Mounds and Almond Joy, Sisters for Life

Sharability: 5 Denture Danger: 4 Convenience: 5 Novelty: 8 Overall: 7 When New Years would come around and my bag of Halloween candy was at it’s end there would always be a couple Mounds and Almond Joy sitting at the bottom of my pillowcase bag. I don’t know why, because they really aren’t bad candies, but the coconut just didn’t satisfy my childhood taste buds the way Reese’s and Kit Kats did. My dad was always happy to put me out of my misery and eat the Mounds and Almond Joy for me. Though I’m not usually a huge dark chocolate fan, it works well with the sweet coconut flavor. And I actually think I prefer it to the milk chocolate Almond Joy. The dark chocolate pulls away from the extremely sweet coconut flavor and the milk chocolate just adds to the sweetness, which is where the almond comes in. It adds another twist to the flavor and does its job to dull down the sweetness. So both are good in their own unique way, it just depends if you are feeling like a nut or not. Mounds and Almond Joy are sister Hershey’s products originally produced by the Peter Paul Company. The Peter Paul name is still printed on the candies’ wrappers even though the company itself no long exits. Peter Paul Halajian and some other investors created the Peter Paul Candy Company in 1919. The company originally sold a variety of candies, but because of sugar shortages during WWII they decided to focus on the production of the Mounds bar, which was created in 1920. In 1946, Almond Joy replaced a candy called the Dream Bar, which was filled with coconut and diced almonds. A famous jingle of the 1970s ad campaign for the sister candies sang, “Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don’t.” If you are feeling like a milk chocolatey nut, grab an Almond Joy, and if you’re feeling more sophisticated, go for the dark chocolate, nutless Mounds. If you want to take the risk with the youngsters on Halloween night, go for it, at least you know the parents will be happy.