The Untold Truth Of Candy Corn Pizza

Sometimes, the internet ends up being responsible for incredible things, like rallying the masses to send Christmas cards to soldiers. Sometimes, the internet does things that are a little less heartwarming and a little more polarizing. 

Like putting candy corn on pizza. 

There are two types of people in the world: the ones that wondered why they never thought of doing it first, and the kind that wish they could set a tweet on fire and never look at it again. Just because it's polarizing doesn't mean it's not brilliant. Dessert pizza is definitely a thing, and it can be delicious... so what about candy corn pizza? We're not going to debate whether or not it happened (it did) and whether or not it should have happened (opinions vary), but we are going to at least get to the bottom of the story of what's going on with this seasonal "treat." 

According to Brit+Co, the whole candy corn pizza thing kicked off in September 2017. It only took a single tweet to send the internet into a tizzy, and make them forget all about the fact that some people thought pineapple on pizza was a good idea. 

This makes pineapple on pizza look positively mainstream. 

The tweet — simply captioned, "Tis the season my dudes" — had two things going against it, naysayers said. First, it was a frozen pizza, and who would do something like this to a decent frozen pizza? Then there was, of course, the ooey, gooey layer of melted candy corn all over the top that got pretty extreme love or hate responses. While some admitted they had bad taste so they would definitely be trying it, others condemned candy corn as "the worst candy on earth," while still others threatened to call the equally odd combination of "the FBI and DARE" to report the atrocity.

The unfortunate pizza in question was a DiGiorno frozen pizza, and hilariously, perhaps the best response of all came from DiGiorno's own Twitter account. The original reply summed up what everyone was thinking: "Tis the no"

It didn't stop there, either. When the original poster offered to selflessly give away the recipe (presumably as an early trick, not a treat), they responded that they passed. When others volunteered the sentiment that they were losing out on a million-dollar idea, they acknowledged, "Billion probably", and when someone pointed out Cicis was going to be the first one to jump on the bandwagon, DiGiorno took the chance to throw some serious shade with, "Ci Who?"

While some took the chance to call DiGiorno out on their past ideas for dessert pizzas, there's no denying it: a chocolate chip cookie pizza is nowhere near as cringe-inducing as a candy corn one. And that's saying something!

When you're a professional chef, you have to be ready and willing to taste everything. But you're not going to like everything, and even if you don't like it you'll have to try to make sure it tastes right. So, the Today Show had Giada De Laurentiis, Al Roker, and Curtis Stone try an actual candy corn pizza. 

It went about as well as you'd expect. 

De Laurentiis got a whiff of the pizza and declared it smelled "like barf," and couldn't even eat it — especially after Al Roker described it as "really horrible." The Australian Stone had never had candy corn before and couldn't believe how sweet it was, and went on to say that he was pretty sure he had been happier not knowing what it was. 

But it was perhaps Roker who summed it up best, saying that it was the sort of thing that would allow you to feel like you'd thrown up in your mouth without actually doing it. So, now you know.

Candy corn pizza might be incredibly... polarizing, but it's definitely not the first time a candy-topped pie has divided opinions on social media. 

Take the equally sugary Peeps-covered pizza. According to the Today Show, the peepza was started by Adam Kuban in 2010, and the reaction was pretty much the same. It may have gotten dropped in the middle of a deluge of Easter-inspired treats, but it definitely didn't go unnoticed. Peeps pizza pops up regularly in the springtime — likely the same way we're going to keep seeing candy corn pizza for years and years — and they had pros like Bobby Flay and Martha Stewart give it a try. 

Surprisingly, opinions varied. Martha Stewart and Adam Richman both declared it was pretty bad, but Curtis Stone was a fan (sort of), and Jeff Mauro had a few bites — and that practically means it's amazing. 

There have been other attempts, too, like Tastemade's cotton candy pizza. That might be good, covered with marshmallows, dried strawberries, and mixed berries... but the mozzarella cheese is where most get off that bandwagon.

While the original post that started this mess was one where someone simply dumped a lot of candy corn onto a frozen pizza, some people have actually gone a little farther and added a bit more to the idea to make it... better? Worse? You decide. 

Gourmandize replaced the traditional pizza dough with a sugar cookie, which is a step in the right direction. They also suggest using not just candy corn but peanut butter, vanilla frosting, and raisins. Others suggest toppings like chocolate chips, M&Ms, marshmallows, peanuts, and Nutella. DiGiorno may have joked that they didn't want the original recipe, but even if you hate candy corn, some of the alternatives don't sound too bad at all. 

And strangely, melting candy corn on pizza isn't a completely new idea, either: it had already been used as a deliciously sweet melty top to candy corn cookie bark, used to top colorful Halloween cakes, baked into cookies in lieu of chocolate or white chocolate chips, tossed in a slightly salty, super-sweet popcorn, and hidden in brownies. And yes, completely sweet versions of candy corn pizza do, indeed, pre-date that one crazy tweet that almost broke the internet in 2017.

So, what are you actually eating when you scarf down some candy corn pizza — and specifically, the candy corn? LiveScience actually counts candy corn as among the best Halloween candy choices — health-wise, at least — and that's mostly because they're fat-free. They do, of course, have a shocking amount of sugar, with just 19 pieces of candy corn containing 32 grams of sugar. To put that in perspective, the American Heart Association recommends men limit their daily sugar intake to 36 grams, and women limit theirs to 25 grams. 

If you think that's almost unthinkable, here's another fun fact: you're also eating the favorite candy of more U.S. states than you might think. According to Forbes, Idaho, Iowa, Nevada, New Mexico, and North Dakota can all boast that their favorite Halloween candy (yes, of them all) is candy corn. Turns out that if you're looking for a really good candy corn pizza, you might want to start by looking there.

For anyone who's in awe that candy corn pizza is, in fact, a thing that someone did, let's stop for a moment and talk about a kind of candy corn pizza you'll actually want to make for Halloween. 

In 2017, Fortune reported that Chuck E. Cheese was going to be adding their own version of the monstrosity to the menu, and this time, they were going to be serving that actual candy on the side. That's a good start, for sure, and their version was only made to look like candy corn. The ingredients were perfectly acceptable, traditional pizza ingredients, no sugar required. 

It's simple, too. It was a white pizza on a traditional crust, with a center piled high with garlic mozzarella cheese. Around the outside of the pizza was a ring of cheddar cheese, and there you have it: cut it, and each slice looked like a piece of candy corn you might actually want to eat. The Today Show notes that this pizza came after the infamous tweet, so were they inspired by the Twitterverse to make an edible version? Maybe!