What's the best thing you've ever received trick-or-treating?

[ipsedixit]

Small, gift-sized boxes of Almond Roca and See's lollipops probably top the list for me,

You?

[gator28]

King size anything - Butterfingers, Snickers, Milky Ways.

[Robinez]

Great question / thread idea :)

Caramel Apples. We made sure to go to Mrs. Kight's house first so we wouldn't miss out. They were so good that may times we took a couple bites before moving on. They were the best caramel apples ever..memories make things taste better sometimes ...

[gooddog]

Ice cream cones. And not those pre-wrapped nutty buddy things. These were choose-your-flavor hand-dipped cones, given out by a family who had just moved to the neighborhood with a kid who hadn't really made any friends yet. So, probably a bribe of sorts, but when you're 10 who cares?

[rainey]

Well, when I was a kid Trick or Treating age most houses gave full sized candy bars. They cost a nickel at that time but they were probably 1/3 larger than what costs $1 today. But one house gave comic books. I lived in the town where Dell comics were printed and that family worked in that factory. No one missed that house!

[Chowrin]

... my landlords gave out full-size paperbacks (kid's choice). Big, big hit with the kids (and we got all the kids from the poorer neighborhoods too).

The best I ever got? A full grab-bag from my neighbor (pretzels, chocolate, candycorn). She'd always make about twenty or so, and never ran out... She used to make candy apples, but when I was a kid nobody would take one from a stranger.

[givemecarbs]

We take our minature daschund trick or treating, she loves it and gets plenty of biscuits. One year a guy gave her an entire Costco sized box of dog biscuits, his dog wouldn't eat them. She beat us all. Took her almost a year to finish off that big score!

[Steven977]

I once went to a house very late and they were all out of candy so they started giving out money. =D That was kind of neat.

[aurora50]

Once (many years ago) (in the 60's) we went to our cousin's neighbor's house.
He was a rotten, mean old man, but -
- He gave out Rice Krispies Treats Balls.
Had to go to his house, no matter what, for that!

[Whinerdiner]

Money for me as well. When I was a kid we lived in a high rise apartment building with a lot of senior citizens. Many had trouble getting around, and never had candy for the few kids who came around for trick or treat. They opened the door though, made a big fuss, and gave us dollar bills.

That was the best building ever.

[Brianne920]

Popcorn "hands" from my old neighbor----take a plastic food service glove (clear, obviously unused), drop a candy corn in each finger as a "fingernail", then stuff the glove with caramel popcorn. Glorious.

Also, because I'm not a huge chocolate person, I got super excited when I got lollipops or Skittles, or anything fruit-flavored.

[vanderb]

University in my residence 1st year... "trick or beer!" It worked out really well, perhaps a bit too well. I know I was too old but it was a good way to meet people.

[Chowrin]

... that's nothing. For Uni trickertreating, nothing beats the Embassies in DC. The french one gives out wine, and because you're on french soil, you aren't underage.

[goodhealthgourmet]

[note to self: tell friends & cousins with kids in NYC to hit the French embassy on Fifth Avenue].

[vil]

Same note taken, good to know :-)

[angelhair]

There's a fabulous bakery in my neighborhood and they go all out for Halloween with decorations, the staff in costume, and scary/funny little skits for the kids. They give out bags of their cookies (4 per bag) to anyone, adult or child, in costume. I never miss that store. And I end Halloween night with a cup of tea and some delicious cookies.

[pine time]

The tiny town I lived in growing up had a great Mom & Pop bakery. They gave away cookies or mini-cupcakes (quite the novelty then, not like the cupcake overload now), just 1 per child. I always tried to hit 'em up early in the evening, and then again just before closing time. I was a devious child (but well fed).

The best I ever gave was full size boxes of Cracker Jacks. We had run out of candy, so I opened the CostCo case of C. J.s (intended for Mr. Pine's lunches) and gave all those out, too. Mr. Pine wasn't amused.

[LeoLioness]

Definitely full-size candy bars.

I was trick-or-treating in the early 80s, when the threat of razor-studded apples was rammed down our throats. Anything "homemade" was thrown in the trash.

