William W. Kolb invented the red candy apple. Kolb, a veteran Newark candy-maker, produced his first batch of candied apples in 1908. While experimenting in his candy shop with red cinnamon candy for the Christmas trade, he dipped some apples into the mixture and put them in the windows for display. He sold the whole first batch for 5 cents each and later sold thousands yearly. Soon candied apples were being sold along the Jersey Shore, at the circus and in candy shops across the country, according to the Newark News in 1948.

Here’s the original candy apple recipe:

What You Need

8 medium sized apples

8 wooden sticks

3 cups white sugar

1/2 cup light corn syrup

1 cup water

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon (optional)

1/4 teaspoon red food coloring (optional)

Make It

Wash and dry the apples. Remove any stems or leaves and insert a wooden stick into the end of each apple. Set apples aside.

Heat and stir sugar, corn syrup and water in a saucepan until sugar has dissolved. Boil until the syrup reaches 300 degrees on a candy thermometer, or until a little syrup dropped into cold water separates into breakable threads.

Remove from heat and stir in cinnamon and food coloring, if using.

Dip one apple completely in the syrup and swirl it around a little with the stick to coat. Hold the apple above the saucepan to drain off excess. Place apple, with the stick facing up, on a well greased pan.

Repeat with remaining apples. If syrup thickens or cools too much, simply reheat briefly before proceeding. Let cool completely before serving.

Variations: After coating each apple, quickly dip the end or press and swirl apples in shredded coconut, colored M&M’s, chopped nuts, granola or colored sprinkles.

If you saw the first Harry Potter movie you will know exactly what Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Beans are. Some of the most disgusting, repulsive and horrid flavors ever imaginable jam packed into a tiny little jelly bean. Of course this was a huge marketable item for the Potter franchise and who better to make them than the world renown leaders in jelly bean production, Jelly Belly. Yes, those overpriced beans that everyone loves to receive as gifts. We went through a rather trying time with Bertie Bott’s; the brood loved combining the flavors to make even more repulsive tastes. Suffice it to say, you haven’t lived until you’ve had a Booger and Trout flavor combination.

Jelly Belly Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Beans

What’s the big deal, they are just jelly beans? Well, if they were just jelly beans they wouldn’t have a huge price tag attached to them and they certainly wouldn’t still be in production. Sure, the 3.5 ounce ‘wizard bag’ isn’t as popular as it once was but it is still an incredible seller. The biggest thing to know about this is that you are only getting twenty select flavors with the pouch version. The last time I counted them up there were over 150 different flavors and when you get into combining them, well, the potential for flavor mixes is endless. The wizards pouch is nice but it isn’t anything that you are going to hang on to unless you are a huge Potter fan.

The 3.5 ounce wizard bags contain twenty flavors but you are not guaranteed to get each and every flavor in the bag; is that clever marketing or what? There is a small fold out on the flavors and it shows a photo of the Every Flavor Bean along with the name. Some of the colors of them are enough to turn your stomach but if you are brave enough to try them, well, I tip my wizards hat to you. The flavors are: Grape, Rotten Egg, Black Pepper, Cinnamon, Booger, Ear Wax, Buttered Popcorn, Earthworm, Grass, Lemon, Sardine, Soap, Bacon, Toasted Marshmallow, Green Apple, Tutti-Fruitti, Very Cherry, Vomit, Blueberry and Dirt.

What are the best and worst flavors? Sometimes you can’t go by just the name of something, the Butter Popcorn wasn’t any real shock since that is one of the old school Jelly Belly flavors. The Lemon, Cinnamon, Blueberry, Tutti-Fruitti and Toasted Marshmallow are the normal run of the mill jelly bean flavors; the true taste is there but they are all a little overly sweet. Green Apple is tart but with a pleasant aftertaste to it, Grass tastes like a mix between lime and some type of industrial hand soap you wash your hands with in a public bathroom and Earthworm tastes like cocoa but very gritty. The brood said it tasted completely different to them so every person is going to have a different “taste interpretation” of them.

If the myriad of flavors in the 3.5 ounce bag is too much for you, you can get this in dedicated flavor selections like the ten flavor pack that includes Boogers, Rotten Egg, Earwax, Dirt and Sardine. Getting them in this format allows you to know what flavors you are actually consuming thanks to the little flavor guide that comes with it. If you want to experience every single flavor, well you are going to have to spend about $49.99 and get the massive four pound container of Bertie Bott’s but the upside is you do get a complete color guide to all the flavors. Some of those include Salmon, Brussel Sprouts, Centipede, Sushi, Worcestershire Sauce, Paprika, Baked Beans, Curry, Frog Legs, Sand, Onion, Toe Nails and Squid. If you want to get the newest flavors you will have to settle for the smaller 1.6 ounce boxes since they are the newest off the production line.

The Bottom Line

So the Bertie Bott’s are too tame for you? Then perhaps you need to check out some of the other gross Potter offerings. Here are some of the Harry Potter candies that are still in production; “Chocolate Frogs”, “Blood Pops”, “Cockroach Clusters’, ‘Acid Pops”, “Jelly Slugs”, “Fizzing Whizbees”, “Cotton Candy Bubble Gum”. The real appeal to the Bertie Bott’s is that there is an unending combination of flavors that you can make with them. If you can get past the flavors on a solo level then you should be able to handle any combination. I was the human guinea pig for several of the broods taste experiments and suffered through it for the sake of science, well, at least that is what they conned in into thinking.