Monday, August 18, 2014

Jelly Belly Beanaturals: 14 Flavors

Jelly Belly BeanaturalsIt seems odd that I picked up Jelly Belly jelly beans while I was in London, but this particular box isn’t available here. I bought this cute little pocket-sized flip-top box of Jelly Belly Beanaturals: 14 Flavors at Selfridges.

These beans are made in Thailand. In fact, if you see Jelly Belly candy in a store outside of North America, it’s probably going to be the Thai-made version. Many European countries have strict rules about genetically modified ingredients, the factory there uses non-GMO sugar and non-GMO glucose syrup (from tapioca instead of corn. (You can read more about that here.)

So, in addition to being free of any GMO ingredients, the beans are also made with all natural flavorings and colorings. They’re kosher, made in a nut free facility and gluten free. This is actually not that different from many of the jelly beans and other candies that Jelly Belly offers ... except for that GMO thing. Jelly Belly has plenty of beans mixes that are all natural ... so what I’m really trying out here is the European version.

Jelly Belly Beanaturals

The box is not large and only holds 1.59 ounces, so there were not even that many beans in there considering there were going to be 14 different flavors. In my assortment I had six Lime. Only one Barbecue Banana, but six Lime beans. These are the hazards of random distribution.

The first thing I noticed was how quickly the beans lose their freshness. The box was shrinkwrapped, and when I photographed them over the weekend, the beans I ate were soft and normal. But later in the week, oh, about Wednesday, when I worked on this post in earnest, they were suddenly hard. They were kept in the flip top box, closed, out of the sun and within a reasonable temperature span. Yet they were stiff and, well, stale.

Lime (light green) is nicely rounded, a little bitter towards the end and missing more of the juicy tartness.

Plum (dark maroon) is sweet and sort of like actual plum ...maybe just the plum skin but not much of the fruity, juicy notes.

Barbecue Banana (speckled yellow) is quite nice. Very sweet but the banana does have more of a baked sweetness to it, instead of the artificial vanilla note. I actually thought I only had one of these until I realized later that I had a bunch of opaque yellow ones that weren’t lemon leftover that were banana. Yum.

Orange (orange) is sweet but with a zesty note towards the end. It reminded me more of an orange jelly slice than a jelly bean as it lacked that tart bite.

Tangerine (orange) was really similar to the orange, so much so, I wasn’t sure they were different except that there were several of those and they were definitely a lighter orange. I wanted something intensely orange with that hint of lemon that real tangerines have. They were fine, but I really had my hopes up.

Jelly Belly Beanaturals

Lemon (yellow) was in the citrus zone that I hoped Tangerine would be. It was both sweet and tart and had a strong lemon peel bitterness at the top.

Cherry (red) was good. It was fruity without any hint of the bitterness that artificial colors can bring. The flavor also lasted a while, with a sort of jasmine floral finish.

Strawberry Jam (light pink) was actually more like jam than fresh strawberries. This left it more on the sweet side, without that delightful cotton candy floral note, but still good and nice in combination with my many Lime beans.

Juicy Pear (medium green) was weird and grassy and maybe even a little garlicky ... to the point where I was wondering if I got a Bernie Bott’s bean by mistake. But I only had one of these beans, so there was no way for me to get someone else’s opinion.

Pineapple (uncolored) was bland overall, like canned pineapple instead of the fresh stuff. Too much syrup and not enough acid.

Passion Fruit (speckled orange) is okay, it actually didn’t taste like much except for that generic “tropical candle” flavor.

Coconut (white with small speckles) tastes undeniably like coconut. It just does. Sometimes I thought there were actually coconut bits in it. You’d think it would go well with Pineapple ... and you’d be right.

Yup, there’s one missing here ... I didn’t get any Fruit Punch in my box. I’m okay with that.

I don’t think I’ve had this issue with the beans getting really hard so quickly before. Jelly Beans are one of those candies that is intended to be put in an open container for serving ... a bowl of jelly beans. If they can’t take being in a closed but not sealed box for several days without losing their freshness, I’m not sure I can commit to eating the full box (I know, it’s less than 2 ounces) within a day.

Related Candies

  1. Sockerbit Swedish Candy Selections
  2. David’s Signature Beans Jelly Bean Sampler
  3. Jelly Belly Snapple Jelly Beans
  4. Jelly Belly Sunkist Citrus Mix
  5. Organic Zootons
  6. Jelly Belly - All Natural


Name: Beanaturals
    RATING:
  • SUPERB
  • YUMMY
  • TASTY
  • WORTH IT
  • TEMPTING
  • PLEASANT
  • BENIGN
  • UNAPPEALING
  • APPALLING
  • INEDIBLE
Brand: Jelly Belly
Place Purchased: Selfridges (London, UK)
Price: ​​​£ 1.35 ($2.25)
Size: 1.59 ounces
Calories per ounce: 102
Categories: All Natural, Candy, Jelly Belly, Jelly Candy, 7-Worth It, Thailand

POSTED BY Cybele AT 4:18 pm Tracker Pixel for Entry     All NaturalCandyReviewJelly BellyJelly CandyKosher7-Worth ItThailand

Comments
  1. Interest review…you need to have your taste buds insured by Lloyds of London…

    Comment by david klein on 8/18/14 at 6:43 pm #
  2. thanks ever so much. i always wanted a beanatural review as part of being a jelly belly uk fan and wanted to know what people think of the seperate flavors. so thanks

    Comment by Ben Exworth on 8/18/14 at 6:48 pm #
  3. david. i have been a big fan of the beanaturals. especially since they are really nice and got some old classic flavors like passion fruit and guava. they are available in UK. i might get some for birthday.

    Comment by Ben Exworth on 8/19/14 at 7:03 am #
  4. I wonder if the Juicy Pear jelly bean has a cilantro thing going on - it tastes vile to me and my sister, for example, but my father can eat it and doesn’t complain about it… (though that might be my fault because I made him eat all the Juicy Pear jelly beans in the assortment he brought me as a souvenir when I was a kid, maybe he developed a taste for them…)

    The citrus jelly beans are really nice and quite close to the real deal in Europe, but a lot of the other flavours are just vile (buttered popcorn! Eugh). I mostly stick to the Sunkist mix or just the grapefruit beans.

    Comment by enterpricicle on 10/07/14 at 1:49 am #
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