Here's why American candy is fruit flavored - a history
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 14 ต.ค. 2024
- The amazing intersection of candy and fruit in the United States.
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And to celebrate that sweet, sweet moment, they planted a lemon tree: lemons being the sweetest fruit available at the time.
Cool. More evidence for my theory that the best way to get props from JJ is to spam Simpsons references.
@@lostcauselancer333 lol
In Britain we often have turnip flavoured candy, lemon sweets are quite unpopular because they are haunted.
@@ImAMassiveBender They’re always eating turnips in Britain: they love the sweet taste.
I was thinking this THE WHOLE TIME.
"What is culture if not the stuff around us too common to contemplate?" Is one of my favorite things you've ever said. It summarizes why I love your videos on middle class and food and stuff so well
Second that
Absolutely. There's not many people who talk about this stuff.
It's my weekly dose of coming in here ,talking about all the differences in cultures and learning.
I thought it boring until half way in and then it suddenly became very interesting. J.J can do that.
Second tgis
I would argue that Grapes have made their way into the “big 5” of fruits these days. If not just for the contrast their purple coloring gives candies. They’re especially common in things like fruit snacks and popsicles.
Purple flavor was always my favorite popsicle! :)
And raspberry
I was like "where's the grape 🍇?!?!"
It’s weird though because most grape flavored things don’t taste like grape. They taste purple.
in britain we might not use grape, but rather blackcurrant
Fun Fact: Early slot machines or "trade stimulators" in bars would have to get around gambling laws by dispensing fruit gum along with your spin. This way the player was technically purchasing a piece of gum when they put a coin in the machine instead of gambling. This is where the common fruit themed slot machine symbols originated. The lemons, prunes, melons, and cherries were all gum flavors.
Related fun fact. Japanese Gacha companies use the same tactic, including a small piece of gum in with their blind box figurines, so that they can shelves in the Kids Toy section
thats cool
@@jonw2945 is that also what inspired trading card companies to package things like baseball cards with sticks of gum? 😮
they should bring this back i wanna leave the casino w loads of gum
@@fmuciI hope they wrap em
Funny how fruit flavors were exotic to people at the time they were made but now I'd consider spice and flower flavored candies to be exotic since I don't see them often. save for mint and cinnamon since they're still common but something in me still considered them mature and adult flavors.
and vanilla
I once got some "spice drops", pretty much gumdrops with spice flavors, and felt so fancy 😂
That is funny considering violet was a common flavor in the 1800s
"What is culture, but the things around us too common to contemplate" that was worded so well
This is actually a major issue historians face. Old civilizations didn't write about mundane things and trades/skills were passed on orally. So it's really hard to get a good picture of the average persons life from then.
@@Beakerbite I feel like we’ve hit a point where it’ll be hard for future generations to understand us because of too much data
@@GaffsNotLaffs @Hiding In Public
Agreed.
@@GaffsNotLaffs But how much of it is online is the question. Our data online is never guaranteed to stay around for years after us.
@@dinofeino1811 true but we even such an overwhelming amount of offline storage that I feel like it will add a significant challenge even if only 10% makes it to next century
My grandma grew up as a Mennonite in Paraguay, she said they had lots of citrus but apples were a rare luxury. She tells a story of a time when her boyfriend got her an apple as a gift, and she couldn't bring herself to eat it, so instead she just smelled it while it lasted. When she came to Canada, she saw a basket of apples in someone's house and assumed they were rich.
That's it, I'm giving everyone apples for Christmas this year!
I’ve heard something similar from people who used to live in former East Germany.
thats so sad but touching, thanks for sharing
Im a mennonite as well! :) Apparently, back in the Ukraine before we came to the new world, there was no refined sugar. So to add sweetness to baked goods, the watermelon harvest in fall would be processed to syrup. Rinds would be pickled (For food all winter long), and all the pink flesh would be boiled down until all the water was removed and all that was left was a thick syrup :)
You can still find a less extreme version of this throughout the world. I lived in Singapore for a while and the fruit prices are the exact opposite compared to the US (east coast). Watermelon, papaya, and dragonfruit dirt cheap, but blueberries and strawberries would cost an enormous amount. I definitely appreciated America's berry-filled goodness when I came back.
Singapore and the US are both 1st world countries... with totally opposite climates lol.
I'm Mexican, and when JJ said that we consume a lot of lemons my first thought was "that's not true!". But there's fresh lemonade in the fridge and we make around 6 to 9 liters of it for my family of four by week, and this week alone I've eaten almost every meal with squeezed lemon too, so, after all, it is truth. Weird how there are aspects of my own culture that I just don't notice until a foreigner points them out. Great video BTW
"What is culture if not the stuff around us too common to contemplate?"
Hell yeah, same!
I thought he said lime...
Ya he said lime and as a Mexican I can confirm that I love lime
@@adfaklsdjf Lemon and lime are both limón in Mexican Spanish.
This video helps me understand why spice drops (now often relegated to Christmas time) are not more common. I love those herbal, floral, and spicy candies like clove, rose, anise, and violet. I hope some more of them will make a comeback!
Yes!! 100% agree
I love spice drops! I love those flavors too. I love spice, herbal, and floral flavors.
I feel cheated. Only spice drops I have ever seen, even around holiday time, are fruit flavored.
agreed. I love spice drops, partially because I only want to eat a few of them over time. Fruity candy I eat fast, dont like that much, and feel sick lol
As an American: Grape ABSOLUTELY belongs in the classic fruit flavor stable.
Lemon is my favorite, personally.
This! Grape is EASILY part of the canon.
@@TheNewGreenIsBlue Indeed. I generally go with the Skittles, Life Savers and Froot Loops' logic of "Classic" fruit flavours.
Agreed! Classic Purple flavor!
Yes grape is the best
I like grape jolly ranchers, but I absolutely love watermelon-flavored jolly ranchers.
This is not about candy specifically, but in Brazil there is this Amazonian fruit called guaraná which everyone knows because it is the flavour of the most popular soda in the country. If you throw a party or go to a restaurant the two options of soda you'll always find are Coke and Guaraná. There is this one brand, Guaraná Antártica which is the most beloved one and coca cola had tried to break into the market many times with their own version of the drink, but Brazilians always prefer Guaraná Antártica.
I find Guaraná at the import store here in New Jersey. I love Guaraná.
I had a roommate in college from Brazil and he always kept guaraná in the dorm
They sell Guarana in the international section at the grocery stores in Toronto Canada. Especially in the portuguese/Brazilian communities and its damn good
Guarana syrup makes for a good cocktail ingredient, as well. Cachaça, lime, and guarana is a good mix.
Grew up in Venezuela and we also had a number of fruit-flavored sodas I was surprised to find don't exist in the United States. By far the biggest one is apple-flavored soda, which Portuguese immigrants popularized in Venezuela and Colombia in the 50s.
In India, as you can guess, we have a lot of Mango flavoured ones. Some are ripe and sweet ones and some are unripe and sour ones. Both taste really good.
@@SnowyButterfly1 In American English (US/Candian) sweets and candies are used interchangeably, but sweets can also be seen as the broad category and candy as the colorful solidified sugar variant.
@@DougWinfield yes correct 'sweets' can also refer to things like ice cream and cake whereas candy sticks more to what they call 'confectionaries'. as with most labels, though, they're definitely not written in stone.
That was by far my favourite thing with India.
Was about the write the same. Mango, Raw Mango, Orange
Indian mango varieties are prized here in Hawaii, where we take mangoes for granted.
I always thought it was silly that the only flavour that wasn't incredibly sour and painful to eat was strawberry. As it turns out, I'm a bit allergic to citrus 😅
Grape: “Am I a joke to you?”
@@schawangus we don't really have grape flavoured sweets in the UK, it's mainly lemon, lime, orange and strawberry 🥲
@@AimeeColeman grape candy tastes bad and artificial as hell ur not missing out
@@AimeeColeman and blackcurrant
@@Starrypaws64 not even grape soda? you are missing out 🥵😋🤤
I feel like grape has surpassed lime- everything has a grape, from jolly ranchers to skittles. Heck, even green Apple has almost replaced like in my part of the states.
We still have lots of lime here in Pennsylvania, but grape is common! Strawberry, not so much
Lime is my favorite. And spittle just had to replace it... I don't like green apple.
I like the lime
I agree. I forgot green was supposed to be lime. I’ve always thought of it as green apple.
@@austinhernandez2716 they just changed it back!
When I see a green fruit candy I generally associate it with green apple instead of lime. I feel like apple has definitely earned its spot. Also blue raspberry definitely deserves an honorable mention. It has a cult following in the states. I'd love to see you talk about how that came to be.
More so than that purple "grape" flavor?
@@adfaklsdjf No perhaps not. As long as I've been alive grape has been a standard flavor in American culture. I remember being fed Dimetapp when I was sick as a child. Which was cough syrup that tasted like liquid grape candy. But blue raspberry is a touch harder to find which is why it has a cult following. Like even my beloved Warheads have a blue raspberry. But you're lucky to get more than three in the entire bag.
