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Wednesday 9 September 2015

Jelly bean

The first jelly bean was created by an unknown American candy maker in the mid 1800s. Its gummy interior was inspired by the Turkish delight, a Turkish dessert made of soft jelly covered in confectioner's powder.

In 1861 Boston candy maker William Schrafft ran advertisements urging people to send jellybeans to soldiers fighting in the Civil War.

Photographed and eaten by Brandon Dilbeck on August 30, 2006 Wikipedia

The original eight flavors of Jelly Belly beans were Very Cherry, Root Beer, Cream Soda, Tangerine, Green Apple, Lemon, Licorice and Grape.

Jelly Belly beans became the first jelly beans in space when they were sent on the space shuttle Challenger in 1983.

Ronald Reagan's passion for Jelly Belly beans was a marketing dream for the company. As red and white colored jellybeans already existed, they produced the blueberry flavor so that the three colors of the American flag could be served in jellybeans at the president's inaugural party.

Australian Loretta Marron (born October 16, 1951) became known as "the Jelly Bean Lady" after using jelly beans to test bogus health products. She substituted jelly beans for magnetized mattress underlays, which the makers claimed could cure a range of health ailments. Participants used a meter that measures magnetism, holding the probes over the underlays. They were not able to tell which one had the magnets and which one had the jelly beans - the results were the same.

Loretta Marron 2012

Very Cherry flavored jelly beans have been the most popular flavor since 2003. Buttered Popcorn was the top spot for the previous five years.

Stacked end to end, enough jelly beans were eaten in 2014 to circle the earth more than five times.

Jellybeans were first linked with celebrations of Easter in the United States sometime in the 1930s because of their egg-like shape.

In the United States, it is estimated that 16 billion jelly beans are eaten each year at Easter. The only candies Americans prefer more on Easter are chocolate bunnies (in first place) and marshmallow Peeps (in second).


It takes about one week to make a jelly bean.

Their shiny coating is made from bug feces. Shellac, also known as confectioner’s glaze, is made from a resin excreted by the female lac beetle.

Sources 9news.com, Food For Thought by Ed Pearce

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