Buttered Popcorn Jelly Beans Have Divided Candy Lovers for Decades: Are They Good or Gross?

A food scientist had to rethink everything about jelly bean flavors to create what’s considered the world’s first savory variety, and candy fans have been arguing about the result ever since.

The Buttered Popcorn Jelly Belly, which turned 25 years old in 2014, is considered the world’s first savory jelly bean flavor, according to the Jelly Belly website. Its creation required rethinking the fundamental assumptions of what a jelly bean could be. That task fell to Ambrose Lee, director of flavor development at Jelly Belly and the food scientist who created the flavor. The challenge: make a candy defined by sweetness taste like something built on salt and butter.

“When we developed Buttered Popcorn, we didn’t use a lot of sweetness,” Lee said, per Jelly Belly. “We had to focus on the buttery flavor and salt. Because it’s a jelly bean, there’s still that touch of sweetness to it. I think many people either like that touch of sweetness to the savory or they reject it.”

That sweet-savory tension made Buttered Popcorn the most controversial Jelly Belly flavor, according to the Jelly Belly website. You either love it or you hate it. Licorice is the runner-up in the controversy department.

Being divisive hasn’t dented its sales numbers. Very Cherry held the title of most popular Jelly Belly flavor for two decades until Buttered Popcorn dethroned it in 1998. Very Cherry reclaimed the crown in 2003 and has remained the top seller since, but Buttered Popcorn still commands a devoted following.

America’s overall favorite Jelly Belly flavors are Very Cherry, Buttered Popcorn, Licorice, Juicy Pear and Sizzling Cinnamon, according to the Jelly Belly website. For kids, the preferences are different: Cotton Candy, Green Apple and Berry Blue.

In April 2023, Taste of Home worked with CandyStore.com to go through candy records and find the most popular flavors by state. Buttered Popcorn was the most popular in 10 states: Arizona, Arkansas, California, Connecticut, Georgia, Michigan, Missouri, New York, Ohio and Texas.

Licorice ranked second overall, topping sales in Alaska, Colorado, Kentucky, Minnesota, New Jersey, North Carolina, North Dakota and Tennessee. Cinnamon came in third as a top seller in Delaware, Kansas, Nevada, Virginia and Wyoming. Watermelon ranked fourth with high sales in Alabama, Florida, Hawaii, Oregon and Wisconsin. Cherry rounded out the top five with the highest sales in Iowa, Nebraska, New Mexico, South Carolina, Utah and Washington, D.C.

The original eight Jelly Belly flavors were introduced in 1976: Lemon, Root Beer, Tangerine, Cream Soda, Green Apple, Licorice, Grape and Very Cherry. From that modest beginning, the brand grew to a massive scale.

According to the Jelly Belly website, 1,680 jelly beans are produced per second. Some 15 billion jelly beans are eaten each year. Laid end to end, those beans would wrap around the Earth approximately five times. The amount of Jelly Belly jelly beans made in one day equals the weight of 24 elephants.

This article was created by content specialists using various tools, including AI.