Candy Construction: How to Build Race Cars, Castles, and Other Cool Stuff out of Store-Bought Candy

by Sharon Bowers

Build a candy fantasy! Use ordinary store-bought candy and cookies as the raw material for a brand-new kind of crafting, where castles are made with wafer-cookie walls and race cars have Oreos for wheels. Sharon Bowers provides step-by-step instructions for dozens of whimsical and fun projects that will have you seeing candy in a whole new way. From licorice pirates and centipedes made from Life Savers to marshmallow aliens and candy bento boxes, the sweet possibilities are endless. 

Genres: Cookbooks, Nonfiction

144 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2010

Reviews

[Stella · Rating 4 out of 5]

Normally I don't like store-bought candy cookbooks. But we loved Ghoulish Goodies by Sharon Bowers, so decided to give this one a try. Sure, there are some "ew, gross, I hope they don't eat that" recipes. But there are also edible chess/checker boards, homemade edible play dough, stained-glass butterflies. Looking forward to trying some of these recipes.

[Kinsley · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty cool creations and easy to follow. Clever language throughout.

[Mckinley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun

[Stacy · Rating 4 out of 5]

My family has Survivor parties twice a year to kick off each new season. We take themed food and after 20+ seasons and multiple attendees, I have run out of ways to make snakes, turtles, beaches, huts and other Survivor items out of food. I came across this book on Amazon and thought it would be perfect. It was. While there are pages of trains, pirate ships, chess boards and popular party themes, my favorite sections were the Creepy-Crawlies and Woodland Creatures. They can renew Jeff Probst's contract for another 10 years now because I have enough ideas for all of the parties!

I also liked the holiday items. The Pilgrim hats are quick and easy and will be fun at Thanksgiving. Santa's sleigh will be cute at the Christmas dinner table and I have plans for eggs at Easter.

[Melissa Lee-Tammeus · Rating 1 out of 5]

Saw this in a catalog and so glad I opted to find it at my local library instead of buying it. The premise is great, and both my son and I were super excited when we started to look through it together. And then we weren't. These are kind of stupid, in all honesty. A bracelet made out of lifesavers and Swedish fish? A pirate ship made out of rice krispies? That's all ya got? There was nothing in here that was remotely exciting and my son lost interest very quickly. All I took from this was some turkeys and pilgrim hats made out of cookies that you can google and find without spending the money on such a letdown. Big bummer because it really is a nicely laid out book, but creativity wise, it is a bit lacking.

[Krista · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really found most of these projects stomach-turning. I can't imagine eating any of the larger projects or wasting so much (crappy) food making them. Really kind of gross. But I did enjoy the holiday section and the little pretzel butterflies. The book was well-written too, just not my type of craft.

[Leah Michelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

this is fun and delicious book on how to make amazing candy structures and objects...counts as one book!