Who doesn’t love surprises? And it’s rare to be really surprised, no? Shh..don’t tell anyone but I feign being surprised all the time: “OOoooh my Gawd! You went to Santa Cruz too? That’s impawesome!” While inside I’m thinking, “I wonder when Netflix will start sending me season 4 of Dexter.”
I think we can all agree true surprises are good. When the lil’ genius who created Jelly Belly’s – by far the best tasting jelly bean ever created – contacted Candygurus and said, ‘we got candy – review it.’ THAT was a surprise – And here we are! If this isn’t a sign that the godforsaken Candygurus have made it then I don’t know what is. …Or should that read, “if this is a sign that the godforsaken Candygurus haven’t made it then I don’t know what it isn’t.” Fuck I hate English. No wonder I swear all the time.
Little background: Jelly Belly creator David Klein sold that business to the company that actually manufactured the little flavor pellets for him, and he started another venture with his daughter, Roxy. Sweet. They now sell all sorts of candies that you can check out and buy here. Candyaddict also has a good interview with David giving the Jelly Belly history, if you want more deets.
When David sent us a note, I wasn’t necessarily sure what we would get to review. Their Web site has loads of stuff like candy java, fish taco, fried rice and sweet sushi. Trippy. What we got was Sour Spanks.
Sour Spanks Baby!
You can see that I ate a bunch already. Sorry. Next time I’ll take pics Before I eat.
See that sugar dusting on the outside? That’s hecka sour powder. If you simply suck these things, your mouth will do the way-too-sour dance. So you need to chew. Leading to Surprise #2: they’re chewy. This I like. Before I ate them, I assumed they were a hard candy. When I bit into them I was surprised to get a good chew. I like a slightly heartier chew but I’ll take it. These things last too, not quickly melting away. So you get to enjoy the uber sour, then the sweet-mixed-in chew until they finally fade out. Not a fast eat, per se. Also, I gave my 4 year old pup a few and the look on her face as she was trying to get the thing down was fucking priceless. She loved it. And perhaps a better parent wouldn’t be letting their 4 year old eat these…hmmm…I’ll get back to you on that.
Surprise #3: Sour Spanks flaves are kinda pedestrian. I expected the guy who created the oh-so-genuinely-flavorful jelly beans to take that same expertise, his calling card if you will, and instill an entirely new bevy of sweets with it. But these are the basics – a red that’s probably cherry, an orange orange, a yellow lemon etc. Eh. ok. Not great.
Still, I find myself eating these at will, and I’ll finish them. And trust me, there are tons of candy that if I don’t like, I would simply throw out. So these get a 5 simply for that. But I bump them up to a 7 because the sour is truly sour and these are fun to eat. They almost knock on the door of absurdly sour but since you can bite in and they’re chewy, they don’t come off as kiddy novelty candy. And that’s good. My fave is green (apple I assume) and orange. Give em a try. If sour is your thing – then you’ll be pleasantly surprised too.
Liked the candy. We also recently saw the movie about David on Netflix and loved it.
I tried these last night. Sorry to say, I’m not that impressed. Sour coating only, so it lasts for only a few seconds. Once that’s gone, the flavors are…weak.
Hey guys….if you thought those were sour we just made some twice as sour as the ones you received. Will be leaving in a few days for the trip of my life. A documentary was made on my life as the inventor of Jelly Belly jelly beans. Slamdance looked at 5000 films and picked 18. We were one of the 18. The film will have its world premiere in Park City Utah on January 24th. We will be handing out free Jelly Bellies to everyone in the audience. It is called Candyman –it is time to spill the beans. A trailer can be viewed if you go to http://www.slamdance.com and click on film festival and then click on films….look for Sunday at 3:30 and a trailer will come up. All the Best to you. Love your reviews…..
There better be some left over for this guy. I can only imagine what they’d be like if they used the real flavorings that made Jelly Bellies (huge bag on my desk in front of me, mix of sours, licorice, pear, margarita, green apple, and blueberry) so impawesome.
Matty. I actually loved these. Agree on the flavors – kind of non-descript but suck off some of that powder and they become a bit more distinct. The chew is great. Anyway, my 2 year old really wanted to know what papa was eating – wouldn’t easily take no for an answer so I let her try it. Wish I had that on video. I would buy these in a sec.