This was another find from the alternate Shop-Rite I visited about a month ago. I realize I've done quite a few posts about Italian edibles and drinks, but, alas, I am limited to what's available to me here. Now that the pandemic is on the decline, and more stores are safely open again, I should be able to test out some newer and more exotic products soon. Anyway, today's offering is two Fruit-tella gummy types--the strawberry and raspberry kind, and the peach and mango one.
The Fruit-tella story is actually the tale of two companies, so I'll start with the elder statesman. Van Melle began as a bakery in the Breskens area of The Netherlands, in 1840. In 1900, the originator's grandson, Isaak Van Melle, changed it to a confectionary business, concentrating on making candy instead of baked goods. By 1931 Van Melle began making "square sweets." By 1949 Van Melle expanded into Germany, Belgium, and some other European countries. In 1992 the firm expanded outside of Europe, to Russia. And then in March of 2001 Van Melle was acquired by the Italian Perfetti SpA company, and the result was Perfetti Van Melle.
Back in 1946, Ambrogio and Egidio Perfetti started a candy manufacturing company, initially called Dolcitico Lombardo. Their flagship brand was an iconic Italian chewing gum called Brooklyn, after the famous American bridge. In 1963 the company name was changed to Perfetti SpA. After the Perfetti--Van Melle merger occurred, the company continued to flourish. As of now it's the 3rd largest confectionary company in the world, after Mondelez International and Mars, Inc. It employs nearly 18,000 people, has 31 manufacturing facilities around the globe, and exports to over 150 countries. (Side note--if you're curious, as I was, as of 2021 there are 195 independent countries that are U.N. recognized, but another 50 or so claim this status.) The current owners, Augusto and Giorgio Perfetti, have an estimated total worth of 6.3 billion (American) dollars! To continue with the company's cosmopolitan nature, their current CEO is Sameer Suneja, from India. Other brands owned by Perfetti Van Melle include AirHeads, Chupa Chups, and probably most famously, Mentos. There are also many different flavors of Fruit-tella, such as lime, blackcurrant, cola/lemon, and "magic," which reportedly changes flavors as you eat it, kind of like the "several-course-meal-candy" eaten by Violet in the 1971 version of "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory," I guess (I hope!). Furthermore, a few posts ago I jokingly wished I'd read about a product that wasn't GMO-free, allergen-free, vegan-friendly, etc., for a change. Well here it is. Fruit-tella is not vegetarian (they're made in a facility that processes animal-derived gelatin), they're not GMO-free (they use corn, which is genetically modified), and they're not organic. They do lack peanuts/nuts, and artificial colors and flavors, though. And they do use real fruit puree, which is rare for a candy. So there's that.
Fruit-tella soft gummies, peach and mango flavor: These were roundish in shape, little pieces of fruit with faces and feet, about 2 cm. by 2 cm (about .75 inches by .75 inches), in two colors--orangish and yellow. Evidently the orange ones were the mango, and the yellow the peach. These were pretty good. Decent flavor, solid gummy candy. Not great, but far from terrible.
Fruit-tella soft gummies, strawberry and raspberry flavor: Same basic shape and size as the previous, but this time the colors were dull red and blood red. (Apparently, the strawberry ones were the lighter red, and the raspberry the darker.) These were quite good. Nice strong fruit flavor. I guess the use of real fruit was a boon. Better than the other kind. Although, to be fair, while I like peach and mango flavor, I usually enjoy berries more.
Additionally, I should get into the interesting aspects of Mentos. Aside from its bizarrely annoying and cringe-y 1990's television commercials, this candy is best known for its dramatic reaction when it's dropped into certain soft drinks, most notably Diet Coke. This result is a dramatic and entertaining fountain, which can reach several feet, or meters, high. I was surprised to learn that this practice is older than I imagined. One source even said it was done back in the 1910's, although this seems a bit questionable. Anyway, previously people did this type of thing using Wint-o-Green Life Savers and various sodas. However, by the 1990's the Life Savers were increased in size, making it more difficult to fit into soft drink bottle necks. But then folks discovered you could also get a fountain using Mentos. A man named Lee Marek, assisted by some children, demonstrated this on "The Late Show with David Letterman" television program in 1999. However, this phenomenon really went into the public consciousness after Steve Spangler did it on an NBC affiliate out of Denver, Colorado, in March of 2002. The great skeptical program "MythBusters" tackled it as well. Assisted by a nozzle, their team was able to get a fountain height of over 10 meters (or about 34 feet)! Scientists believe this reaction is due to a process called nucleation, caused by the high surface area of the mints, combined with the surface tension-lowering effect of the aspartame artificial sweetener. The most dramatic effect appears to be using the mint flavored Mentos, and Diet Coke. If you're interested in setting the record for most simultaneous fountains, better call ALL your friends. Perfetti Van Melle organized an event wherein 4,334 fountains were set off at once in Leon, Guananjuato, Mexico, in November of 2014.
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