Highway 74 candy store expected to stick it out through construction
For more than 40 years, Highway 74 commuters and hikers with a taste for everything from salty-sweet rock candy to homemade peanut butter cookies have paid homage to the Ortega Country Cottage Candy Store and Gift Shoppe.
The shop, known by many people simply as “The Candy Store,” is a veritable landmark along the 29-mile stretch of the road, also known as the Ortega Highway, that links Orange County and the Inland area.
A nearby Caltrans project at the Orange/Riverside county line suggested to some the candy store’s days were numbered. However, the store’s new management does not see it that way.
“This is the candy store. It will always be the candy store,” said Therese Nierhoff, 43, who recently took over as manager of the Ortega Country Cottage Candy Store and Gift Shoppe off Highway 74.
“We get people almost every day come in with their children, and tell us that their parents used to bring them up here when they were children,” said Therese Nierhoff, who recently took over as candy store manager. “You hear it constantly. It’s tradition.”
“This is the candy store. It will always be the candy store,” Nierhoff said.
