Jelly Belly is always coming up with creative and interesting flavors to add to their already impressive line of jelly beans. Back a few years ago I did the review for the new Dark Chocolate Jelly Beans and BeanBoozled for CandyAddict.com. After that I was then featured in the New York Times in a Jelly Belly article, so now I feel I’ve come full circle with my first official Jelly Belly review for The Candy Enthusiast.

The new flavor for Jelly Belly? Honey! This is the 92nd flavor (told you it was a big list!) of Jelly Belly bean for sale and is the idea of many consumers who’ve written and polled for it for some time now. It’s great to know Jelly Belly listens to it’s consumers.

These Honey beans are made with real wildflower honey and the flavor certainly reflects it. The beans are beautiful and they look like little hardened globs of honey. My photo makes the look more orange than they really are, as they’re more of a shade of amber. 

So how do they taste?

Really wonderful.

The first thing you get is a flowring sweetness that evolves swiftly into a full honey flavor. It’s as if you just liked the end of honey spoon, just not as intense. It’s amazing how well these beans capture the honey flavor, and they’re just delightful.

I found myself reaching for another and another, and I had to hide the rest of my samples so I was able to share them with my boyfriend, who is a big honey lover. Needless to say, he’s just as smitten with them as I am! These honey jelly beans I feel are really unique, so if you see them do give them a try. And if you’re one of the many who’ve written Jelly Belly requesting this flavor over the years, I can say you will not be disappointed. 

Rating: Hoard

Links Jelly Belly Website

I admit, there’s lots of Jelly Belly’s line of confections that I’ve never had before. I’ve never tried their candy corn, their bridge mix, and until this review their Dutch Mints. I don’t really know what Dutch Mints are per se, as they look like generic mints you see at most restaurants and such. I went into this purchase not really knowing what I was getting into.

The mints are little round balls, which are about the same size. They’re a little smaller than marbles, more like wasabi peas. The mints come in pastel colors of white, pink, green and purple. They’re quite cute.

They’re light in my hand, and as I popped one in my mouth, I realized I wasn’t sure what to expect from these. Well, except some mintiness of course.

The shell is thin and very crispy crunchy. It breaks easily when I bit down. Underneath is a layer of chocolate, then a mint fondant center. The mint part is fresh and not overpowering. It mixes nicely with the chocolate to form a contrast of fresh mintiness and the deep, sweet chocolate.

Considering I’m pretty lukewarm on minty candies, I found these quite lovely. I really liked them. The bag I bought quickly disappeared and I plan on getting more when I see them again.

Rating: Will Buy Again

Links Jelly Belly Website

These were a lucky find that I stumbled across another day. Sometimes the other confections that Jelly Belly makes, aside from their trademark jelly beans, are hard to come by. These looked very similar to those Smooth ‘n Melty confections that I’m such a fan of. The rarity of this find and the possibility of finding a new treat that’s a twist of a favorite sold me on the purchase, as so to speak.

These are round, flat little tablets, about the size of a quarter and are really smooth to the touch. They’re attractive to look at with shiny hard shells and pretty colors in pink, yellow, white and light green. 

The textue is firm, like a thick hardened frosting. The outside is hard, but gives into teeth easily when bitten into. The flavor is sweet and strongly of peppermint, extremely so. The texture is kinda grainy, sort of like candy corn but no where as nice. I tried one of each color, and they taste all the same.

I see these working as a more intense after-dinner mint, but not something I’d enjoy as a candy treat or a quick breath-freshener.

Rating: Not Worth It

Links Jelly Belly Mint Cremes Webpage

I was pleasantly surprised and excited to find that Jelly Belly was releasing a new flavor mix based on the Sunkist line of citrus flavors. A couple years ago Jelly Belly had bought out the Sunkist candy line and have since tweaked the Fruit Gems packaging and the flavors. Thankfully, for the most part, the flavors and idea of Sunkist candy is still faithful to the idea of tasty fruit and citrus jellies. These new Jelly Belly Beans flavor is no exception.

First, I like how the flavors are translated from one jelly candy to another. Sure, fruit pate and jelly beans have the same origins with Turkish Delight, but the fact that granulated sugar covers one and a panned shell the other, still makes them different in my mind. It’s fun to experience the flavors in a way that feels new to me.

True to all the Jelly Belly line, these beans are made with real juices, citrus oils and pulp. Or so totes the press release. Also, each 40 gram serving of this mix provides 25% of you DV of Vitamin C. I guess anything to make candy seem healthier, right?

Sunkist Lime: Pleasing with it’s bright light green color. The flavor is immediately tart, bitter and zesty. Unmistakeably lime.

Sunkist Pink Grapefruit: Wonderfully tart, sweet and juicy like a real grapefruit. It has that nice acidic edge to it along with bitterness you get from the pith. Beautiful.

