When in Finland, my friend Tim recently picked up this bag of supremely working class licorice:

The overly pragmatic packaging screams “Hey!  Don’t get too excited about this, mmmkay?”  As it turns out, this is probably a good thing.  It isn’t very exciting licorice.

It sorta looks like generic licorice, the kind you’d find in the states.  Also, it tastes like it.  There’s no ammonia taste, there’s very little to no salt taste, and the licorice itself isn’t particularly “strong” in any way.  It doesn’t have that molasses note to it, nor does it contain intense anise spice, or any other herbal flavor.  It’s a very middle of the road, as you’d expect licorice experience.  Sort of like if you had bought these:

I’m really not kidding.  But this isn’t necessarily a bad thing-I love Red Vines.  It’s just that there’s no real reason to seek these out when there’s cheap alternatives all over the place.  But now that I’ve got you craving Red Vines black licorice, you can literally walk to any grocery store in the continental US and find some vines.  Or Twizzlers-Depends which side of the country you’re on.

Regardless, I think we can all agree that sports are fun.

Oh, and click the link below to get some delicious, salty, entry level licorice if you’re not a connoisseur.