It seems wrong, somehow, to speak ill of a confection that’s been around since 1918. It’s like saying someone’s grandpa is a jerk. While it may be true, clearly someone, somewhere, has good memories of this candy, right? Someone remembers the old-timey days of going to Old Man Jenkins’ corner store with their 10-cent allowance and buying a Cherry Mash before tricking someone into whitewashing a fence or something.

But… yeah, nostalgia aside, this was pretty awful.

The chocolate with chopped peanuts was good, and the cherry flavor was good—not cough syrupy at all, but like a good maraschino cherry—but the texture… UGH THE TEXTURE. It’s like toothpaste, but like, old toothpaste — back in the days before toothpastes all became sparkly gels. This is basically the Pepsodent of cherry candies.

Sorry, Grandpa.