Watermelon Jelly Belly Jelly Beans - 10 lbs bulk
Click to buy directly from Jelly Belly!
Click to buy directly from Jelly Belly!
The Good: Tastes good, Environmentally responsible bulk
The Bad: No real nutritional value, Taste fades quickly
The Basics: Not the ideal flavor of Jelly Belly jelly beans, Watermelon Jelly Belly's disappoint some.
Some might have wondered just what it takes for me to reject the environmental responsibility of the 10 lb. box of Jelly Belly's in favor of a smaller size package. The answer, now that I finally have one, is simple: a less worthwhile flavor. I found that flavor with Watermelon Jelly Belly's, one of the few flavors of Jelly Belly that is fair at best and that seems to have little or no reason to be stocked up on.
For those who might never have had Jelly Belly jelly beans, these are easily the best jelly beans on the planet, packing a lot of flavor into a very small size. Unlike most jelly beans which are only vaguely flavored and are more based on colors, Jelly Belly jelly beans have a wide variety of actual flavors, like Berry Blue, A&W Root Beer, the Smoothie Assortment, or their signature flavor Buttered Popcorn.
Who needs ten pounds of Watermelon flavored Jelly Belly's? For Watermelon, I find myself unsure!
Basics
Watermelon is a flavor of Jelly Belly jelly beans. Jelly Belly jelly beans are approximately one half inch long by one quarter inch wide and they are roughly bean-shaped. These little candies are marketed to taste precisely like Watermelon and they come more or less close enough.
Watermelon flavored Jelly Belly's are available in a wide array of quantities, but the largest quantity available is the ten pound bulk case. This is a decent-sized box with a plastic lining and while some might wonder why anyone would need a ten pound box, I find myself simply repeating that question; why would anyone need ten pounds of this mediocre jelly bean? The Watermelon flavor is a fair one. I suspect that for most people, a ten pound case is a year's supply of these jelly beans.
Watermelon flavored Jelly Belly's are easily distinguishable from other flavors of Jelly Belly's by their dark green and red coloring. They are a fairly consistent mix of green and red, which makes them different from Green Apple (translucent solid green), Juicy Pear (opaque olive green with spots), lemon-lime (translucent light green), kiwi (solid neon green) and Margarita (translucent green with spots).
Ease Of Preparation
These are jelly beans, not naming all of the former vice presidents of the United States. Preparing them is as easy as opening the box and popping one (or a handful) into your mouth. In the case of the ten pound box, one might want to put them in a candy dish of some form as opposed to always going into the box. Then again, if one is bobbing for Watermelon flavored Jelly Belly's, the open box might well be the best way.
Taste
Watermelon Jelly Belly jelly beans are good, but not great. This is not a flavor of Jelly Belly that is likely to light the world on fire. Instead, like watermelons themselves, Watermelon flavored Jelly Belly jelly beans have a more subtle flavor. Watermelon, one might recall, was named because its dominant taste is . . . water. Let's be honest; who wants a flavor of jelly bean that has a taste mostly reminiscent of water?! No one I know either.
The problem, then, is that Watermelon Jelly Belly's have too distinct a flavor to actually replicate the taste of watermelons. The beans have the faint aroma that embodies the produced, oft-assumed scent of watermelon that those who frequent candle shops and aromatherapy booths would recognize as watermelon more than farmers and produce vendors who work with actual watermelons. Like many fruit flavors, there is a difference between the actual fruit and the taste/scent of the confection/other food version of it. Watermelon Jelly Belly's suffer from that syndrome.
The result is a jelly bean that smells like Assumed Watermelon and tastes more like lemon or a more rich and flavorful fruit than actual watermelons. Indeed, there is a somewhat generic sweet and fruity taste to watermelon Jelly Belly's that makes it a tough sell, even to those who love Jelly Belly jelly beans.
Either way, Watermelon seems to be one of the flavors that one cannot eat in excess in one sitting before the taste begins to fade and the taster is simply tasting a generic, sugary flavor of gelatin. It does seem that this is not one of the flavors that is flavored strongly on both the shell and the center, leading to a generic taste within a handful, even when eaten bean by bean.
Nutrition
Again, these are jelly beans, so anyone looking to them for nutrition needs to do a comparison between the nutritional information provided by a greengrocer and the fine folks at Jelly Belly. Jelly beans, even Jelly Belly jelly beans, are not a legitimate source of nutrition. These are a snack food, a dessert, and are in no way an adequate substitute for a real meal. A serving is listed at thirty-five beans, with each Jelly Belly jelly bean having approximately four calories. This means that in a single serving, there are 140 calories, which is 12% of your daily recommended intake.
The thing is, Jelly Belly jelly beans are not as bad as they could be in the nutrition area. They have no fat and no protein, but for those who have ever dated a Vegan, these are Vegan compliant because they contain no gelatin! They have only one percent of the daily sodium with 15 mg and they are gluten free! The main ingredients are sugar, corn syrup and modified food starch, so it's not like this is an all-natural food, but they could be far, far worse.
Storage/Clean-up
Jelly Belly jelly beans have a shelf life of approximately one year and I have yet to run across a stale Jelly Belly (though that could have something to do with a package never surviving a year around me . . .). They remain freshest when they are kept in an airtight container (the bag in the bulk box is sufficient if it is kept closed) and they ought to be kept in a lukewarm environment. Storing them in hot places is likely to make the beans stick together and be gross. Kept in a cool, dry place, the beans retain their flavor perfectly.
As for cleanup, unless one allows the Jelly Belly to get hot to the point that the waxy coating on the bean melts, the dyes on these do not bleed or denature, so there is usually no cleanup necessary, not even washing one's hands after eating them (always wash your hands before eating Jelly Belly's, though, especially when coming in off working in the fields; who knows what you touched out there?! I don't care if you were wearing gloves!). I've never had Watermelon Jelly Belly's stain anything. That said, it's pretty wild to be able to eat something that tastes so much like watermelon and not have to clean watermelon juice off one's fingers afterward!
Overall
In the end, though, Watermelon is simply too unlike the flavor of actual watermelons to rate highly or recommend. With so many amazing flavors of Jelly Belly jelly beans, it's easy to give this one a pass and move on to other, far better flavors.
For other Jelly Belly flavors reviewed by me, please check out:
Strawberry Daiquiri
7UP
Peach
4/10
For other food and drink reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!
© 2011, 2008 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
| | |
No comments:
Post a Comment