[beevod]

Candy corn and malted milk balls.

[alliegator]

A can of beer, haha! I was 9 or 10, and there was a creepy house where a bunch of guys lived. Guess they ran out of candy. But I was a good girl and turned it over to my dad.
I always liked the neighbors that gave out little bags of pretzels or chips. Even little kids can go into candy overload.

[coll]

For the last bunch of years, I've been giving out full sized black and white cookies (wrapped from the factory of course) but at Halloween they make orange and black. The parents used to fight the kids for them. I used to buy them from where I worked but since I just retired, checking here for new ideas. Wanna keep wowwing them!

[meatn3]

My trick or treating was during the '60's and early '70's. As young kids we had a route from our house to my grandparents, where we would get hot cider and cinnamon toast and a ride home.
Homemade treats were from just a few "known" homes - actually most of those were made by retired neighbor ladies and they usually brought them over earlier in the week. We were on the receiving end for a number of women who had out of town grandchildren!

Most homes gave snack sized candies or standard lollypops and such. The best was a full sized candy bar or money. Just remembered - the best was one year when I received one of those stretchy necklaces strung with a sweet tart sort of candy. I loved those!

I can't believe how excited I got when I remembered that - started smiling and typing very fast!
Now I'm worried I might actually be a cheap date...

[MonMauler]

Gotta be beer.

When I was young, and my parents would take us trick-or-treating, there would invariably be that house with the father on the porch, next do a table of candy and a cooler full of beer. Parents would get beer, kids would get candy, but my dad always let me take a can of beer, too.

So, fast forward a few decades. My parents aren't going to be in town on Halloween, and they live in a great neighborhood for trick-or-treating so they ask me to go over and hand out candy. Immediately, I know that I'm setting up in the driveway with a big fire, a bunch of candy and a couple coolers of beer. I invited a friend over. By about 8pm we had a group of around 15 parents hanging out in the driveway, and the last one didn't leave until around midnight.

[tcamp]

A few years ago we were walking around the neighborhood with our TnT'ing kids, carrying wine glasses, and some houses offered free refills. Nice!

[sunshine842]

when I was in college, we trick-or-treated with shot glasses (to friends only). That works, too.

Best trick or treat prize? My husband! We were attending the same party, made a date, and the rest is history.

[Island]

Best: Kennedy silver half dollar. Giving $ was just as common as giving candy, but usually it was a stack of pennies (1960's) so that was a big prize.
Worst: A pencil!

[meatn3]

My worst was a toothbrush from the home of a dentist!

[alliegator]

Hmmm, my dentist lives 3 doors down from me. I'll have to get the scoop from the neighborhood kids:/

[Michelly]

My kid still gets at least 1 toothbrush/paste package. Jeez, can't people relax for this ONE day a year? It's "Trick or TREAT", after all! Even a quarter is better than a toothbrush!

[woodleyparkhound]

Homemade cinnamon candy apples, followed by other homemade treats. Next would be full sized candy - the kinds that I really liked (Almond Joy, Mounds, Reese's, Hershey's, etc.). The worst were candy corn - just hate that stuff!

[ricepad]

The best thing I ever got was an ice cream bar, but I didn't get to eat it. One year, when I was about three or four, our next door neighbors were giving out run of the mill candy to most kids, but the kids from our immediate neighborhood got ice cream bars. Since they were the first house my older brother and I hit, our dad didn't want us to get ice cream all over our costumes, so he put them in his pockets for later. I have no idea what the man was thinking...he's an otherwise really intelligent person, but for some reason, it didn't occur to him that 20 minutes of walking around the neighborhood would have a negative effect on the ice cream bars. By the time we got home, his pockets were swimming in melted ice cream.

The worst thing I've ever seen given out was a little booklet of Bible verses, given to my kids by the neighbors who "refused to participate in the devil's holiday."

[coney with everything]

Colbert featured some group that wants Halloween to be "Jesus Ween" and have people hand out bibles instead of candy. Yeah, that'll make the kiddies sign up for church...