The 7-11 Slurpee is where I first saw Blue Raspberry. Early 80's.
I’m pretty sure blue raspberry is a made up flavor tho and not an actual fruit
Blue raspberries aren’t in nature but the flavor is based on another kind of raspberry that’s dark purple / bluish black. It’s definitely not the bright blue it’s associated with. It has a kinda tart flavor.
One of my favourite candies ever was one of the first sour candies that was made at an industrial scale in India. It's made of a raw mango flavour with, believe it or not, sugary rock salt stuffed inside the hard candy shell. They have tons of flavours like tamarind, guava, litchi and even cola, but that raw mango is pretty unique.
Are talking about pulse candy?
Pulse ayyyy, my brother is addicted to that stuff
Actually, two spice flavors have easily stood the test time time as far as candy goes: Mint and Cinnamon. Mint candies are all over, including Lifesavers making their own to entire brands built around being Curiously Strong, and Cinnamon is usually the underlying flavor for most "spicy" / "hot" candies, which are still quite common to see.
This. I absolutely love mint, I want everything mint flavored.
I live in New Zealand and I don't think I've ever seen a cinnamon flavoured lolly, but other than that American flavours seem very similar
Huh, I never thought of those as spices until now because of how we use the term "spicy" to refer to hot things.
Yup. Cinnamon, mint/spearmint/peppermint, grape, Blue Raspberry, green apple, and banana are all big flavors that I think got swept under the rug in this video. Red Hots, Altoids, Life Savers, peppermint candies are ubiquitous, and Spearmint is the default gum flavor. I also think Menthol should get an overview as well.
“Curiously Strong” is the altoid slogan
American here:
Grape could be a big contender for the big 5.
However other parts of the world would more readily recognize something like Black Currant than our menagerie.
I was thinking grape too.
I would replace grape and lime
I was a bit shocked that it was lime and not…apple ? Apple flavored things are a very common thing in Europe, much more than lime. In candy assortments we tend to get orange lemon (or lemon-lime but most often lemon) strawberry (or undefined berries) and apple. And other things, but lime and grape appear pretty far down the list, after pineapple (pretty common) or raspberry.
@@saulemaroussault6343 In general, green apple is a common replacement for lime in American candies, but I'm not sure why it's usually green apple. Maybe because it's more sour and so stands out more?
@@gavinthecrafter It's the right colour I would say. If you'd just call it apple most people would first think of a red-ish sweet while when you call it green apple specifically it seems more intuitive.
Also, not all green(ish) varieties of apple are more sour.
Fun lil' addition to this line-up in the UK is Blackcurrant flavour, which is equally ubiquitous due, in part, to the Second World War.
During the conflict, imported foodstuffs were restricted by the Atlantic blockade, and the industrial and military demands on manpower led to a shortage of agricultural labour.
In response to this, the government incentivised the cultivation of blackcurrant plants, as they represented one of only sweet sources vitamin C that grew year-round, and as a bonus they could grow on very poor quality land with minimal cultivation, thus not impacting the production of staple crops.
Thus during the war, blackcurrant became the most popular fruit flavour enjoyed by British adults and children alike, most notably in Ribena - a sort of blackcurrant squash, but also in confectionery as well to a more limited degree.
By the end of the war, it had become a staple fruit flavour among the British public, resulting in its expected inclusion in any assortment of fruit-flavoured sweet things.
As a fun bonus fact, to celebrate the end of the war, and mark the end of the pressures of the battle of the Atlantic, the government organised the shipment of one banana per child to every household in the country - something all my grandparents remember vividly as it was the first time they'd seen such exotic fruit.
However, as the bananas were delivered to the household, not the children, there are also several stories of parents eating their children's bananas instead.
Great video and have a lovely day
I'm a big fan of variety of candy flavors, especially pepper or other things that aren't typically "candy" flavor in North America. Black currant sounds great! :)
I used to live in Malaysia as a teacher and blackcurrant is one of the most notable colonial residues, Ribena is everywhere. I never noticed it as a child, but you can find Ribena for sale in import sections of grocers in Canada.
I’d kill for more blackcurrant flavoured stuff in the US; everything I’ve ever had with that flavour is to die for.
@araparseghian2 fruit shoot but no blackcurrant flavour? As far as I'm concerned blackcurrant is the only fruit shoot that exists
smh british people still eat like they're in WW2
I think "Blue Raspberry" deserves a spot on the top 5. The "Blue" flavor not based off of any real fruit, but is incredibly common.
It's based off raspberries...
@@sjajsjsja4523 are rasberries blue? do they taste like blue tastes?
@@sjajsjsja4523 This is from a simple search
“Blue raspberry is a manufactured flavoring and food coloring for candy, snack foods, syrups, and soft drinks. The flavor and color do not derive from any species of raspberry. According to one expert, the flavor profile of raspberry was developed using "mostly esters of the banana, cherry, and pineapple variety." Sugar is commonly used to create taste appeal for the blue raspberry flavoring.”
Maybe it’s blueberry and raspberry
Its blue to differentiate from all the other red shit, being strawberries, cherries, etc.
Turkey's maybe most famous "candy" is turkish delight which has tens of different flavours but the default one is usually the rose flavour. Some foreigners I've talked can't really like it right away beacuse they say it is very distinct. Interestingly, even though rose flavour is not commonly used in any other food here, the default turkish delight did not ever came out as distinct to me, probably because I've been consuming it since childhood.
However, once I visited a city called Isparta which is famous for its roses and rose-infused products and tasted rose flavoured ice cream. In that moment I realized that very distinctive flavour because I wasn't used to it in the ice cream. I mean it had little leaf chunks an all but was delicious neverthless lol
Iran too. So many different rose desserts, from ice cream to hard candy
I have never been as disappointed in the taste of anything as I was the first time I tried turkish delight. After reading the Narnia books, I imagined it must be pure heaven for that little twerp to sell everyone out for it, and it tasted like my aunt's hand cream smelled.
Almost everything else I ate in Turkey was delicious though.
I had prickly pear Turkish delight from my Universal Yum box. Was awesome
Although it came from the “Greece” box not turkey
@@tinnagigja3723 watching the movie I thought it was like a powdered jelly donut he was eating, I deadass thought Turkey was just really famous for its donuts for my entire childhood
In Kuwait about 18 years ago I had rose, lavender, and a few other flavors of ice cream. They didn't really do it for me. I wanted strawberry or chocolate.
I was one of the people who was heartbroken when Skittles tried to remove lime flavored skittles from the pack. Sorry JJ, but it’s my favorite. Every time a beloved lime candy is replaced with apple, I shed a tear. I hate artificial apple. 😭 I love lemon too, but lime is #1 in my heart (of the big 5/6).
I count grape as one of the big 6; I feel like it’s getting rarer for there to be strawberry and cherry at the same time, since they are both colored red, so grape often takes the place of whichever red fruit got the axe.
same!!! i love lime and in high school i had a best friend who would save all her lime skittles for me lol. I'm also a Texan tho, so maybe that's why? We keep giant bottles of lime juice in our home. lol
Tbh I'm from Europe and I don't even recall having a lime candy. The green one is usually the apple flavour and I love it haha
If you didn't know, lime Skittles are back!! :)
I like lime and apple
Of all the candy fruit I like them all besides banana and strawberry is meh
Lime's my favorite too. Whenever I got a bag of skittles I'd separate out the green and orange ones -- those are mine. You can have the red ones. I don't want em.
In my region of France, there was and still is a tradition of flavouring things with violets, particularly marshmallow! The flower also has a distinctive purple shade, which makes them quite attractive. It's difficult to find mass produced sweets with violet flavouring, but ice cream shops and fine goods stores can have them on sale
Oh yeah, and I love it. I was not born in France, but eversince I discovered this taste I got hooked right away. Talking of that, let's not forget fir and gentian.
@@alexanderfo3886 I am familiar with rose, jasmine, orange blossom, lavender, and violet but, gentian and fir intrigue me. I use to gather pine needles to make teas so fir would probably be similar. I am unfortunately an American so my penchant for floral and herbal flavors is not easy to satisfy.
@@N33k5 Gentian is mostly used in licors, but there are also sirops. If you're into bitter tastes, it's perfect for you. Fir tastes similiar to pine, I guess, it's just that this tree is more current.
@Masen S Yes! I forgot I make my own juniper based syrups as well I don't know why I forgot I do that! It wasn't a bad latte kinda bummed they don't do more herbal subtle flavor profiles in the US more often.
There's a sweet in the UK called parma violets, though they're unfortunately artificially flavoured these days. Still one of my all time favourite sweets though
While I have definitely seen a lot of lemon, lime, strawberry, cherry, and orange flavored candies in variety packs here in the US, I think as standalone flavors watermelon and grape are just as common, sometimes even in the mix of the big five (often by mixing lemon-lime). There is also green apple and the whole blue raspberry thing. Mixed berry though has to be one of the most common flavor sets now alongside citrus and tropical.