Sunkist Orange: Very smooth and sweet flavor. I almost want to say it’s creamy because the flavor is absent of that citrus zest I associate with oranges.

Sunkist Lemon: The lemon is surprisingly sweet and juicy. No tartness or zest at all that I associate with lemons. Then I had another one and found it to be quite sour. Interesting.

Sunkist Tangerine: This has the tartness that I was expecting the orange to have. It’s still only a slight tartness, but it did carry that extra sweetness that tangerines have.

I wish I had some of the Sunkist gels on hand to compare these to. Alas I don’t, so I’ll save that for another day. These flavors stand beautifully alone as well, so if you’re a citrus lover, this is the mix you’ve been dreaming of. The press release says you can start seeing the mix in stores in February and March, so keep your eyes peeled!

Be sure to check out Cybele’s review of this mix as well.

Rating: Will Buy Again

Links Jelly Belly Website

Many know Jelly Belly for their jelly beans, especially around this time of year. What many don’t know is that Jelly Belly makes other candies besides their signature beans, especially around Easter. They can be hard to find, but I have come across these other confections in Bed Bath and Beyond, Marshalls, Ross, TJ Maxx and some specialty stores (thankfully the website has an item locator to help with this). I found this bag of their Speckled Chocolate Malted Eggs in Marshalls when I was there shopping for a new skillet.

I’m no stranger to these eggs. I reviewed them when I was writing for CandyAddict, and enjoyed them very much. Now that some time has passed, I wanted to give them another go and see if they still held up to my more seasoned candy tasting palette. Plus the colors are so pretty, how could I resist?

The eggs are really stunning with a light, sweet smell. The shells are smooth and matte in color. They each have a unique speckled pattern on them with green, magenta, blue and yellow.

The first bite reveals that the shells are wonderfully crisp and crunchy. One egg can be two bites or a single bite if you like to get a mouthful of malt like I do.

I’m happy to report that the whole egg, not just the shells, is very crunchy. The malt center is a key player in that. The center is wonderfully strong and malty. The chocolate between the shell and malt center adds sweetness and not much flavor. Depending on the color the shell adds subtle flavor too, white is more vanilla, purple grape, pink strawberry, yellow lemon and green lime. It’s not enough that it takes of the whole egg, but instead adds an extra level to the malt interior, just enough to keep things interesting.

I like these, but as much of a fan of malt balls that I am, I find that after my initial tasting, I didn’t feel compelled to go back and finish my bag. I don’t think there’s a big enough chocolate hit to these as I prefer. Yet, if I found these in my Easter basket, I’d certainly scarf them down with no hesitation.

Rating: Will Eat Again

Links Jelly Belly Website

Jelly Belly has been trying to push the envelope with flavors and products it seems in the past few years. Back when I was at the All Candy Expo in 2007 they unveiled their BeanBoozled beans: essentially a Russian roulette with good and gross flavors. This year they announced a line of flavors inspired by Cold Stone Creamery’s ice cream. I’m not quite sure on the connection between the two, especially since I’ve never been to Cold Stone Creamery (silly lactose intolerance). I am certainly intrigued by the idea of ice cream and jelly beans.

Chocolate Devotion: (Chocolate ice cream, chocolate chips, brownie and fudge): So bland. It has a faint cocoa flavor, yet lacks that “chocolatey” punch you hope for and expect. It doesn’t taste artificial, just weak.

Our Strawberry Blonde: (strawberry ice cream, graham cracker pie crust, strawberries, caramel, whipped topping): This one is odd. It’s strawberry, but also has strong flavors of banana too. It’s sweet, tart and very concentrated in terms of flavor. My favorite of the bunch.

Apple Pie A La Cold Stone: (french vanilla ice cream, cinnamon, graham cracker pie crust, apple pie filling and caramel): Immediately you taste the cinnamon and apples. There’s a note of the caramel there too, but it’s faint. It reminds me of store-bought apple strudel muffins. Or cinnamon coffee cake.

Mint Mint Chocolate Chocolate Chip: (mint ice cream, choc chips brownie and fudge): This has a nice medium mint flavor, but the chocolate part tastes awful and ruins the whole Jelly Bean. It’s horribly fake tasting, like Tootsie roll’s bad, ugly cousin. It also leaves an odd aftertaste in the mouth afterward.

Birthday Cake Remix: (cake batter™ ice cream, rainbow sprinkles, brownie and fudge): Very artificial vanilla flavor, right at the start. It’s overpowering and it burns my throat.

One thing does confuses me about these beans is their “mixability”. Most of all the other flavors in the Jelly Belly brand are meat to be eaten together in certain recipe combinations to make new flavors. I don’t see that happening with these. This isn’t a problem for me, as I like to eat my Jelly Beans one by one. I can’t help but wonder though…

Even eating these flavors solo, they aren’t enticing enough for me to recommend them.

Rating: Not Worth It

Links
Jelly Belly Website