We've seen some pretty sweet LEGO art and videos before. But the LEGO candy dispenser, a contraption made with some seriously cool engineering (and sugar!) is pretty unique. In the video above, YouTube user MeMyselfAndMovies demonstrates a fully-functioning candy dispenser he built entirely out of LEGOs when he was 12 or 13 years old. Now 21, he explains exactly how his machine works. The brightly-colored box features two coin slots in front -- one for M&Ms, one for Skittles. When a nickel is deposited and a lever is pulled, the machine dispenses a handful of candy. The project also has a ton of clever features, like locks and secret compartments. LEGO enthusiasts are a creative bunch, so it's no surprise that there are a ton of incredible projects made with the plastic building blocks. Last year, high school senior Rocco Buttliere created a series of 1:650 scale models of the world's most famous monuments, including the Eiffel Tower and the World Trade Center. And at Digital Harbor High School in Maryland, students used stop-motion animation to create a seriously cool LEGO dance-off.
Are you a LEGO fan? Have you ever made anything awesome with LEGOs? Sound off in the comments below or tweet a photo of your own creation @HuffPostTeen! HuffPost Lifestyle is a daily newsletter that will make you happier and healthier — one email at a time.YouTube is chock-full of amazing instructional culinary videos, but some of the recipes are easier filmed than done. So I'm volunteering to find out if YouTube can turn an Internet-addicted idiot like me into a cooking master, starting with "How to Make LEGO Gummy Candy!" This video by Grant Thompson (also known as "The King of Random") about how to make your own LEGO gummy candy certainly caught the Internet's attention; it's racked up nearly 4 million views in under a month. In it, Thompson makes gummy versions of LEGO men and even a stackable set of LEGO bricks—what could be more awesome than that? Though I was skeptical of how simple it would be to make any sort of gummy candy in my kitchen, the three ingredients required were remarkably easy to find: I was able to grab the exact three shown in the video—Karo Light Corn Syrup, Knox Unflavored Gelatine and Jell-O—at Target, practically all on one aisle.
I did, however, use grape Jell-O instead of the berry blue flavor, because fight the power! Slightly harder to find was a LEGO ice cube mold, which I had to grab from a LEGO store. But sure enough, a mold for making little authentically sized LEGO men was right by the entrance. Back home, watching the video again made me a little nervous: The instructions are very specific—almost like he's expecting me to screw it up. But things went smoothly. My corn syrup easily dissolved into my cold water. It took slightly longer than expected (about 10 minutes), but my gelatin dissolved completely as well. At the stove, heating the mixture was a piece of cake—it was ready to go after about eight minutes. Thompson's biggest warning was to watch out for stuff floating in your liquid. Since I didn't want my little LEGO children to turn out deformed, I took this advice to heart and followed his method for scraping off the imperfections. Sure enough, after 10 minutes, all the garbage had floated to the top, and removing it was relatively straightforward.
Yes, a little bit of white gelatin was left behind and ended up in a few of my Jell-O men, but, hey, as a parent, you love them all the same, right? RELATED Don't Be Afraid of Gelatin » With the imperfections gone, I poured my mixture into the LEGO-man mold, and just like that, I was done. The whole process, which I took at the slowest possible pace, took about 30 minutes. All that was left was to wait five hours to let the gummies set and see how badly I screwed up. So I shoved my mold into the refrigerator and went to sleep. Like a kid on Christmas morning, I was excited to see what my LEGO men looked like when I woke up. Sure enough, they popped out of the tray without incident and—voila—I had perfect little gummy LEGO men! The final product was a little bit sticky, but not problematically so, and definitely didn't leave a mess like regular Jell-O would. And though the consistency certainly feels lighter than commercially produced gummy candies, the little men held together firmly (even after sitting out for hours) and stood up straight on their feet, just like The King of Random said they would.
(Though gravity did take hold after a while, causing them to face-plant into the table. After a while, gravity will cause the LEGO gummies to face-plant. The texture was also lighter than a normal gummy, but the flavor was pleasant, resembling a slightly chewier Jell-O square. I had to restrain myself from gobbling up all eight of my LEGO buddies right away and creating a major LEGO-man massacre. Overall, I was impressed. Making these LEGO gummies was almost ridiculously easy, and though their resemblance to actual "candy" is a bit overstated, they are as durable and detailed as promised. But what about the promise of an amazing collection of stackable LEGO gummy bricks to build amazing gummy towers for my gummy LEGO men to live in? Well, for that, all you need are different molds. If I can do it, you can do it. Just beware of getting emotionally attached to your handcrafted LEGO men before you eat them.It’s fun to build things with LEGO, but it’s even more fun if you get to eat your custom creations.
These homemade LEGO gummy candies are easy to make, taste great, and can even be stacked like real LEGO bricks. In this video, youtuber Grant Thompson “The King of Random” explains what you need to make custom gummy candies, and how to do it. For ingredients, you’ll need a box of your favorite flavor of Jell-O, corn syrup, and a few packets of unflavored gelatin. You’ll also need some food grade molding silicone to make the LEGO mold (this video will show you to create the mold). When you have your mold ready, mix a half cup of very cold water with a quarter cup of corn syrup and stir it together until the liquid turns clear. Pour the liquid into a pot with the Jell-O and packets of gelatin, stir it until everything mixes in evenly, and heat it on the stove at medium-low heat for 5 to 10 minutes. Your sugary soup should now be a thick candy syrup that’s ready to be poured into your mold. Let the gelatin cool for about five hours on your counter and you have your own homemade, LEGO-shaped gummy candy.