I was a 1960's trick or treater, and I distincty remember one house giving out homemade popcorn balls, and kids passing the word to other kids. Ah, those innocent days of homemade treats!

[sunshine842]

the family in our neighborhood who gave out tracts were usually the first on the list of houses to soap/wax/tp

[Michelly]

That's interesting considering that Halloween was the e'en (evening) before All Hallow's Day when one was supposed to pray to make sure that your dead loved ones made it to Heaven. Trick or Treaters were originally people who were willing to do the praying for you in return for payment in the form of All Souls' Cakes.

[Chowrin]

... not quite. samhain's the original holiday. and like carolers, people would basically be peaceable thugs.

[JMF]

My trick or treating was during the early to mid 70's, by the late 70's it was shaving cream and egging fights and chugging beers. But during the peak my favs were Sixlets, sweet tarts, butterfingers, candy necklaces, soda caps, fizzies, the original chunky before they dumbed down the recipe, and we had an English neighbor who gave some of us boxes of English style jello mix. Not a powder, but a super thick, rubbery and tough, jello concentrate that you were supposed to add boiling water to, to melt it and make jello. But we ate the blocks as is. they were about 2x3" and 3/4" think. very tasty, imagine super concentrated, high quality jello, that you had to chew and chew to dissolve in your mouth.

[meatn3]

I forgot about chunky candy bars. They were so good!

I wonder if that style jello mix is still sold - what an odd thing to give. But it sure made a memory!

[pine time]

Didn't know anybody else liked Sixlets! I just found them at the dollar store and bought a bunch for Halloween (if they last that long).

[jmcarthur8]

I have been wracking my brain trying to remember the name of one of my favorite candies from when my boys were young. The neighborhood kids loved them, and none of the other parents gave them out.
We found them today at TJMaxx.....Sixlets!!! I haven't seen them in years. We got a container of yellow ones, but I really like the multicolor little tubes.
Memories....

[goodhealthgourmet]

i just saw them at Target the other day - with all the discounted Halloween candy - when my sister was on a hunt for the brown candy corns. that sighting gave me such flashbacks :)

[sunshine842]

the bank my mom and dad used when I was a kid would send a little tube of Sixlets through the drive-in tube for every kid when my mom went through the drive-through window.

[Peachie]

This is feedback from the kids that come to my door. The girls say that the jewelry I give out is the best thing they've ever received. I collect inexpensive beaded bracelets and necklaces throughout the year at various sales. I put them on a tray and offer the girls a choice of candy or jewelry. For boys I usually get the inexpensive parachuting toys or other cool things. I had plastic bat rings and the boys weren't interested in them until I put on in my nose (as a nose ring) and suddenly all of the boys wanted one. Just mixing things up.

[danionavenue]

a grandma in my small town made popcorn balls which were delicious.

[Veggo]

A nice widow who owned the Chatterton mill in CT always gave the industrial sized Hershey bars. Mrs. Harris was classy, in many ways. She let us play hockey on her pond, when the ice was thick enough. Her pond was the last to freeze because it was very deep and had a damn and spillway and a gristmill way down below in all that steamy roar of the waterfall.

[goodhealthgourmet]

funny Gawker piece on what you hand out to trick-or-treaters says about you:

http://gawker.com/5853130/what-your-h...

the comments are pretty entertaining too :)

[coll]

Oh no, and I was thinking of giving out prepackaged cups of sugary cereals this year. No joke, I have a case of 100 I got stuck with,I had another and gave it to a neighbor and he said the kids were fighting over their favorite flavors. I usually offer a few different things and snack sized bags of cereal usually seemed to go: I'm still on the fence because there's a good sale on chocolate bars at Walgreens. They will be a bit disappointed either way, I usually give out full sized black and white cookies but lots of changes in my life the last year!

Gotta get back into checking Gawker on a regular basis, thanks for reminding me!

[goodhealthgourmet]

lots of changes brewing among the Chowhounds this year, i hope everything is okay with you.

i actually didn't even see the story on Gawker initially - the local TV news did a spot on it and i caught it at the gym yesterday (apparently it was a slow news day), so i Googled it when i got home.

anyway, fret not, if i was a trick-or-treating kid i'd love to get a bag of sugary cereal :) and thanks for the tip about Walgreens because i have to go buy our stash today and there's one on my way to the gym!

