dad's mother was an outlier; the only candy she kept on hand (that she admitted to or shared) were old sugar flowers my grandpa had made decades earlier. Nothing says childhood treat like a scary older woman eating decades old sugar flowers made by a dead man.

You got this Gretel!

My mom's mom on the other hand, otherwise known as Grandma, kept peach and apple hard candies at her home. I have never, ever found a store that sells them and have always been a little curious where they came from. She also kept a roll of mints in her purse at all times and God him/herself only knows how much lint I ingested in my youth from those mints.

Which is all well and good, but what does any of that have to do with butterscotch discs? When we would drive across country to visit my grandmothers (and their interesting candy choices) my dad would pick up a couple of rolls of butter rum Lifesavers and a bag of butterscotch. There were orange slices (the candy, not the nutritious fruit) and circus peanuts as well. Sort of a theme of orange tinted snacks now that I think about it. The other stuff invariably ran out first and every so often I'd unwrap a butterscotch for my dad while he drove.

Over time, road trip treats dwindled down to just the butterscotch variety. And then family road trips disappeared as my siblings and I scattered into adulthood. Fortunately for me, my husband loves driving trips. Every stop at a gas station he'll ask if I want a bag of butterscotch or a roll of butter rums. And I never would get them, but it would make me smile and remember traveling as a kid.

With my parents living with us now, my dad's wanderlust combines with ours and we've taken some road trips over the last few years. I drive instead of my dad now. I've traded circus peanuts for real almonds. I've traded orange slices for sliced apples. But when we go on a family trip, I pick up a bag of butterscotch discs. One bag lasts several trips now, and it's my dad handing me the candies.