Bassett's Jelly Babies

I am going to make a controversial statement now (ready?): war can be good. Of course I do not mean that war is good but rather war can bring about some good things. In the midst of all the death and dying medical advances can be made far quicker than they would have occurred in peacetime.

Of course after a period of war comes the period when there is peace. During this period everyone is so happy and full of joy at the fact that it is peacetime again that they get a little bit idealistic and say things like there will never be another war. They also do various things to mark the peace. Governments declare holidays, new parks and things are opened and let’s not forget the food.

So after the First World War Bassetts introduced a special sweet to celebrate peace. They called them Peace Babies. And indeed what better way to celebrate peace than chomp on a baby. A few years (and wars) later the Peace Babies became Jelly Babies which has to be one of the more successful name changes in confectionary history.

Now admittedly Jelly Babies have never featured very predominantly in my life. I never bought a packet for myself and any that I happened upon were usually a gift or bought by accident. However Jelly Babies are one of those sweets that everyone is familiar with. I did not set out to buy Jelly Babies but Liquorice Allsorts and by happy co-incidence there was a Buy One Get One Free offer on so I seized my opportunity and bought a bag of Jelly Babies to go with the Liquorice Allsorts.

Jelly Babies are available in 215gram bags or little small snack size bags usually found in Treat Size Variety packs. I snaffled a 215gram bag and it set me back by 99p. Generally speaking (and depending on where you buy them) a similar sized bag will set you back by around £1 to £2 (at petrol stations). The bag is instantly recognisable. It is predominantly yellow with black strips across the top and bottom. In the upper strip there is a red box with the word “Bassetts” in it. In the centre of the bag there are three cartoon Jelly Babies trying to break free (or at least that what it looks like to me). Above the babies there were the words “Jelly Babies” in black, green, yellow, pink, red and orange letters. The bag seems designed to appeal to children yet be adult enough for adults to buy without feeling daft. On the back of the pack there is some information about three Jelly Babies. Touchingly Bassetts have given each Jelly Baby a name.

The bag can be somewhat difficult to open so I resorted to scissors (as I hate tearing packaging). Once open I was hit with a fruity-sweet smell. I could pick out some very sweet citrus and generic berry smells, emanating from the contents. Inside the bag there were the Jelly Babies themselves. For some reason the Jelly Babies are all covered in icing sugar which gives them a strange frosted jewel-like appearance. It also makes them look like they have just left their crack dealers. But I digress. They are quite big sweets compared to other sweets.

The Jelly Babies come in 6 flavours and so there are six colours of Jelly Babies. Please note that the number in brackets indicates how many of each sweet I found in my bag as a guide of what to expect.

Green (11)
This Jelly Baby was wiping a tear from his eye. Bassetts claim that he is crying with happiness. I beg to differ. Green’s flavour (I won’t use their names that would just be cruel) is lime. The taste when chewed is a sweet limey taste with none of the tang of fresh lime. There also seems to be a sort of berry undertone. When sucked the flavour seems less sweet and more sharp which is very pleasant.

Yellow (7)
This Jelly Baby was not doing anything unusual. Yellow is universally known as lemon flavour. When chewed the flavour was sharper than the lime flavour and tasted distinctly of sweet lemons. When sucked the flavour seemed less sweet and sharper and was actually quite refreshing and did not leave me gasping for a drink. Sometimes I find that very sweet things can make you thirsty.

Orange (5)
Unsurprisingly this colour has a flavour that corresponds. The taste was a citrus sweetness and the closest anemology I have is that it tastes like orange scented bubble bath smells. It is not a sharp orange flavour as you can find in some sweets. It was very pleasant but not my favourite.

Black (3)
Black can only be blackcurrant flavour (except where it is blackberry of course). The blackcurrant taste was the sharp slightly artificial tang that I have come to expect from blackcurrant sweets. As a child I always found this a bit too strong but now that I am grown up I quite like it. This flavour was very pleasant and not too sweet.

Pink (5)
This one is shaped like an actual baby, complete with bonnet. It appears to be waving but at what I do not know (perhaps farewell, heh heh heh, enough must stop tormenting Jelly Babies). I am not quite sure what flavour pink is supposed to represent but it tasted to me like raspberry, so raspberry it is. The flavour is sweet but there is perhaps a subtle sharpness as you would expect from fresh raspberries and there is none of the dry taste that comes with strawberries. Out of all the flavours this was the sweetest.

Red (4)
Thankfully this Jelly Baby was not waving at me. Usually red is strawberry and this did taste like strawberries but it also had a sort of perfumy cherry hint to it. It tasted sharper than the pink one and also seemed to have a stronger flavour.

Overall these are truly excellent sweets. How could anyone not love them? They are very moreish and have a unique texture. When chewed they are pleasingly chewy but do not get stuck in your teeth like wine gums. When you fist bite done on a Jelly Baby it is like a jelly explosion in your mouth as the outer edge of the Jelly Baby has a slight sugary crust to is. When sucked they dissolve into sugary lumps in your mouth which is very pleasant. They also seem to taste less sweet when sucked but that is maybe due to the fact that you have sucked off the icing sugar.

I would recommend Jelly Babies to anyone who likes chewy, jelly like sweets. Although to be fair Jelly Babies have no real equivalent. They would be equally good for children as for adults. However some people may find them too sweet and may not like the addition of the icing sugar. The icing sugar makes your fingers dusty and has a habit of getting everywhere, which you may wan to bear in mind when purchasing. They are not too sickly which means you can easily eat a handful without feeling sick.

If I had any criticism of the product it would be that the bag is not resealable. However you can easily solve this problem by employing a clothes peg or some sticky back plastic (surely enough for my Blue Peter badge?).

I think that the Jelly Babies provide excellent value for money. I paid 99p for my bag and in return I got 35 Jelly Babies which works out at roughly 3p per baby. When you consider that a bag will last me several days and I can make each Jelly Baby last a few minutes by sucking them, I think that this provides good value.

I also feel that in a small way I am protesting for peace when I eat a Jelly Baby. You know the world would be a better place if, instead of bombing countries to pieces, people ate Jelly Babies. So kindly join my crusade for peace and bite the head off the nearest Baby, I mean Jelly Baby (unless you are Hannibal Lecter in which case…have a steak).