[coll]

Hersheys, Mars and Nestles chocolate, fun or snack size, are $1.99, limit 4 (best price I've seen this season) you have to have the coupon but here the cashiers always scan it with theirs if you say you forgot it. Only til Saturday, then Sunday the price goes to I think 2/$5.

2011 has been a very bad luck year for my husband and I, can't wait til 2012 to begin! But we're hanging in there, thanks.

[pie22]

i see nothing wrong with you giving out sugary cereals! it's not like you are passing off all-bran or something!

[coll]

Thanks guys, I didn't even check the weather yet. so I may take a chance. Yeah it's Kelloggs frosted flakes, corn pops, cocoa krispies, fruit loops, apple jacks and the like. We're having our annual block party out in the street the day before and I have Twizzlers, candy corn and imported lemon candies for the kids then, besides the four soups I volunteered to make (homemade gumbo and chili, plus jazzed up Campbells NE Clam Chowder and Tomato soup to which I will probably add some type of pasta), Then the two "adult cakes" I will offer, alchohol based. If the weather is bad Monday, I will probably be twiddling my thumbs...which would be good, since it's my cat's birthday and I'm making her some shrimp over polenta, she loves her some shrimp.

[pikawicca]

Homemade, from scratch chocolate cupcake when I was 12. We sat down on the curb and gobbled them up on the spot.

[Veggo]

those were the days....

[FoodFuser]

Snickers. Overconsumed.
Thank God for the bucket.

[bootlady]

Hotdogs - at the local funeral home. We had to walk up the dimly lit driveway, past the funeral home, and into the backyard. They gave out the hotdogs from the garage, where the hearses were kept. This was really scary when we were little, and there was lots of discussion about what the hotdogs were made from. But the warm treat on a chilly night was worth it.

[Tripeler]

What a cool story! Thank you, bootlady.

[coll]

Love it!

[jwg]

My grandmother's friend owned the Pepsi bottling company. They always left out cases of Pepsi and 7Up cans.

[SweetPhyl]

I grew up in a small coastal town with 20 to 30 kids TOTAL, so trick or treating involved parents driving around the kids throughout the sparsely populated beach town. The last stop was always a retired couple who lived in a beautiful home right on the Bay. He was retired from Coca Cola and his treats were an entire six pack of COKE! AWESOME! We loved them forever for it...Nothing better than an ice cold Coke to wash down all that Halloween candy!

[sunshine842]

geez -- I cannot imagine trying to get *that* bunch of kids to sleep -- jacked up on sugar and caffeine!

[mpjmph]

I also grew up in a small town, maybe 70 kids of trick or treating age in any given year. Most people gave out full size candy bars, but my grandparents were snack cake devotees and always had a selection of Little Debbie cakes for kids to choose. Their neighbor was in charge of Lance snacks distribution for the region, and always gave out packs of crackers and other Lance products.

We moved to a larger town when I was eight. No more full size candy bars, but a lot more variety and volume :) We did have one neighbor that would buy all of the personalized pencils and rulers from the dollar store and give those out. Your real name didn't matter - you got whatever name she pulled out of the bag.

[BiscuitBoy]

BEST - full size snickers, hershey, reese's, or those ridiculous candy necklaces
WORST - apples, quarters, homemade junk, (cookies, popcorn balls, etc) usually from the old lady houses, bleah! sounds awful, but when you're a kid, you have a different view

[pie22]

best is always reese's, sour patch kids and juice boxes (walking around makes you thirsty)
worst - hershey kisses (really, your just giving me one?), almond joys/mounds, raisins

[CDouglas]

As a kid back in the 70s it had to be Marathon bars. These were 12 inches of braided chocolate and caramel that took forever to finish. The wrapper even had a 12 inch ruler printed on the back. They were always the biggest thing in the candy bag.

