"licorice" news and stories

It's easy to get into the spirit of fall produce -- what's not to love about fresh apples and beautiful root vegetables? But it takes a true fall-lover to embrace the all of the candies of fall as well. You have to take the candy corn with the caramel apples, the liquorice with the maple sugar candy. Liquorice it seems, is a pretty divisive candy. If you hate it, you hate it. I love it, and here are some yummy variations that I've spotted across the web.

Liquorice Root Tea from Teaviews

Liquorice Altoids, reviewed by Candy Addict

Liquorice Caramels from the Vermont Country Store

Liquorice Pudding from Epicurious

Very Salty Liquorices from Dutch Sweets

Liqource Cupcakes from Apple & Spice

Liquorice Ice Cream from Chow

Chocolate Licorice from Chocolate Heaven

In the pantheon of "acquired tastes" - natto, Scotch, chitlins, bitter melon - salty licorice definitely deserves a throne. This northern and western European favorite, also known as salmiak, doesn't really taste like anything else I associate with the word "food." That's not to say it's bad - after years of licorice-eating, I've come around to its acrid, ammonia-laced punch. But I've only recently learned what makes it taste the way it does.

It's not salt. Well, it's not NaCl - sodium chloride - the stuff that's in our salt shakers. Despite the name "salty licorice" and the definite saline flavor, the "salt" in salmiak comes from ammonium chloride, also known as sal ammoniac, a mildly acidic salt of ammonia. It's pungent, peppery stuff - a bag of strong salmiak smells like something wafting out of test tube in Chem 101.

Popular type of salty licorice include diamond-shaped Dutch double salt disks, Dutch cat-shaped drops, soft Finnish salmiak bars, and hard Swedish "Turkish pepper" pastilles.

We are entering a whole new era in dentistry. One in which we'll be able to eat candy to prevent cavities. Specifically, we'll be able to suck on a licorice lollipop.

Scientists from UCLA School of Dentistry have developed this sugar free treat using Glycyrrhiza uralensis, which is "a liquorice root extract that destroys the bacteria responsible for dental cavities." The extract doesn't kill other bacteria necessary for a healthy mouth.

The developers collaborated with scientists in China to work out what kind of herbs to use. Once they had determined what would work, they had to create a delivery vehicle. Lollipops were chosen because they are consumed slowly, giving the active ingredients time to work their magic. Only 15 milligrams of licorice root powder are needed to kill the harmful bacteria, Streptococcus mutans.

So one day soon we'll be able to prevent cavities with lollipops. Maybe next we'll have plaque scraping treats and edibles that floss for us. Though it is still a thing of the present, this gives me hope that a trip to the dentist will one day be a thing of the past.

[Via ConfectioneryNews]

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I've never liked American licorice candies, since they have no licorice flavor whatsoever. I've sampled some of the Dutch double-salt licorice and while it's certainly an acquired taste, it's one I do enjoy, particularly when I'm in the mood for an extreme licorice experience.

But my hands-down favorite for licorice has to be the Italian candies made by Menozzi De Rossa. Being the sucker for cool foreign packaging that I am, I have to admit that that's one reason I like them. Lunik, with its nifty slide-drawer metal container sports a doctor jauntily pointing at the name. It reminds me of packaging for an old-time patent medicine. Rombetti di Liquirizia all'Anice, brings to mind Peter Max because of the picture of a gnome bearing a bundle of bright flowers interspersed with licorice cylinders.

Aesthetics aside the real reason I like these candies so much is because of their intensity of flavor. Each is only half as big as a pencil eraser, but the the licorice flavor lasts for five minutes minutes or more. I presently own three containers. At the rate I'm going through them I should have exhausted my supply by 2010.

I've never liked black licorice. I don't mind the taste of fennel or anise, and I'll even drink Sambuca every now and then, but I've always found black licorice repulsive. That is, until I tried this Dutch "dubbel zout" or double salt licorice. A Dutch co-worker was a fan, and she ate it with such zeal that I had to give it a try. To my surprise, it had all of the anise flavor I enjoy but none of the qualities I dislike in regular black licorice. That said, almost everyone else I know hates the stuff. Every time I buy it, the lady at the candy store inevitably says something like, "You're actually gonna eat that?" The folks over at Bad-Candy.com aren't fans, either. But I am. Just imagine the taste of licorice but instead of cloyingly sweet, it's really, really salty. My Dutch friend says it'll sooth a cough too.

[Photo: Nick Vagnoni]