Dill Pickle Flavored Popcorn and Other Weird Kettle Corn Seasonings

I usually like to eat my food plain and boring, which is my excuse for being a bit out of the loop in terms of the latest fads in snack foods. There are some really interesting food creations out there, most of which I still have yet to conceive of, though I'm not sure why each new discovery manages to surprise me in the slightest. Our society consumes some weird products.

Take popcorn for example, since it is after all National Popcorn Popping Month; I admit I was vaguely aware that various flavor toppings existed to put on your pop corn at the movies. But it was only while doing research for "Unique Tabletop Popcorn Popping Machines: Best of the Web", an article I was writing for Associated Content, that it dawned on me how broad and diverse this popcorn seasoning selection has in recent years become.

I thought I'd share with you some of the more interesting popcorn seasoning flavors I came across.

Below are six of them:

Grape Glaze Pop
Glaze Pop is added to the kettle along with popcorn and oil to produce a sweet taste to your popcorn. In addition to the grape flavor, Snappy Brand also offers Blue Raspberry, Cherry and Cinnamon flavored Glaze Pop. It must be an acquired taste, as the products are still available, but when I think of fruit I do not immediately reach for butter and salt. Sweet and salty is good in granola bars or Chex Mix, which use raisins but something about salt with grape flavor or raspberries doesn't sound all that appetizing. Maybe I'm alone on this one.

Dill Pickle Popcorn Seasoning
SpiceBarn.com offers this "classic dill pickle" flavored seasoning in sizes as small as a 3 oz. jar ($3.79) and as huge as a 50lbs. container ($209.65). This shake-on seasoning should be sprinkled on to oil popped popcorn while still hot. Ingredients include milk, MSG and garlic powder.

Beer Flavored Popcorn Seasoning
This popcorn flavor, which is also used by shaking onto oil popped, hot out of the kettle popcorn, is also a stranger one, but I admit, its description does make it sound tasty. This product, as sold by Spice Barn, is said to smell a bit like brown sugar and taste slightly bitter and yeast-like. Now this is the kind of sweet and salty that sounds good, unlike the Grape Glaze Pop. Unfortunately, it also contains 323 calories per 100 grams (3.52 oz.).

Orange Popcorn
I found this lower calorie recipe for popcorn seasoning on www.fitnessandfreebies.com. It calls for refrigerated butter-flavored cooking spray (yummy), orange flavored powdered drink mix and dried orange peels. I can't imagine that being better than just consuming a few more calories but I do have to give them credit for creativity.

Chocolate Marshmallow Popcorn Seasoning
This product, known officially as the "Chocolate Marshmallow Popcorn Pal" is sold by AmericanSpice.com and apparently is not just used for popcorn but also enjoyable on pancakes, toast or in coffee. This is another example of an appropriate mix of sweet and salty. Although I guess it really is all about individual taste. Some people might think this sounds gross while the grape one, delicious.

Popcorn with Ketchup
I don't know how common this one is but my Canadian friend was looking for ketchup to put on his popcorn at the movies and he was surprised that I wasn't.