As an adult it has to be my neighbor who gives out oil cans of Foster's Lager and Premium Ale. They are the right size to make it around the block with the kids. Stopping by on the return trip is even better.

[BiscuitBoy]

I am definitely outta the loop (sadly) with all this trick-or-drinking!

[pdxgastro]

Not trick-or-treating but I was invited to my next door neighbor's house for a Halloween party. All dressed up, I go into a dark room to dunk for apples and in they come in with a lit birthday cake. They turned it into a surprise birthday party for me (my birthday is the following week). Unforgettable! Best party I've ever had.

[Cathy]

Vendor size bags of potato chips. From Bars on Michigan Avenue. In Detroit.

Now, my brother and I both give out bags of chips to Trick or Treaters. Passing it forward.

[Michelly]

Oh, GREAT idea! Will try it next year (my daughter insists that "everyone" loves Takis.

[coney with everything]

I bought a box of snack size Doritos/Cheetos/Fritos from Costco and gave the kids a choice: chips or candy. Most of the older ones went for the chips. I'll do it again next year, but more carefully as the box I bought was all "spicy" snacks.

[calliope_nh]

The best was the neighbor who had a big bowl of pennies and a very shallow spoon. We could take as many pennies as we could scoop. If you took too many almost all would slide off. There were no do-overs.

[jumpingmonk]

My best memory was one year near the end of my Trick or Treating phase. One of the houses in our neigborhood was home to a freshly married couple who must have shopped at one of the fancier supermarkets. So instead of the normal Hersehy's or M&M marst American Candy they were handing out Quality Stree chocolates and minature Bounty bars. Not all that different from the regular stuff objectively, but to someone getting a little jaded with most of the regular candy it was a nice change.
And I probably went down as the best Haloween treat giver in a lot of kids minds in my colledge years, when I fogot to get candy and handed out Pokemon cards.

[HillJ]

When I was a kid the authors Wende & Harry Devlin who wrote Old Black Witch were my neighbors. One Halloween Harry read the story to us on his front porch while we ate black licorice from his "black caldron." Still the best time I ever had on Halloween. I still miss you, Harry :)

http://www.amazon.com/Black-Witch-Wende-Harry-Devlin/dp/B0038BBN86/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1319847788&sr=1-4

not to mention the recipes! http://www.harryandwendedevlin.com/re...

[jvanderh]

A handful of fun sized milky ways.

This thread is enlightening. I always thought people giving out chips and pennies and popcorn balls were just killjoys. It appears they had great memories of getting those things as children. Aha! I so wish I weren't too old to trick or treat. Remember the smell when you'd empty it all out on the floor? Intoxicating. Nothing else smells like that.

[aurora50]

Ahem, just a little thing -
-I don't know if they are still doing it, but Disneyland, a few years ago, was still giving out candy to anyone who would ask, during their Halloween promotion days.
I remember, about 7-8 years ago, someone wheeling upt their (mother/grandmother)? up to one of their stations.
"Trick of Treat!" the family members yelled.
I can't tell you, the joy I feel the elderly lady felt, when she received her "treat"
We all feel the need to be needed.

[otps]

Regular size boxes of Dots.

[mpjmph]

Mickey's Not-so-Scary Halloween Party. I believe Disney requires a separate or more expensive ticket than regular day time admission, but they offer all-ages trick or treating a few days a week from Mid-September through Halloween.

[aurora50]

Oh yes, that is so fun. We've done that once or twice.
I remember one family, wheeling up their (mother? grandmother?) in her wheelchair and saying, "Trick or Treat!!" and her receiving candy in her little bag.
That is one of my best memories.

[escondido123]

1960. Anaheim California. Homemade cinnamon sugar doughnut, still warm.
1967. Berkeley California. Hand rolled joint, already lit.

[sunshine842]

now if you could just get the Anaheim neighbor to live about 4 doors further down the street from the Berkeley neighbor, you'd be on to something...

[will47]

My folks used to give out homemade popcorn (just with oil and salt), packed in plastic sandwich bags. I'm sure that a lot of parents made their kids throw it away, but I always liked it more than candy.

