Necco Wafers, Candy or Communion?

By Kitty Lapin Agile on June 16, 2013 • ( 3 )

Necco Wafers are a candy that you either love of hate. People that love Necco Wafers, such as my husband, always purchase this hard to find candy whenever they see them.

“They have Necco Wafers!” he will exclaim, ignoring all the real candy with chocolate.

Hard to find, but it never goes bad once you find it.

I have always hated Necco Wafers, mind you I only tried them when young. Necco Wafers did play a part in my childhood, as my friend and I would play communion and use the wafers.

The brightly colored chalk like substance was a good stand in for what we thought real communion wafers tasted like. She was Catholic and I was raised High Episcopalian, which means our church services were the same only she could meet the wife and children of the priest at my church. Poor Father Taylor probably did have to ask his wife just what I meant after I took my first communion wafer from him and said “Oh it is kind of like a Necco wafer.”

Regular communion wafer

If you know communion wafers, you’ll know what I mean. I’m not talking the lovely baked bread that I would receive when I attended the Congregationalist Church in Connecticut. I’m talking that thin wafer that refuses to melt as it sticks to the roof of your mouth. Usually I end up to this day, when taking communion, trying to sing a hymn with the pasty mess still gumming up my mouth. It’s not correct to take a water bottle to church, as much as I would like to, but it sure would help with my post wafer singing.

Just add color, Necco wafer!

I’m sure that there are 2 assembly lines in the candy factor, one line goes to get the wafers colors and they become Necco Wafers. The other line leaves the wafers plain and they go to churches.

My husband is well loved by not only myself, but by his youngest daughter. She will hunt out Necco wafers for her father, and insist I purchase them for him. I don’t mind, they are a hardy candy. I can put them away for when he’s had a bad day and

Communion wafers that accidentally fell on the Necco Wafer line.

pull them out. I don’t think they can go bad. I read during WWII the candies were a favorite to send to the troops as they just, held up well.

If someone had sent me Necco Wafers, it would just have inspire me to liberate Belgium more quickly ,where they had real candy made with delicious chocolate.

Maybe it is a guy thing. My brother Paul has been known to not only eat Necco Wafers, but also likes Malted Milk Balls. Malted Milk Balls often come in a cardboard milk carton, but they are not milk. It’s a disguise, much like the thin coating of chocolate which tries to fool you into thinking they are a real candy. They aren’t.

Give me a York Peppermint Patty or a Mounds Bar any day. Even better, how about some imported Belgium chocolate. Belgium has a law about the amount of fat chocolate must have to be called chocolate. That’s why when my husband is in business in Belgium he knows he can go to the food store and buy the cheapest bar marked “chocolate” and it will still make everyone back home rave about how terrific it is. “Del Haze” isn’t the name of a fancy chocolatier, it’s the name of the food store.

This is a damn Necco wafer isn’t it? I can only tell as I can peek with this blindfold on.

If it’s not chocolate, it’s not candy. Also, men will eat just about anything if it has some sugar in it somewhere. Though I’d like to do a taste test with Necco Wafers and Communion Wafers. Blindfolded, could men tell the difference?