So I'd say there is a less of a clear big five and more clusters now of flavors you will see side by side.
Blue rasberry and grape are more vommon than lime
I also see many candy of those flavours in Portugal
I remember long ago my mom talking about the gum they would buy as kids: Black Jack, Clove, Tea…something, and I want to say Beech Nut (? I‘ll have to google it). She said there were a lot of spice-/herb-type candy and gum when she was little. There was something else they would chew besides chewing gum, and it wasn’t fruit flavored. Unfortunately, I don‘t remember what it was, and she isn’t around anymore to ask. I also remember going to the store when I was little and picking out penny candy, which literally cost a penny a piece. Mom said, as a kid, they would do chores, get a penny, go to the store, and get a whole BAG of candy for one cent. That always amazed me.
This has nothing to do with the video, but I remember mom would eat things that I called “depression food”, because it was what they ate as little kids growing up during The Great Depression. For instance, she often made “cereal” for herself, which was a bowl of bread torn into small pieces, with milk and maybe some sugar. I’d say, “Mom…there’s Frosted Flakes in the cupboard, smh”. Maybe it was comfort food for her.
Hmmmn...wonder if it was Cinnamon Bark? My Grandmother said she used to during the depression.
Maybe it was a kind of wax candy?
Teaberry! I'm not sure about Beech-Nut, but you can buy Teaberry, Cloves, and Black Jack still. I tend to find them at candy stores and shops like Cost Plus
Beech Nut was a kind of gum when I was a kid. Haven't seen any for a long time.
My mom chewed beach nut and she was born 1944
I think lychee should become more popular here!
Occasionally the Japanese section of our market will have lychee flavored sodas and candies, and they have such a nice, refreshing flavor.
Lychee is fucking delicious
YES!
When I see a green candy I do associated with lime primarily, although Matcha/green tea is one of my favorite flavors of candy
@@GZQ9 I always associate it with green apple, most of the sweets I see have swapped lime for apple.
Hard agree on matcha flavor being the bomb though.
Every time I eat something lychee flavor just tastes like soap to me. Anyone else?
In Sweden you will find many candies, soft drinks, and other sweet "foods" with pear flavour.
I haven't seen any other European country be as obsessed with pears as Sweden is (we even have pear flavoured sparkling water)
In general our favourite fruits are of course the pears, but also apples, cherries, plums, roseships, red- and blackcurrants, cloudberries, raspberries etc (pretty much every type of berry you can find in a taiga or the tundra). When it comes to kompot (or saft as we say) the favourite of the Swedes is forest berries and especially currants if it's the homemade kind since it can grow even in the most northern regions on the country. We also love making soups out of blueberries and roseships and even sell them in tetrapaks in the store like milk or juice.
This comment kind of got away from me but I hope you learned something interesting about my country!
Don’t forget lingonberry! It’s such a classic jam and drink flavor. But I definitely think strawberry, raspberry and blueberry, pear and apple are dominant here. From living in the US I can confidently say we don’t use cherry or grape nearly as much as they do. For example very few people buy grape jelly. We have some strange candy flavors too, like violet flower, cactus and salmiak.
That is interesting, especially since most of my grandparents were from Denmark or Sweden (I’m American).
Your comment made me really miss red and black currants which I really got hooked on when visiting Europe, mainly in Switzerland. Oh my gosh, they were so delicious and seemed to be everywhere! 30 years later and I have never found them fresh here in the states. I used to see boxes of dried currants occasionally, but they are just not the same!
I’ve always wondered why we don’t grow them here, they are so good!
Now I have to search again. I can’t grow them myself bc I live in the hot dry desert!
I used to work at a bar here in the US that carried Kopparberg pear cider for some reason. Very few people ordered it or even knew what it was but I liked to have one now and then after my shift when I wasn't in the mood for beer. Always thought pear was an odd choice of flavor though as nearly all the most popular hard ciders here in America are apple based.
Finland älskar päron också helt sjukt mycket
@@ltraina3353 if i remember correctly ( and I might be missing some details) the fact that currants isn't a thing in America is because the plant got banned due to a sickness it helped spread, a sickness trees in Europe knew how to survive from but not trees in America. I'm sure its been fixed some way now but that is at least why it isn't a part of Amercan culture in the same way its over here.
I remember taking a ziplock bag of Maraschino cherries to lunch with me when I was 7 or 8 after seeing them by the ice cream toppings and begging my mom for them. Looking back on that I can only imagine how strange I looked to everyone else at the lunch table. Wtf was I even doing back then lmao
Lol I bet your classmates were jealous of your cherries
My parents Pavlov'd me with maraschino cherries - I was given one every night before bed, they were called my 'sleepy seeds', and I would just conk out.
McCullough’s forays into the history and depth behind American “canons”, whether of halloween monsters, fruity candy flavors, or even flag designs, display an encouraging depth of sociological perspective. Through these videos, he encourages his viewers to question the things they view as normal, inviting them in to being mini sociologists.
I think he also says American to annoy Canadians who don't like to think of themselves as culturally American.
its very funny how americans will say that americans have no culture, but saying that is more acknowledging either how uncultured they are or how universally american culture has been forced onto the world
Yeah, all of that. Being half-Canadian myself (nonpracticing), it's fun to hear a Canadian under the age of 70 who doesn't rail on and on about how culture-free the US is. (People over 70 don't seem to care. Their world was very different and they didn't seem to have the inferiority complex many of my relatives do)
@@noellesears10 It's funny. As I've travelled around the world, I often seen things derided as American cultural imperialism that are mostly unknown in the United States or Canada that are really examples of a global consumer culture or a local impression of what American culture is like. By and large Americans aren't forcing those things onto other cultures. They are able to pick and choose between whatever consumer products they desire
@@mahatmarandy5977 Canadian and US culture is 90+% identical and varies more by region than by country. I think younger people, Millenials and Gen-Zs, are less protectionist and couldn't care less whether something is American or Canadian. Perhaps your example of 70+ people reflects that they are experienced realists who enjoy wintering in Florida.
I'm an American and I'd actually guess that we have more grape candy than strawberry candy. Maybe not in old-timey brands like Necco, but it seems to be a more common staple. Not that the grape flavor actually tastes like grapes very much, but hey. ;) I also found out that the reason why we always ask "why does banana candy not taste like banana" is that it DOES, just for a variety of banana that got wiped out but used to be the main species people ate. Modern bananas are a different variety and that's why the candy tastes different than the fresh fruit!
It's actually the same with grape flavor! There's varieties of grapes that absolutely DO taste like "grape flavor" they're just harder to grow and highly seasonal, so more expensive and not as commonly sold at stores
@@Sanee650 Same with banana flavored items now. they taste nothing like bananas 100 years ago as parasites drove the “Candy flavored bananas” to extinction.
@@lj6284 not sure, but i believe this thing was debunked.
@@darkerfox6246 I haven't been able to find any evidence that it was debunked, it looks like the Panama Disease is the reason why the Gros Michel banana was replaced with the Cavendish we all know today.
“Grape” flavored candy tastes like purple
I'm disappointed that pharmacies weren't mentioned. The weird flavors originate from old concepts for cough drops, a spoon full of sugar helps the bitter herbs bind together. Pharmacists had a lot of methods for administering medicine back when they did everything from scratch, that's kinda how soda fountains happened...
That's really interesting! I'm curious how it ties in to soda fountains though!
i always found that fascinating too. soda fountains were almost exclusive to drug stores/ pharmacies back then.
@@yasaiaisa8363 Soda back then was nowhere near as common as it is today. Soda could be considered a "digestive" back then like the bubbles help an upset stomach. or an alternative to alcohol during prohibition, hence the name "soft drink" meaning it didn't have alcohol in it.
Oh, yes. Salmiak and related liquorice varieties were likely created in just this way -- as a remedy for coughs, with an extra punch of ammonium chloride to, I dunno.. clear the patient's sinuses nicely, as well? (I'm lookin' right at YOU, Dubbelzout!)
I knew an older person whose grandfather co-founded a candy company and one of the things they made were cough drops. "Horehound" is definitely one of the more interesting flavor names.
For context, I'm from Finland. I consider Haribo's Goldbears to have the real line up: green for pear, red for strawberry, darker red for raspberry (these two are hard to differentiate), orange for orange, yellow for lemon and sort of a clear colour for pineapple. This is kinda my reference guide for candy flavours
And as a citizen of the promised land of liquorice/salty liquorice, I love liquorice. Here little bit of aniseed is sometimes used in making liquorice, but I've never heard of plain aniseed candies before. I know people eat fennel candies in some parts of the world, which kinda resemble the taste of liquorice
I would do prison time to get that pear flavor commonly available in my part of the USA! I'm 90% sure our green ones are lime flavor, but I'm going to check now to be absolutely sure. I love sweet apple, pear, and honeydew melon flavors. They are so much harder to find without paying a fortune compared to the commonly available cherry, grape, citrus combo.
