It’s been quite a long time since I’ve been in a drugstore. I’m not sure why; I guess since I shop like I’m British and all the grocery stores I frequent have pharmacies, I never really have the need to visit them. However, after a recent trip to the bank went wrong (after almost three decades of life you’d think I’d have learned that banks are closed on national holidays), I noticed that the new Walgreen’s across the street had opened. I also remembered that drugstores often have the best Halloween sections.

As you can see, I was NOT disappointed. There were so many gems that I wanted to bring home with me, but my cupboards are already so full of Halloween crap that if I brought home another armful, I’d have to put the Cheez-Its out on the streets, and that would have been immoral. Everybody knows Cheez-Its got no street smarts. They wouldn’t last a day out there. They’d be eaten alive. MUAHAHAHA BAD PUN HALLOWEEN TIE-IN.

I stood in that aisle for a good five minutes, taking everything in and trying to decide what I would pick. The store was almost empty and strangely silent. I felt exposed and conspicuous. No grown woman should spend that much time looking at novelty Halloween items. Which is not to say I picked Take-Out Gummy Fried Noodle & Eyeball with Candy Sauce out of panic or embarrassment. (Not that that hasn’t happened before.) No, I think the picture and the name say it all. I mean, c’mon. Miniature Chinese take-out box? Fake noodles with eyeballs and sauce? Tiny plastic chopsticks?! I think the chopsticks were what ultimately won me over.

One of the hazards that a food reviewer has to navigate through is the Embarrassing Cashier Moment. Much like how a grown woman shouldn’t spend five minutes looking at novelties, a grown woman also shouldn’t walk up to the cashier with nothing but a fake take-out box containing gummy noodles. I considered buying a few other items, like maybe a box of suppositories and a can of nuts, in an attempt to look like I hadn’t just come in for bizarre candy. In the end I decided to man up and walked to the counter with my silly, lonely purchase. Lucky for me, the teenager who rang me up had dead zombie eyes and couldn’t have cared less what I was buying. It was so anticlimactic that I felt mildly disappointed.

While arranging my Take-Out Gummy Fried Noodle & Eyeball with Candy Sauce for its Glamour Shot, I became unreasonably grossed out. Maybe it was the plastic smell of the gummies. Maybe it was the squishy, elastic texture. Maybe it was the fact that I knew I was going to have to eat it. Whatever it was, dread filled my stomach, and I came to realize that this was a good thing. I was being grossed out by a gross-out Halloween candy! My body became confused with revulsion and joy. ‘Tis the reason for the season. I fell even more in love with my take-out candy.

Turns out, my fears were largely unfounded. I bit into an eyeball, squinting my eyes closed, and…it was a gummy eyeball. It was squishy and tasted like high-fructose corn syrup. That was it. I had that feeling you get when you exit a Halloween maze – you’ve just been tormented by normal people playing crazy psychos and werewolves, you screamed like a little baby, but now that it’s over, you just laugh at yourself. That wasn’t so bad! I tried a noodle and it tasted exactly like the eyeball. Also, kudos to the noodles for looking like earthworms. It’s the kid-friendly version of Fear Factor. That show ended four years ago. My pop culture references are always so timely and relevant.

More props to Take-Out Gummy Fried Noodle & Eyeball with Candy Sauce for putting some extra care into the Candy Sauce packet. That is one evil-looking green apple, right there. The sauce itself is more like a super-thick syrup; I had to coax it out of the packet and somehow managed to get it all over my hands. I hate sticky hands. The syrup calls itself “sweet”, but never believe an evil green apple. It will lie to you. The syrup was actually sour green apple. Very sour. Delightfully so. I took a bite of earthworm noodle coated in it, and my lips were puckered for thirty minutes afterward. I approve.

Really though, who gives a shit about how Take-Out Gummy Fried Noodle & Eyeball with Candy Sauce tastes. It’s all about appearance, and this candy delivers in spades. From the box to the chopsticks with convenient eyeball holder to the earthworm noodles to the evil apple sauce packet, this novelty Halloween candy is the best. One box of TOGFN&ECS could make the centerpiece of your whole Halloween party. Evil Green Apple for President 2012.

• Score: 4 out of 5 earthworm gummy fried noodles
• Price: $1.99
• Size: 5.19 oz. fake take-out Chinese food box
• Purchased at: Walgreens
• Nutritional Quirks: Eyeballs do not actually taste like eyeballs. Halloween!