The Jellybean

All in flavor of Jellybeans say I! The Jellybean, once a popular sweet snack, a delicious break from a rotten day, or a treat revered by small children everywhere, has been replaced with caramel, nougat and chocolate. This once popular treat hasn't been treated kindly over the decades since their nemesis, chocolate hit the scene.

The Jellybean has been around since the early 1900s. During the 1930s Jellybeans jars were a staple in the local store or gas station. Children everywhere mopped, scrubbed, carried and washed, doing every chore asked, just for pocket change so they could get their fill of these sweet, chewy treats. A dime would buy you a pretty fair amount of Jellybeans back in the day, but was a dime worth ever enough?

Jellybeans were stored in large glass jars, with little scoops and came in an array of colors. Red, orange, green, black, yellow, white, purple and pink are the traditional bean colors and everyone has their favorite. People hankering for the sweet treat would scoop them into small paper sacks and if you were one of the lucky few kids on the block who, with waterlogged hands from chores were lucky enough to buy a bag of Jellybeans, you were revered and honored. Of course everyone would be eager to befriend you if you were the owner of a bag of fruity chewy beans.

Traditional Jellybeans are flavored on the outside on the shiny shell, while the inside jelly is the same for all flavors. Modern interpretations of the Jellybean, such as the "Jelly Belly Jellybeans" are much smaller and come in dozens of flavors, from vomit to grass. Jelly Belly beans come in delicious flavors as well, such as; Soda, Ice cream, popcorn and many more. The color of a Jelly Belly Bean will reflect its flavor, or so they say.

As well all know, grass is green, that is unless you live in California, where grass is brown, or Arizona where grass only exists on the landscaping of homes or business' otherwise surrounded by dry desert. But, most everywhere else grass is green and so the choice of color is obvious. But for a vomit flavored bean, the flavor choice becomes more difficult. The flavor of vomit varies and is dependent on what we ate that day. If I ate franks and beans, what would my vomit taste like? I know, its revolting, but in order to fully understand what the flavorologist was thinking, we have to delve into vomit to fully understand.

Since vomit comes in many colors, depending on the contents of one's stomach, the color is up to your own interpretation. Do we really care about the color? Candy makers say that the presentation of candy is as important as the flavor and that may be so if we're discussing "Hershey's" chocolate, but I know few people who enjoy a vomit flavored Jellybean and give zero consideration to the color.

With regard to Jelly Belly beans, let's see if we can figure out how they come up with the color and flavor of a bean? The history of the Jellybean is difficult to pin down. What we know is the bean and its name have been around for a hundred years, but where they originated from is still up to debate. Since this isn't Jellybean 101, let's skip past early history and get to the good stuff, shall we? Since the Jellybeans arrival on the candy scene, its popularity has been in a slow decline.

Jellybeans are the favorite candy of many, such as my mother and of course President Reagan (may he rest in peace), who rarely went a day without his fill, but the heyday of the Jellybean has since passed. Today, consumers seem to prefer the gourmet bean to the traditional. Let them have their vomit and grass; I'll stick to my usual, thank you.

The black Jellybean with its licorice twang, is the ugliest in the bunch, but packs the most flavor, as do the red beans. Who on earth doesn't like cherry anything? Licorice flavored beans are usually one of the first to be thrown out by non-licorice lovers. Then comes green and yellow, never did like them much. The green reminds me of floor wax and the yellow like lemon pledge. While I've never actually licked a newly waxed floor, or freshly polished coffee table, I would imagine this is what they taste like. It seems the flavorologist of yesteryear neglected to taste these two; perhaps he was too busy deciding what color they should be? Red, white, purple and orange are the most popular and are always the first to be eaten.

How often do we think about the Jellybean today? How often do we say, "Oh boy, could I go for a bag of Jellybeans?" Not often unfortunately. But there is one time of year that the Jellybean takes center stage, Easter. The Easter holiday is the only time of year when we hope to impart our good taste for Jellybeans onto our children. I recall filling the kid's baskets with Jellybeans year after year, only to end up sucking them up the vacuum or seeing them line the trash can. They are the last candies in the bottom of the basket and will stay there only until our kids are so desperate for candy; they give in and eat them.

So, hooray for the Jellybean and its creator. Many thanks Mr. Bean. When was the last time you ate a jellybean?