Watermelon and sour green apple are also very generic flavours these days
Oh and that banana flavour that actually tastes like the now extinct banana variety that died out from a fungus/blight in the 1950’s, if I remember correctly! It seems like medication is one of the last things to always be flavoured with that extinct banana species flavour…
Oh and a new fungus is apparently ravaging banana plantation again, so we may soon have a new banana flavour!
I guess having all your plants clones of one plant and a massive mono culture really is a big risk when I new disease develops, or is introduced…
i feel like you watched that video of the guy making candy with jazz in the background
"Watermelon and sour green apple" - Yes. Jolly Rancher is my favorite brand & I like their Blue Raspberry (turns my tongue blue).
@@henryt2229 Who is this I want to see them.
@@LARKXHIN Lofty Pursuit, the banana episode
now i have a craving for extinct bananas, thank you
For me, lime has always been a close second to cherry and I've never thought that it may have more to do with me being Hispanic and being born and raised in Texas. These videos never fail to give me a much more broad perspective of the world than I'm used to. Thank you so much J.J., you're very much appreciated!
yo... i havent had it in a long time but i used to buy minute maid cherry limeade and it's awesome
It's the same with me and anything citrus and I'm from Orange County ca
The realisation that fruits used to be so much rarer brings things like, say, Russians eating mandarin oranges on New Year's Eve, a lot more understandable. What other fruit to celebrate this big holiday than that which does not naturally grow in your country and is thus super-rare?
Brazil being a tropical country always had a larger amount of fruit culture going on but when it comes to Christmas we will default to colder climate fruits like peaches, berries, cherries, etc, so I think you are right about celebrating the holidays with rare fruit.
It’s not exactly something eaten in celebration but in Poland, children that are rich and spoiled are called “bananowe dzieci”, banana children, which comes from the fact that when Poland was under communist rule, you had to have connections or just be wealthy to be able to get a hold of foreign fruit, like bananas. I think the term will keep becoming less popular because of how specific of a circumstance brought it about and needs to be explained to make sense. I don’t hear or see it much anymore, and even when it was still a bit more popular, I only first heard it in my early teens. But it still sort of boggles my mind when I think about how nowadays you can go to a mall and get any category of imported foreign products (even if a bit more expensive than standard products) and when my mom was a kid, it was almost impossible to get anything aside from the most basic and necessary things (which were also sometimes difficult to get by the way).
In Iceland mandarins are inextricably linked to Yule.
@@andrina118 The "it is not real communisim", since it doesn't follow the perfect ideal of communist soceity, ehile it is still in they transformation sate discribed by Karl Marx, from people who never lived under a socialist regime. Allways give me a shuckle
@@andrina118 it was called communist because it was under the Soviet Union. A communist country.
I'm from New Zealand, and from what I can see candy (lollies in NZ English) have 6-7 default flavours when it comes to assorted packs:
Raspberry[sometimes Strawberry] (red) , Lemon (white), Blackcurrant (purple), Orange (orange), Lime[sometimes Apple] (green), Pineapple (yellow) & [sometimes]Aniseed (black).
The only odd thing to me with the American colours was yellow being lemon, as I grew up with white being lemon and yellow being pineapple.
You know that’s funny cause in America the white candies would actually be pineapple
I wish black currant was more of an in flavor here in the US
Popularity of fruit in America is definitely a factor in what is now in the “big five” but just as important is the state of food chemistry from 1880-1950 or so, specifically food grade dye and flavorings. Citrus is easy and cheap because you just need some citric acid and yellow or green dye.
Also important would be to have all the primary and secondary colors. But blue dye was expensive to synthesize and it wasn’t until the 1980s that we got a lot of it in our candy.
Yes, I also thought this was a key element not mentioned in the video.
Being a kid in the 90s i remember everything getting the new "blue raspberry" flavor!
@@beemelonhead1 hell yea, it was magical
My school had a solid "bring a lime to school and suck on it" phase and then the following year was ironically the "suck on blue rasberry lollipops all day or you're gay" phase, at an all girl's school. If you ever see a closeted lesbian with a split tongue lisp and veneers tell her I said 'ssup.
In the UK, our big five is lemon, lime, orange , strawberry like the US, with the addition of Blackcurrant (which isnt grown in the US); its usually a black or dark purple, and is devisive. The black wine gum is either the first out of the bag, or the last left.
Blackcurrant fruit shoots are a symbol of childhood, similar to the apple juice box
What is a fruit shoot??
@@JJMcCullough it’s this juice drink in a cute little bottle young primary school kids take to school, the original flavour is the orange one (with or without bits) but the most popular one is the blackcurrant one, which was my favourite. It’s not really juice though per se, more intensely flavoured water
@@nanakatana1 Oh a juice box!
Yeah it's largely the same in Australia. Cherry and grape flavoured sweets and drinks are considered "an American thing"; we have blackcurrant instead.
Black Currant can't be grown in the US due to it being a host to a fungus (blister rust) that can kill of North American white pines because it never evolved with the fungus, therefore more states ban its import. I wonder what it tastes like?
Red dried ginseng, "scorched rice", and green plums in sugar are some of the more exciting additions to the candy flavor profile in Korea.
Rhombus-shaped peppermint candy is also worth a mention, since it's almost symbolic as an after-meal breath freshener in so many restaurants.
what does the scorched rice flavor taste like?
@@kedamonorex6453 It's a slightly nutty sweet flavor. I haven't had any in some time so I might not be accurate.
Oof that green plum flavor sounds divine and now I want some!
Korea makes that honey butter chip things, yes? I’m trying to remember
I got a perfectly timed ad:
JJ: why is it not-
Ad: 2 PIZZAS, BREADSTICKS, AND WINGS
I can't believe I never stopped to think about the "Sugar Plum Fairy" in the Nutcracker as akin to a "Candy Fairy" today. To me the name "Sugar Plum Fairy" still sounds way more dignified and serious haha
I never stopped to think - there was such a thing as a 'sugar plum'?
in some christmas candy packs, sugar covered purple gummies are usually dubbed as "sugar plums" on the side. So for all of my life I have thought that was a sugar plum. You can look up sugar plum candy and recognize what I'm talking about.
Sugar plums are so good, ground up dried fruits, nuts, and spices held together with some honey. People should start eating them again.
Also flower flavored candies are my favorite. I love candy but America has some really crap candies. Europe preserved more of the old style classical candies.
@@TeaSerpent I never knew what a sugarplum was! Gotta try to make some
The "red" flavour is usually raspberry here in Australia. Sometimes it is strawberry, but more usually that flavour is coloured a more pinkish hue (and come to think about it I think the few times I've seen red as strawberry was probably in American brands imported here). Cherry is hardly ever used in candy, other than in chocolates.
Blackcurrent is a fairly common fruit flavour here, coloured a dark reddish-purple, almost black colour
Other than fruits, a flavour that is still persistent in Australia from the spice/flower era is musk. Lifesavers has (or had, I don't see them around anymore) a musk option here.
Musk melon?
@@alixyarrow5821 No. Musk like the scent used in perfume.
@@sharielane Apparently musk flavour, like in Musk Sticks, is one of those "quintessentially Aussie" things that confuses or confounds foreigners (particularly from the USA) when given them to try.
@@dj1NM3 Yeah. I've seen a lot of snack reaction videos where foreigners try out musk sticks. It's always amusing how weirded out they get by them.
Musk sticks are a staple of childhood
Banana flavor? That has a history of its own but isn’t that popular as it once was. But the “Blue” Raspberry may be the runner up you left off. That’s an iconic flavor as well.
Twinkies were originally banana flavor, only. They became vanilla creme pretty quickly, but I recall they brought back banana flavor creme filling recently.
I'd say grape is the runner up, with banana behind it
@The last Bean bender Dookie flavor ftw
@@themoviedealers They were actually banana flavored for over a decade. They only switched when WWII decreased the amount of bananas available.
Banana is among the manu flavors of Jelly Belly Jelly beans. We don't have Currant flavored snacks and drinks like Ribina like they do in The UK. That's because the USDA decades ago found out that there was some kind of spore or fungus that was endemic to currant plants , the spore had an adverse effect on fruit that was already being grown. At least that's what I remember hearing on a food network show a few years ago. The closet thing to currants we have here are blackberries, and i.the pacific north west ( Oregon and Washington State) and Northwest( Montana, Idaho), Marionberries and Huckleberries).
In Denmark, I dont think most people would refer to the “green flavour” as lime, but rather pear or apple in some instances, since lime is still considered a relatively recent fruit here. Idk if the flavour is the same though
Yea i agree. I refer to green candies as apple though, not really pear. Seems like Danes think less about which fruit each colour is associated with. Like does Harbo's 'vingummi tudser' taste like apple? Are the transparent pineapples in Matador Mix pineapple flavoured? A lot of our candy is also not fruits, but rather cola/liquorish/foam/salmiakki/chocolate or simply sugar-flavoured (like the chewy-crumbly insides of lakridsstænger and the smooth outer coatings of sugar that melt in your mouth on stuff like 'Pinocchiokugler' and 'Labre Larver').
Norwegian here, I was thinking the same thing!
