Today we celebrate peanuts. And chocolate. Together in one sweet, salty little bundle. It’s National Peanut Cluster Day!
Peanut clusters have been around for about a hundred years or so. The Standard Candy Company of Nashville, Tennessee came out with the GooGoo Cluster, a round candy bar containing marshmallow, caramel, and peanuts, covered in chocolate. It is considered the first combination candy bar, made up of several different types of candy rather than an all-chocolate chocolate bar. Kind of like the mutt of the candy bar kennel, if we’re stretching for analogies here. During the Great Depression, the marketing slogan for GooGoo Clusters proclaimed them “a nourishing lunch for a nickel.” The FDA would have a field day with that today.
Here’s an interesting story on a company whose own peanut cluster recipe dates back to 1912 or 1913. They are bucking the manufactured-by-machine trend and bringing back their original recipe peanut clusters, making each one by hand. If you happen to be in Bryan, Ohio, stop by the Spangler Store & Museum and pick some up!
I bought peanut clusters from the bulk foods section at WinCo. I doubt they were handmade, but they still tasted pretty good! It’s hard to go wrong with that combination of sweet and salty. Just ask the folks who created chocolate covered bacon (which, unfortunately, is not a food holiday). Tara and I ate them in the car on the drive to Seattle, where we’re headed for the weekend.
Related articles
- Peanut clusters hand crafted again (toledoblade.com)
