Is There a Difference in the Layers?
You might have spent many post-trick-or-treating nights debating the difference in the flavors of the three layers of candy corn, but manufacturers say the only difference is the variation of food coloring. That doesn’t mean your friend was lying when they said they could tell which was which by taste alone — studies suggest that it is possible, but that would just be because the dyes taste different. So you were all right. Rejoice!
Related: Spaceballs’ Classic Merchandising Joke Had Another Layer
Why Candy Corn is So Divisive
There’s a scientific reason people feel so strongly about candy corn, mostly because it’s a flavor so inextricably linked to childhood. “The area of the brain where we process smell (which has a major impact on how we process taste) … is in the same part of the brain where we store memories and evoke emotion,” explained one food scientist, so loving or hating candy corn may very well have to do with whether you ate it as a child and whether childhood was an awesome time for you. Feel free to test the theory by quizzing your friends about their childhood traumas over the candy bowl.