I personally associate green flavour more with green apples than lime..
(The Swedes seem to be more into pears, at least as a soda flavouring..)
I have absolutely no idea if this is representative or not tho 😂
It's probably actually apple flavor, green coloring sometimes means green apple flavor here in America too, it just usually means lime which tastes pretty unique and different from the slightly sour green apple flavor we have here
yeah its not always standard, we like green apple here in the states too, sour green apple is actually pretty popular
I always thought it was apple too, its weird that pear is a somewhat obscure fruit in america, but completely ubiquitous in Danish culture. The more i learn about America and American people, the more i realize that their culture is more different from ours than you might think
Oh, so that’s why old-fashioned candies have flavors like “clove” and “hot cinnamon”!
You can sometimes get them today (depending on where you are). For example, at my local grocery store they have a store-brand (aka cheap) mix of gumdrops called "Spice Drops", that are made entirely of old-fashioned flavors. Wintergreen, cinnamon, clove, liqourice/anise, spearmint and peppermint. I always get them in the winter because to me they taste Christmasy. :)
@@robinchesterfield42 Honestly as much as "the big four" are fine candy flavors I also find them somewhat boring now. I'd love more wintergreen stuff, and I haven't had a hot cinnamon or mint hard candy in ages. :9
I was really happy as a kid to get horehound drops.
I love Adams Clove chewing gum. It's on;y manufacttred once every few years so you have to jump on it when it comes out to get it fresh.
I used to keep "spice drops" around the house so the kids would not eat MY candy! I would leave out some gummy worms or something else as a diversion...
The "green = limes" part is really weird to me, in Germany one of the first flavours you associate with green is Waldmeister (wikipedia translates it as "sweet woodruff") a small herb that tastes similar to cinnamon. For a long time the green gummy bear was strawberry flavoured until they replaced it with apple, which is the 2nd most common association. I don' think there is any major brand that uses lime.
Are skittles in Germany they still use lime. Starburst as well.
@@RusticRonnie wait, green starbursts exist?
Green is usually lime, apple or melon in my experience.
Strawberry is usually red or pink, the other being cherry.
@@RusticRonnie Green skittles haven't been lime for a number of years, they are apple now as far as I know. Edit: Also, lol I just googled this and skittles are changing the green ones back to lime, they've been reversing the flavor over the past month in the US market.
That's why I am always driven crazy by Haribo Bears... The green strawberry is so bizarre to me
If I'm getting domestic candy, lime is my favorite of the big five. But I always am on the lookout for British candies where instead of grape flavors, you get currant. And that, in my opinion, is always the best candy flavor.
As a European I don't remember ever having lime flavored candy. The green ones are always Apple. Strawberry, lemon and orange are definetely in every bag of candies though. For some reason pineapple candies are usually gray.
Also popular along those in europe is coca cola and even grape flawor
@@SandraSine40 ah yes, coca cola unironically be best fruit flavour
Don't know about other European countries, but here in Italy mint is quite popular, even though it's always sold by itself
@@L-73580 Technically, cola flavor originally came from the seeds of the Cola fruit(called kola nuts). Although, I doubt modern cola flavor has much resemblance in taste to actual kola nuts.
In America pineapple is yellow, which stinks for me. Lemon is my favorite and pineapple is my least favorite, so I'm always hoping that the yellow candy is lemon flavored and I get so disappointed when it's pinepple.
The reason why I love your channel so much is that you think about OUR culture, something we don't often do. As you mentioned, the default stuff is so typical in our day to day life we don't really consider that maybe these "defaults" are abnormal outside of the US or Canada. While reading about other cultures is certainly fascinating, reading about my own culture and how that's different from everyone else is even more interesting to me because, up until these points, I assumed it was universal.
I feel like watermelon is starting to emerge as a dominant fruit flavor I see at least where I live ,South Texas, people tend to opp for watermelon flavored sour patch kids instead of the original bag, as well as hubba bubba watermelon flavored gum is popular as well among kids. As for a fruit flavored candy that isn’t common in American but is very common in Mexico is Tamarind this sort of spicy, sour, and sweet fruit that come in sort of bean pods and can either be eaten in its paste form or can be made into very delicious hard candy
Personally watermelon flavored stuff sucks because it isn't juicy which is the main appeal of watermelons
@Jordan you should try rellerindos it’s a Mexican hard candy made completely of tamarind the outside lets you savor the taste of the tamarind then once’s it’s soft enough you crunch it and release a nice soft interior it is the best
Tamarind candy is best when it is also slightly salty.
Here in Mexico, people like pineapple candy more than lemon flavored candy. Even though we get lots of American candy, locally produced candy usually have a pineapple/lime/orange/strawberry/mint lineup. Tamarind candy is very popular as well, but it exists more as its own independent entity. We also have a different ice cream lineup, instead of vanilla/strawberry/chocolate, we usually have lime, mamey, guava, strawberry and "burned milk." For sweet drinks, we have the Horchata/Jamaica duo, but tamarind and lime are also common.
And yes, Mexican soil really must be good for growing lime, because most people with gardens have lime trees in them, and you don't even need to take care of them they just thrive. No wonder we use them so much.
Ironically, chocolate doesn't seem to be a particularly beloved flavour. Chocolate bars are usually seen as "ok, they are tasty" and little more. There's more of an inclination for hot cocoa and other chocolate based drinks like champurrado. "Ate" used to be very popular, but it's made out of an endangered species of cactus that doesn't do well in captivity, so it got banned (apparently there's a whole underground illegal trade for the stuff)
Here in Mexico, a lot of sweets have tamarind in them... also arrayan, which to my palate tastes about the same as tamarind. And of course, a lot of them have chilli on them.
Cocktails and alcohols have taken a similar path to candy, starting with warmer herbs and spices as the primary flavour additive and moving over to fruit, particularly citrus. Some amount of orange, lemon, or lime are in almost all modern (20th century and up) cocktails. Honey, predictably, is common to both early alcohol and candy, mead being one of the first alcoholic beverages, and honey being utilized in the earliest known candy. Honey of course is still used today, and you can install Honey's browser extension to automatically apply coupons when shopping online. Install Honey today or something.
Wth?
Well played
I see what you did there. Heh
With legalized cannabis fruit flavored rolling papers and strains have become a big thing.
I feel americans in general like adding fruit flavors to anything edibles
I think " blue raspberry" has definitely become mainstream from blue raspberry slushis, lemonade, candies, etc. Often presented as an opposite to "red" whether that be cherry or strawberry.
I LOVE your videos my guy. They seem like they take so much effort to make. Idk how you're not burned out, releasing one every week. Keep it up! Take care of yourself
In Japan melon is definitely considered one of the default flavors for candy, soda, etc, with lychee also being a contender.
I love grape flavored stuff from Japan and Corea, especially grape calpis
Yes i spent a lot of summers in china growing up and coming back to the US i always missed the asian market’s melon & lychee flavors. Also the milk flavored candies.
JJ, You take a topic I have never given a moment's thought and turn it into 15 minutes of mesmerizing entertainment. That's talent. My compliments.
"Lemon, Orange, Lime, and... red?"
Got a chuckle out of that one
Same 😆
It's like those ice pops: watermelon, strawberry, orange, lime, grape, and... blue.
Yeah, never knew what "blue" was, other than "tasty."
@@kimarous blue raspberry usually though I do remember getting one with a dark blue one which was titled “blueberry”
@@kimarous blue is both the most mysterious and most tasty
I love that you’re so enthusiastic about candy!! Make more candy vids tomorrow!!! Thank you!!
I'm brazilian and would say the main fruit flavours in candy here are mostly the same, exept there is never cherry, red is always strawberry and grape/purple flavour is also pretty popular
No, actually not everything that's red is strawberry, sometimes the flavour is advertised as "Frutas vermelhas" (red fruits), but it's almost never called cherry, it's a fruit most brazilians have almost no experience with since they don't grow here and are very finicky to transport over large distances.
Also we don't really have a lime flavor, most of the time green is lemon and yellow is banana and sometimes pineapple. And there's purple too for grapes like with Jujubas/balas de goma.
I love in South Africa and often eat cherries imported from the UK.
@@jackyex Yeah, most people in brazil might not even know what a "lemon" tastes like since we call limes "lemons" but I agree banana/pineapple, "red fruits" and grape stand out although oranges and limes are still very common
@@funkysagancat3295 Most people probably know but there's a reason why those limes are more used here, they taste much better than an Sicilian Lemon, they are sweeter, scentfull and juicier than the true lemon, they also have less seeds. And like our fruits colors are just different, our most common orange is green while our passion fruit is yellow instead of purple or green.
I was surprised grape wasn't one of the top flavors in the US. I imagine it's more common here because of wine from southern European cultures (mainly Italian and Portuguese)
This man is the most interesting combination of different groups. He has the hair and mustache style of the 80’s, the accent of a Canadian when saying words like about and around, he has the facial expressions and head positioning of a surfer dude, and he up-talks where you end your sentences in a higher pitch.
