The History and Production of Jellybeans Essay Sample

The jellybean is a bean-shaped candy made by Boston confectioner William Schrafft in 1861. The jellybean is composed of a hard outer shell and a soft inside. The soft inside is believed to have originated from the mid-eastern confection called Turkish delight, but no one knows. And even though William was the original creator he would be overshadowed by a small candy-making company of that time, Jelly Belly. Jelly Belly, at the time, was a small company when it released its eight original flavors of jellybeans Root Beer, Green Apple, Licorice, Cream Soda, Lemon, Tangerine, Very Cherry, and Grape. These flavors would give the company a head start into becoming a global company famous for its jellybeans.  

Jellybeans are an edible food usually consumed by both adults and kids all over the world. Jellybeans are the most popular during the Easter season due to their bean shape being confused for an egg. Jellybeans might seem like something easy to make, but now these beans have a strangely hard-to-follow process in creating them, for example, their ingredients. According to jelly belly, their ingredients are, “natural flavors used for flavoring whenever possible, i.e., fruit purees, coconut flakes, coffee, juice concentrates. Other primary ingredients are sugar, corn syrup, modified cornstarch, and confectioner’s glaze. OU Kosher. Diary-free, peanut-free, and gluten-free. Does not contain gelatin.” (Brand fact sheet) 

So, let us get into how jellybeans are created. First, manufacturers heat liquid sugar to about 350°F. Then, they mix starch and glucose. After that, the mixture is poured into the starch bean mold. They then let the mixture dry in the mold for a day to make the cake tough. After being removed from the mold, the bean jelly is steamed and covered with a layer of liquid sugar. They are then placed in a spinning machine. During the spinning process, Jellybeans are constantly modified when artificial colors and flavors are added. This is how they get their final color and taste. Towards the end of the process, the sugar granules are fed into the spinning machine about four times. It is this sugar that gives the jellybeans a hard outer shell. Finally, the hot syrup and wax are fed into the spinning machine at the end giving the jellybeans a glossy appearance. When finished, the jellybeans are dried, packaged, and shipped off to stores and homes.(Wonderopolis) Jelly Belly® alone produces up to 16 billion beans each year just for easter. The reason they can do this is their production capacity of 1,250,000 beans per hour: 300,000 pounds per day. 1,680 beans per second. (Brand fact sheet) 

Jellybeans are a staple in American culture due to their flavor’s history and easily recognizable shape, but how did they get their shape. Well, candy makers back always shaped candies into shapes easily recognized by people like the chocolate bunnies for Easter. Because of this trend of shaping candies into easily recognizable shapes, candy makers shaped the jellybean into a bean since beans were the main staple in people’s diet since they were cheap and easy to grow. Another thing about jellybeans is that they were U.S. President Ronald Reagan’s favorite candy so Jelly Belly® Sent him over 7,000 pounds (about the weight of an elephant) of jellybeans throughout his eight years of presidency. 

So, in conclusion, even though jellybeans are not a groundbreaking creation improving society, they still are a staple in American culture.