How to Use Up Your Leftover Halloween Candy

Did you get more Halloween candy than you know what to do with? You won’t believe some of the cool things you can do with your extra or leftover Halloween candy!

12 Fun Ways to Use Leftover Halloween Candy

If your family is like mine, now has a newly acquired overabundance of Halloween candy. Over the years, I have had an opportunity to find new and unique ways to use all the Leftover Halloween Candy.

My favorite is to just eat it…but my hips say another thing. So, what can one do with bags and bags of leftover Halloween candy?

This year there is no reason to let all that excess candy go to waste. Let’s do something different. Hey, let’s be frugal. These candy ideas include a few baking ideas, but most are ideas that will provide new life.

Here are some of our favorite ways to use up leftover candy:

Trade It In At The Dentist

This is the simplest idea. Many dentists across the country do a Halloween Candy Buy Back. In exchange for kids’ Halloween candy, dentists give out healthy rewards like toothbrushes, stickers, small toys, or even small amounts of cash.

The dentists then donate the candy to members of the military. I just found out our local dentist is participating. C-YA! Out of sight and out of mind.

Donate Halloween Candy To The Troops

However, if you aren’t interested in stopping to see the dentist, you can send Halloween candy to U.S. troops through an organization like Operation Shoebox or Operation Troop Treats.

Register to donate your leftover candy through the nonprofit’s website and soon enough, your leftover candy bars and Reese’s peanut butter cups will be placed in a care package and sent to troops and first responders across the U.S. and overseas

This one I love. Our troops on deployment look forward to extra packages. And they won’t turn down candy. They miss special treats from home.

Let’s send them ours. It is a win/win situation.

Put It Away For Christmas

Most candy can last longer than 6 months or more without any issues. This is one of my favorite ideas. It saves money during one of the busiest and most expensive seasons.

When the kids aren’t looking, I take out handfuls of candy that are not branded with Halloween pictures or colors. I place them into a zipper bag and hide them in a cool dark place.

My kids get so much candy they have no clue they are missing any.

Stir Candy Into Your Ice Cream

Get ready for a sweet delight. Dress up some plain vanilla ice cream or chocolate ice cream, with some delicious candy.

Chop up your chocolate bars, peanut butter candy, or Twix bars, and fold it in; store your spooky surprise in a lidded plastic container or a loaf pan and re-freeze. Now if you don’t want to do it this way. You can be lazy and just sprinkle them on top.

I doubt you will hear any complaints.

Bake Them into Cookies or Brownies

Many of the candy collected for Halloween can be used in holiday baking. Next time you’re making chocolate chip cookies, reach for your leftover chocolate candies instead of the chips.

You can use hard candies to decorate cakes and cupcakes.

There are no limits to what you can do. Think about baking chocolate or peanut butter cups into cookie batter. M&M candies are great in cookies. Things like Heath Bars, chopped Snickers, and crushed peanut butter candy also work well here. The possibilities are endless.

One of my favorites is making Halloween Dessert Bars.

Freeze Halloween Candy For Later

Chocolate freezes well, and you’ll be less tempted to break open the bag and eat it until you have the proper occasion for it or eat it on the go.

To freeze – Seal your candy using an airtight container, freezer bag, or heavy-duty freezer wrap. Most candies will keep their best quality for up to one year in the freezer.

Did I mention frozen Twizzlers are my favorite? Yep. they sure are. Chopped candy will also freeze well. Freeze it in 1-cup increments to make it easy for baking.

Make Your Own Trail Mix

Turn your leftover candy into a fun, creative trail mix. Because we know the best trail mix has chocolate candy in it. Combine nuts such as cashews or peanuts, dried fruit like raisins or cranberries, pumpkin or sunflower seeds, and any candy leftover from trick-or-treating.

A little sweet find is always fun in a handful of nuts and fruits. Makes snacking extra special.

Put them Into Your Granola

Bake your favorite granola recipe. Then sprinkle with your favorite Halloween candy for a sweet and delicious treat. Now you get to eat candy for breakfast and call it cereal. HA!! Yes, you can. And we won’t say a word about it.

Use Them To Decorate Gingerbread Houses

This is our personal favorite. Each year we collect our favorite Halloween candy and place it in a separate bag marked for favorite house creations.

It is so simple to make on your own. We always enjoy watching the kids making their houses special. Plus, all the decorations were absolutely free. Here is a picture and recipe of our houses. HA! You can see skull candy being used, and it is still perfect!

Use Candy As A Learning Activities

Match, sort, and count your way into math fun. Make counting fun with treats. How many rectangle candies? How many rounds, and which ones are chocolate? Count how many Snickers, Skittles, or Starbursts did you receive? The list goes on. You can also use Halloween Candy to play math games.

My favorite is “You have 3 Snickers and mommy eats one, how many do you have left?” – don’t forget to eat it… 🙂 Or subtraction never really happened.

Drink it up warm.

Melt chocolate in warm milk for a yummy hot chocolate drink. Those solid, fun-size Hershey candy bars work great. Fun for the kids after a full day playing outside in the cold. Yummy!

TREAT TIME Reward!

I typically don’t like to give out, but kids love them. Did they have a good day behaving or using it as a prize after having a family game night? Leave random pieces of leftover Halloween Candy for your kids and spouse to surprise them.

I would think about not using candy with the Halloween wrapper. This way they don’t get to upset. We don’t want our secrets out.