I think the haircut and mustache is a big part of his brand as a creator, and I have heard people theorize that he sort of overpronounces the world about as a way of emphasizing the fact that he’s Canadian(although I personally Have no idea whether or not it purposefully or not)
I hate the way he swings his head around
He is also deeply deeply ignorant. I am gobsmacked at all the flat out false BS in this segment. Seriously stunning.
He has the worst either fake or played up accent ever. Please please please don't get it into your head that canadians actually sound like that when we say about or around 😂
@@dreadwolfrising didn't he say himself that his accent is stronger than most Canadians anyway?
I always got oranges and walnuts in my Christmas stocking (along with other things - like fancy soap), and I wondered why I ended up with groceries on Christmas. Now I'm sure it's an old tradition, from when oranges and walnuts were considered exciting sweets!
I heard my grandparents used to get that too, and it was kind-of just a thing to order crates of oranges all the way into the mid 90's here (Canada) in the winter from China.
Part of me wishes I could go back in time to that. As a kid we got big crates of clementines and hug netted bags of mixed nuts in the shells for Christmas. One of the most fun parts was taking the clementines and decorating them with cloves to put out on the mantle. Turns out this is like "old world tradition" and as a millennial, none of my peers really had those traditions. My family has a lot of direct European heritage, however, and seem to hold on to those older traditional things more heavily than families around us seem to.
My parents spent a lot of time in Germany, so I grew up with oranges and nuts in my xmas stocking.
I continued this tradition with godchildren, filling their shoes with nuts and oranges.
When I was growing up the high school bad would sell crates of oranges and grapefruit before xmas.
They do this in germany and i hated both 🤣🤣
GRAPE!!! YOu forgot grape in the divine flavor foundation, I'm with the Grape Flavor Army and we demand you amend this video!
Still?
I feel like raspberry could easily be in the big 5. Whether it’s blue or red, raspberry is also very iconic. Could just be because that’s my favorite flavor though, so I’m a bit biased.
Yeah blue raspberry is very iconic even though ya know... raspberries arent blue. I'm guessing candy companies wanted a blue candy and a raspberry candy. Blueberries (the only really iconic blue fruit) are probably too bitter to be a candy and a red raspberry flavor would be confused for more iconic cherry or strawberry. So just make the raspberry blue I guess 🤷♂️ it's weird.
@@alfredosauce3727 Blue raspberries do kinda exist. And that’s actually what the flavor is based off of. They’re called Whitebark Raspberries, and they are rather blue. Not the vibrant bright color the candy companies use, but still more blue than most fruits.
Honestly, the way cough syrups defaulted to cherry for flavoring during my childhood has to this day kept me from any cherries or cherry flavored items.
A particular brand "Brondecon" has permanently soured any desire to have anything maraschino cherry flavoured.
Fresh cherries on the other hand, I think taste quite nice.
I know this comment is super old, but the reason cherry flavoring is default is because most cough syrups were made with wild cherry bark as the expectorant.
It has a mild cherry flavor, so they stuck with it I guess?
I have a similar problem with root beer since growing up in Europe, there's a medicine there that tastes like the soda. So having been exposed to that in childhood before the soft drink, root beer to me tastes medicinal.
As I've grown up grape is the default for cough medicine, and is why I say that Grape Soda tastes like cough medicine. I'll happily drink grape juice or eat things that more resemble grape juice or actual grape flavor when eaten, but never grape soda.
@@thomasthomasthomas296 That was the flavor of dimettap back in the day and the only one I liked as it was not nasty cherry flavored.
Random fact, that "gross apple" you referenced (red delicious) used to be a lot sweeter and better until supermarkets came along and bummed it all up. theres a video by atomic frontier that goes over this really well.
Great video as usual though :)
I don't think it was a great video at all. Completely full of BS and ignorance.
That’s simply not true. Once an apple gets a name, it’s cloned. Apples are not selectively bred.
@@ThunderStruck15 1. not how cloning works
2. th-cam.com/video/mgZNDTJSvJQ/w-d-xo.html watch the video for yourself and make your own opinion
@@vatira ...yes, that is how cloning works, and b) they’re “improved” red delicious- which isn’t red delicious at all. There’s no way to selectively breed apples, too many alleles for it to be successful, and it takes too many years to mature to select.
@@ThunderStruck15 did you watch the video I sent or not.
In Germany, a green flavor called “Waldmeister” (sweet woodruff, literally “Forest master”) is common.
@@its_yellow Apparently one of the major flavor components in woodruff is coumarin which is also contained in vanilla, tonka bean, cinnamon etc. Nowadays it's usually an artificial flavor because coumarin is toxic in high doses. It's very hard to describe, I think you need to taste it for yourself. It's kinda just a very herby, mellow, slightly bitter aroma. Slight hints of licorice/anis/fennel maybe. I think tarragon/estragon is somewhat close in flavor. Outside of Germany there is the Georgian soft drink Tarkhuna which is flavored with tarragon or woodruff as well.
Here's a joke on this topic:
A teacher handed out Life Savers to her class.
She began to ask the children if they could identify the flavor by each candy’s color.
Pretty soon, the class had identified red for cherry, green for lime, yellow for lemon, and orange for orange. So the teacher tried a harder question. She handed out HONEY Life Savers. Nobody could figure out what they were, so the teacher gave a hint:
“They’re like something your mother might call your father.”
One little girl immediately looked horrified and spit her candy out.
“Oh my GOD!!! They’re ASSHOLES!!!”
This is the quality content we came here to see.
What is a life saver?? A candy??
@@KASANITEJ They're ring shaped candies, meant to resemble the life saver ring floats they throw off boats to help someone whos drowing or fell overboard.
@@KASANITEJ Yes, they're candies. They are on the screen at 12:53.
Ouch
When my family lived in Germany (Army) we had black currant flavored gummy bears! I don’t know if they’re here in the US as I haven’t really looked, but they were my favorite flavor
I believe Black Currants are making a comeback in the states!
@@RealBradMiller black currants were actually illegal to grow here until the mid 1960s to protect the timber industry because they harbored a disease that killed white pine!
@@maryhayes7574 :O that's crazy, there's a similar reason why we can't grow our own cotton.
The state came to my landlady years ago and told her they need to treat her pines to protect the nearby forestry lands. She came home one day and they had cleared every pine on her property which left her other trees open to wind damage. Sorry, for the story! 🤭
Swede here, and I loooove black currant wine gums! Bassets used to be the best, the real original and now they're the worst, since they changed recipes a few years ago. Now store brands are actually the best, still made in Belgian fabrics and with juicy fruit flavors and that tasty black currant. :)
Concord grape (a native American species) fills the same niche in the US that black currant does in the UK. In addition to their use in candy, they're one of the most common/traditional jam/jelly flavors in each country, for example (alongside strawberry in both countries).
My personal favorite fruit flavorings from outside the US include Tamarind, Lychee, and Guava. They just have such a different flavor profile compared to what is typically eaten and really tastes delicious
As a puertorican, tamarind, guava and passion fruit are popular flavors. I haven't tried lychee, but I would love to.
Lychee is delicious!!
Tamarind is delicious
In our place, tamarinds are actually made into candy by coating it with sugar and cornstarch.
I prefer testicle cheese flavour myself.
Many people have already mentioned that "Grape" flavored candies have largely entered the pantheon of the Big 5 due to their ubiquitousness. But I'd like to argue that "Watermelon" has been increasingly entering this club over the past two decades in the US. I'd say it was spurned by the general popularity of Jolly Ranchers and specifically their Watermelon-flavored products. "Blue Raspberry" is also a very popular candy flavor.
One fruit flavor you'll rarely see in candy within the US is "Black Currant", as the plant the flavor was derived from was banned from being farmed within the US in the early 1900's due to being a vector of "white pine blister rust", a species of fungus that threatened the logging industry. The federal ban was shifted to individual state jurisdiction in 1966, and a few states have since lifted the ban, but it still remains illegal to farm in several states. So it's still relatively unknown to many Americans, and is only just starting to make a comeback. I myself was in high school when I learned black currant was even a thing, though I've since had it as both a candy and a jam. Quite good, though more tart than most fruit-derived products I'm used to.
Interesting family history, my gr gr grandpa and namesake was part of that SoCal orange boom and was a signatory to the creation of Orange County. My gr-uncle Lee was the last in the city of Orange. Their house is a historic landmark now, but i never got any of that wealth since Uncle Lee died 6 years before i was born.
BTW slight correction: LA's boom was indirectly fueled by the orange industry, due to the Cajon Pass and the Grapevine forcing growers to ship though there, but growers themselves formed a different county to get away from LA power (hence OC). But LA had oil and grew mostly grapes/veggies. They benefited most from ridiculously low train fares due to a railroad war between the SP vs SF/AT, bringing fares between LA and Chicago down to $1 for an entire 18 months. That rivalry was so important that it formed the basis of Route 66 three decades later
My great grandfather was an early Orange inhabitant and owned the newspaper. He has a park in Orange renamed after him called W.O. Hart Park. I visited the park before COVID. What is your family name?
