National Candy Day

The story of candy begins in India. Between the 6th and 4th centuries BC, the Persians and Greeks learned that the people in India had, what they called, reeds that make honey without bees. These reeds were actually sugarcane, which is indigenous to Southeast Asia. Ancient Indians would boil sugarcane juice, turning it into individual pieces of sugar, which they called “khanda.”
 
Before sugarcane was domesticated outside of Asia, honey was used in ancient China, the Middle East,  Egypt, Greece, and Rome to coat fruits and flowers, which would preserve them and turn them into a form of candy. Before the Industrial Revolution, candy was used as medicine to either calm the digestive system or cool the throat. In the Middle Ages, candy was mostly consumed by the wealthy and was made of sugar and spices to aid digestive problems, which were very common, as food was neither fresh nor balanced.