I think I've gotten (homemade) popcorn balls once or twice as a kid.

[ratgirlagogo]

Los Angeles suburbs, 1960's. The two houses that gave out homemade spiced cider, one hot, one cold. It was fantastic to get something to drink when we spent hours running around and wandered for miles. Second best was the house that gave out homemade pumpkin cake.

There was a constant rumor that a retired baseball player in the neighborhood gave out silver dollars. Not true, but it didn't stop hundreds of kids from banging on the door on his darkened front porch every year and hoping. Poor guy.

[AnneMarieDear]

Full-sized boxes of Cracker Jack. Loved those silly prizes!

[amyzan]

We loved getting full size candy bars, but my favorite was the lady who made popcorn balls with caramel and M&Ms. I don't know how she kept the M&Ms from melting, but I love caramel corn, so that house was my favorite.

[GraceW]

One time we received a chocolate called an "Ice Cube" IT WAS SOOOOO GOOD. I never saw it again. Although I looked it up online, and you can still order it.

[aurora50]

Oh yeah, Ice Cubes!!! MMMMMM.
We used to get them at one of the restaurants we used to go to when we were young, they would be at the front counter as you paid.
They're smooth, creamy and milky, almost/kind of like a truffle. But without the cost.
Glad to know you can still get them online!

[coll]

Oh that was my favorite candy for a long time, when I was a kid. Wonder if it would still taste the same now to me? I also liked white chocolate back then, I think it almost leaned that way.

The big thing was most candy then was 5 cents, but Ice Cubes were only 2 cents. I remember that box, always by the cash register, the original impulse item.

[JudiAU]

I wasn't allowed to TOT as a child (insert lame bibical nonesense) so I have a certain amount of pent up need surrounding the holiday. But my kids are small and I won't let them eat junk.

So...we handed mostly bags of Snyders prezels with some super tiny gummy candies and organic lolipops thrown in. And wouldn't you know it, the prezels were a HUGE hit. I got a lot of great comments and only one skeptic who picked them up, put them back, and choose again.

I left out a big bucket of prezels and most of my kid's candy and in the morning lots of candy left and no prezels.

[mpjmph]

I was a very serious T-o-T'er, and still have a huge sweet tooth. The occasional savory treat is good - it helps cleanse the palate when sugar overload leaves things tasting bland.

[FoodFuser]

Best gift on Halloween?

As a parent, must say
it is smiles of excitement
on the faces of children
as they race door to door.

[coll]

One of my friends got really weirded out the other day. When she went through her 4 year old son's bag, she found a pair of "Love Cuffs" (you know, satin covered handcuffs) still in their package from CVS, and is freaking out who gave them to him. I told her, her husband just became a cop so maybe they thought it would be funny, but I don't think she'll ever be the same again!

[jvanderh]

I'd be freaking out too, and checking the sex offender registry for my neighborhood. Hopefully if it was a joke, the person tells them so they stop worrying.

[jmorri26]

My most memorable was an old man in our neighborhood who worked for Barq's root beer. Every year he gave each kid a can of root beer, a small bag of Zapp's potato chips with halloween decorations on them and as many sheets of these amazing temporary Barq's tattoos as he could stuff in your bag! We looked forward to his house every year and those tattoos stayed on so long, it would be Christmas and my mom would still be finding lips and spiders all over my brother!

[MattInNJ]

A beer!
I think we were in 7th grade.
Me and the girl I was with split it lol

[mamachef]

Actually, ipse, it was a walnut. I thought I was "suprise" trick-or-treating my boyfriend, and when he handed me the walnut I thought, "well, the trick's on me then." Turns out it WAS on me: he'd split it and hollowed it, filled it with my engagement ring, and glued it back together. :) Next best was our neighborhood when the kids were little and all the adults went trick-or-drinking and we all tried to outdo each other with Halloween-y drinks.

[silvergirl]

I always went to my grandparents first so they could see me in my costume. One year my grandfather made me a papier mâché rock filled with candy bars. Like Charlie Brown, I got a rock.

[mamachef]

I like your Grandpa's style, silvergirl. :)