@@sydneyfairbairn3773 Young - though I should add that's maternal through my grandma. You might recognize my last name otherwise, which I'll only hint at it being hyphenated with an H and a P
Never seen the gr = great abbreviation. Makes sense but at first I thought you were just angry ....grrr! Not many have living family members to need that abbreviation
@@CynicalHistorian h-phenated?
U talking about florida righ?
When I was a child in the UK, Cherry flavour was rare/exotic/new. Our main fruit flavours in sweets (we didn't say "candy" back then. though we knew Americans called chocolate and sweets "candy" we didnt) were orange , lemon, lime and strawberry. you usually got a smaller number of strawberry than citrus in the pack!
Blackcurrant was the next most common and then raspberry. Cherry, pineapple and banana flavours came in by the time I was about 10. Grape flavour has never been a thing in the UK and I never even heard of blueberries or mangoes until I was in my 20s. I think a lot of these things have changed now, because why flavour sweets with soft fruits people had never tasted?. refrigeration and rapid global distribution has changed everything
I think blackcurrents are banned in america so they have cherry instead
China doesn't really have a big market for American-style candies with the sugar and artificial fruit flavors, but there are a few standouts. Jellies are big, with the standard lineup being lychee (my favorite), pineapple, peach, orange, and grape. In general, I think peach and pineapple are more popular flavors here than in the west. I've always associated jujubes (red dates) with hard candies, and hawthorns (candied, on a stick, wafers) are big in the north. Nuts and seeds are considered candy (like in 1800s America), especially peanuts, and milk is seen as a sweet, exotic flavor as well.
Lychee is actually on the rise as a candy flavor here! I've seen it and guava as everything from sodas to candies of late. I think the most popular peach candy in the u.s.a. would be peach rings, dried/candied pineapple is weirdly very popular around christmas for some reason?(It's pretty common to have candied pineapple come it these weird nut and dried fruit platters that seem to only be sold at that time of the year) I think the most popular pineapple candies would be pineapple gummy bears. I've never had/seen anything jujube or hawthorn flavored though.
i noticed in candies in korea and japan grape and peach are very popular .. its most-likely that the candie flavors in china come from these.. in turn these popular flavors in korea come form japan.. and in turn they come from the u.s.a..... its an artificial flavour pack .. and youll find the composition is quite similar. you could say hawthorn, jujube, lychee... ect are the local tastes.. as there was probably some sort of confection made from these previously. the artifical grape taste in the candies you thaste in asia is not an old world grap taste but the taste of native american grapes that are not commonly cultivated in america any more. if you eat a native american grape suddenly you will taste the flavor of the "artificial" grape taste..
its curious how international flavours or things can overtake a local products taste.. as these days companies buy the flavour packs they use andso many tastes get quite generic... in many countries local common traditional fruit that are popular are however never made to candies, softdrink ect as there is no commercial flavour packs made for these tastes.. its like having american grape flavored candies in thailand.. but no mangosteen or jackfruit flavors.. outside of north america in the enligsh speaking world grape is not a common flavour and is associated with american things as the american native grape is almost unknown and such a taste would nto fit with epople understanding of grapes.. and grape itself is mostly just a sweet taste (unlike american native grapes) but the artificial grape taste is very common in asia due to american influence.. (as with the artificial peach taste which is also american)
Wow, I am astounded by the amount of detail you go into in these videos!!! Tyyy for your hard work!!
Yeah, in Mexico we have the tamarindo flavour. Fruity, chewy and most important, goes absurdly well with spicy and salty flavours.
Cause yeah, most of the Mexican candy (other than chocolates and american inspired) are salty and spicy
Yeah, a definite war on lime has been raging in the US for the past 20 years. Nothing against green apple, but it's become downright hard to find lime flavored anything anymore unless you're ordering margaritas.
Skittles changed back to lime. This is a major blow to the green apple heretics.
@@keepermovin5906 Indeed. Green apple didn't suit Skittles anyway, good flavor but belongs in the sour pack. It clashes with the sweet citrus theme, besides I couldn't mix green & yellows anymore for a 7-up/Sprite kick. Glad they came around.
@@ByrdWhiteMovie absolutely! I like your theory on it not fitting the theme and I agree completely. I’m usually not all that against green apple but I felt it was wrong in skittles. Now I know why I have felt that.
@@ByrdWhiteMovie same
The can says “Lemon Drops - For That Candy Thirst” lol love that
ETA: I think watermelon and green apple have gained a lot of popularity and are good top 5 additions :)
I love watermelon! Right now it seems to popular but they disappear quickly.
Watermelon and green apple are two of the worst candy flavors.
@@Andrew-it7fb I like watermelon, and green apple is tolerable, but wintergreen turns my stomach. Can't even smell it without a wave of nausea.
I almost always associate red candy with cherries more than strawberries, actually. Probably because most candies here tend to emphasize more tart flavors, whereas most strawberry flavored confections are usually paired with a sweet and creamy element (like chocolate or vanilla or sweet cream) or other berry flavors.
I lot of times I’ll see both cherry and strawberry candies in the same package. Cherry is usually red while strawberry is made pink. Cherry seems to be red more often than strawberry, like you said.
Good observation. Yeah, maybe that's why Strawberry candies are usually pink.
I feel like grape is also a big flavor that's being left out.
Agreed. I see grapes about as often as any over candy flavor. I would say they're at least as popular as strawberries. The red candies tend toward being cherry more often than strawberry. Grape has the benefit of adding purple to the color lineup.
What about apple? I like apple candy
My favorite candy flavor is Tomato
@@jejtherusheddoodle23 black currant is elite just a shame it’s illegal in America
I think apple is relatively uncommon for for candy because it looks so counter-intuitive (When juiced, in striking contrast to its skin, looks like a dull, almost urine-colored yellow), and because I think people associate it with less bombastic, but cozier baked goods.
Utahn here, most people here are obsessed with cherries, apricots, apples, strawberries, peaches, and raspberries. I've noticed most people in the Salt Lake Valley love cherries, Whereas when I lived in cache valley people went crazy for peaches and raspberries (Bear lake is totally raspberry themed, they grow everywhere there).
One fruit I wish I'd see more often is huckleberry! I only ever see them further north around Montana or Oregon, they taste amazing and I wish you didn't have to go all the way north/northwest to get them.
I agree about Huckleberries...but they're only so local and hard to find because they haven't successfully been domesticated yet so you have to gather them from the wild.
Totally agree with this assesment. Im from utah and the best part of going to bear lake is eating wild rasberries and getting rasberries shakes from every mom and pop restaurant
My mom would always call dibs on the red and orange candies, leaving the yellow, green (and black) ones for my dad and I. Out of necessity those became our favourites. I love a good lemon candy, and anise seed ("black licorice") jelly beans are probably the ones I like the most. I also enjoy old-fashioned spice and herb-based candies. Mint, cinnamon etc.
I remember how my great grandmother liked her "Horehound" candies. She was born in 1885, so she was old-school to say the least. They were so different than today's candies. Not that sweet and actually had some natural ingredients that were good for digestion.
My great grandmother always told her grandchildren to "eat a horehound and take a nap on your back" (always on your back because she believed that was the only way to sleep since she used to share a bed with a lot of siblings)
Horehound is delicious! Claey's brand hard candies still makes that flavor. I find it at Walgreens and Hobby Lobby of all places
Horehound was also recommended for throat and lung issues. Horehound is an herb, and tea and candy soothes the throat and an expectorant to loosen phlegm.
@@avacurtis2729 I get nightmares if I sleep on my back, wouldn't make me feel better at all lol
I actually like horehound candies.
Down here in Mexico, pineapple candy is very popular, as well as grape. I would say they take lemon and cherry's places in the big four. Banana flavoured candy is also extremely popular, and "bubblegum", which is basically sugar flavor is commonly found among candy flavours.
I was surprised by the "Top 4/5."
My guess for "Top 4" was orange, cherry, grape, and lemon. (With strawberry and watermelon as runner-ups)
But lemon AND lime? Honestly, I would consider them two sides of the same coin, not 50% of the flavors.
After bringing spices into the mix, obviously cinnamon and mint aren't even debatable.
When I think about the old lady with a bag of candy at church I think cinnamon, lemon, mint, and occasionally caramel would be the "grandma's" version of candy.
In any case, thanks for the flavor-blasted peek into my countries fruit history.
Lemon and lime are pretty distinct! As a kid I remember lime being pretty popular but most kids don't like lemon and wish it was banana.
@@tiglionabbit
Sure, they have different tastes. But I can't remember ever thinking "Ooooo I hope they have lime candy."
What kind of lime candy were kids eating when you were growing up?
Also, I'm definitely biased in regards to banana candies. ALWAYS hated it. Probably because I loved bananas and the candies didn't taste like bananas to me.
@@biteyalmighty7874 You know the reason for this, right? Banana flavoring is based off of an older variety of banana that has since gone extinct. Modern bananas are obviously quite different in taste, and therefore the difference arises. Basically older bananas were way more.... "banana-y" than current day bananas based on having more of the main chemical that is used for banana flavoring.
@@Tehbestestevasss
I've heard that, yes. I'm definitely not a fan of the taste. It's too... ... Nasal-y? Kinda like peaches.
@@biteyalmighty7874 Runts, Jolly Ranchers, Skittles, and Tootsie Fruit Rolls.
I love the way you talk, it makes me smile. Thanks bud.
This channel manages to dredge up so many obscure questions from my childhood it's actually really impressive.
How could JJ forget the king of fruit candy flavors, whatever the hell “blue raspberry” is.
Blue raspberry is the best.
I feel like blue raspberry was just made because there were already a couple of red color fruit candies with strawberry and cherry, so they just made it blue to have it stand out.
@@alouise , I have heard that is actually the reason.
Funny thing though, have seen blue raspberry wild but never in a store. I don't think that blue raspberry flavor is much like it but it makes for a nice color/more acid flavor.
Growing up in Ireland in the 90s, the most popular sweets in my town were split into boiled sweets and soft/gummy sweets
Boiled: apple drops, pear drops, cola cubes, mint bullseyes
Soft: gummy strawberries, gummy bears, one's that look like fried eggs but just taste like sugar, and chewy bars like refreshers which also just taste like sugar/chemicals
Pear drops look like little pears but taste like nail varnish 💅
I used to think apple, grape and cherry sweets were very American
Turkish delight (Rose flavour) was also pretty popular
The smell of pear drops comes from the synthetic flavouring which is in fact an industrial solvent if memory serves me. If you become ketotic your breath will start to smell like pear drops and if it gets bad enough it can make breathylisers show up as high alcohol readings which is unfortunate because if your breath starts to smell ketotic, you're going to be confused, unfocused and sleepy basically appearing drunk when you're not.
I hate pear drops, had one that was in a bag of Yorkshire mixtures recently and had to spit it out! 🤢
I looked up the fried egg candies. I've never heard of or seen anything like that where I'm from. I feel like there need to be some gummy bacon candies to go with it, lol.
Black currant flavor is pretty big in the UK. It pretty much replaces grape as the "purple one".
I remember hearing as a kid that some fruit flavors used in candies aren't actually derived from fruit at all, but chemicals like esters that have "fruity flavors" that taste more fruity than the real thing. I think banana and cherry were mentioned, but that was long ago. I know I was surprised the first time I tried actual concord grapes and realized that was the grape flavor in my favorite Hubba Bubba bubble gum. I'd always kinda thought of the flavor as more purple than actually grape. :)
I've actually made an ester in my chem class that smelled like bananas lol
@@rusty_sniper4992 Ha! Love it! Go science!
@@jenthulhu I wanted to make one that smelled like cherries but we ran out of time and had to go to English :( We also couldn't taste them because we used concentrated sulfuric acid as the catalyst lol
@@rusty_sniper4992 Turning high school students loose with sulphuric acid--WOW! Your teacher is brave. :D
@@jenthulhu the process was part of our Organic Chem syllabus, she said she was only able to do it once and wanted to give us a try lol
My grandmother tells stories about her mother (my great grandmother) growing up getting oranges in her stocking on Christmas Day as a very special treat. We still keep the tradition as well, but now sometimes with chocolate oranges.
Yes, I used to wonder why my parents always put an orange in the toe of our stocking, till I finally realized that oranges would have been a special treat when they (and even more so, their parents) were kids.
@@carolthedabbler2105 Very common, even in Europe. My family is from Eastern Europe and for generations they would only get oranges at Christmas, since they had to be imported from Italy and were quite rare and expensive. But yes there is a very special connection between oranges and Christmas haha.
My Grandma does that to
Idk if it’s a French thing but me and a lot of other Louisiana people get oranges apples pears and nuts in our stockings
@@voiceofreason2674 I'm French at all, and I'm from Indiana, but we also got apples (but not pears) and nuts (in their shells) in our stockings (in addition to the oranges I mentioned before). Also quite a bit of candy!
American needs to bring back spice candy; Clove, cardamom, allspice, cinnamon, ginger, mace, nutmeg, fennel, etc.
Likewise, a line of fruit candy in flavors of fruits that can't be found in America.
I like the old Christmas hard-candies (and sometimes ribbon candy) that has some of those spice flavors.
idk what it is, i like cinnamon sugar and cinnamon the spice, but for some reason, the cinnamon flavor in things like gum or jelly beans are kinda unappealing.
@@midshipman8654 most cinnamon candies use Cassia, which is close-ish.
They would not get any sales
@@ducksongfansOf course a duck song fan would say that. 😒
"After all, it is the things we take for granted that are often the purest manifestation of our culture....What is culture if not the stuff around us too common to contemplate?" I just started watching these vids and this! This is why cultural anthropology is so cool (and why I've now subscribed to this channel) :)
One surprising thing about banana flavoured food, which used to be much more popular, even though bananas are still the #1 selling fruit, is that the banana flavour is based on an extinct species of banana. Which means that no banana you buy in the store will actually taste like a banana flavoured candy and vice versa.
Those bananas aren't actually extinct, they still exist! They are just much more difficult to find now
@@lunarm0th690 I kinda want to try them now. Normal bananas don't taste great but the candy banana flavour is somewhat better and possibly worth a try.
They still grow them mostly in Asia and they are commercially popular there. They just got blighted out of the big banana plantations in the Americas and replaced with the Cavendish variety we have now.
@@rustydowd879 What was the name of the other kind, as opposed to the blight-resistant Cavendish?
@@shadowcween7890 They're called the Gros Michel. And the Cavendish is facing its own blight problem right now too.
I’d be interested to know how blue raspberry because such a phenomenon. I know when I was young blue raspberry lollipops were highly coveted, which is especially strange considering that blue rasberries weren’t a real fruit when the flavor was popular
My assumption is that cherry/strawberry are already red, so making raspberry blue allows people to differentiate it from strawberry/cherry
The way this is phrased makes it sound like blue raspberries have since been actually invented... they haven't, have they??
@@xanderliptak from the wiki on blue raspberry: Blue raspberry is a flavoring for candy, snack foods, syrups, and soft drinks. The flavor ostensibly originates from Rubus leucodermis, more commonly known as the "whitebark raspberry" or "blackcap raspberry" for the blue-black color of its raspberry.
so no, blue raspberry does not taste like traditional raspberries. Nor does is taste like "blueberry and raspberry" as a lot of people think. It's actually a different species of raspberry entirely.
It was from an entirely different species of raspberry. They do exist.
One special flavor that is very persistent in German & Austrian candy is "Waldmeister" (woodruff). It's this herb that tastes sort of soapy... but in the best possible way. 😅
It's definetly not one of our big five - which are probably lemon, orange, cherry, raspberry/strawberry. But woodruff is still popular enough, that I you can get all sorts of candy and sweets in its vibrant green flavor!
I especially always liked woodruff jello 😉
Somebody mentioned “fruits of the forest…” Is that a thing?
@@JJMcCullough Oh yes! 😍 Fruits of the forest! That's totally a thing in candy, and ice cream.
But I especially think of drinks. If we were to buy one of those "healthy" flavored waters, we'd surely find a forest fruit flavored one!
But I think it's synonymous with (what Americans would label as) broadly "red berries". 🤷🏻♂️
@@JJMcCullough Waldfrüchte (fruit of the forrest ) is a mix of diffrent classical"native fruits". Typically strawberries, blue berries, raspberries, cherries and black berries. It is a flavour in ice cream or in particular in a type of sweet sauce. But it is far from being one of THESE flavours
Those small, shrimpy things (at 7:25) had more taste and were more delicious than any modern tasteless, but beautiful, strawberry of today's supermarkets. I should know - they grew in the field behind my house when I was a young girl.
You're lucky! Wild strawberries are by far the tastiest berries I've ever had. It's a shame that many people, especially Americans think that "Bigger = better", which leads to bigger but less flavorful berries, fruits and vegetables being more popular than the "shrinky" but really flavorful stuff.
The small ones have the most flavour.
Always excited for more JJ!!!! I love chuckles candy- due to the included aniseed flavor. When living in UK I missed grape and apple flavored candy.
But now in USA and missing black currant flavor.
I’ve always been a strawberry flavor lover
My grandma told me that when she was a kid they would get fruit for Christmas and were excited af about it lol. I live next to Georgia in SC and peaches and watermelon are our biggest fruit. I'd say cantaloupe too. Lime is amazing flavor cmon JJ lol
We were still getting walnuts in our stockings when I was a kid in the 80s. Unfortunately I always hated nuts of any kind (turns out I'm allergic so that was probably good for me that I hated the taste, lol) so I always gave them away and wondered why they kept showing up in my stocking. xD
South Carolinian Here. I don't ever see cantaloupe candy in stores, but that's probably because I only really go to the Dollar Store for candy.
@@vinny.montgomery oh sorry when I said cantaloupe I meant the actual melon itself not candy lol I just see them often in the low country
@@statesminds no it's fine