The Best of Everything: The Best Jellybean Flavor

Tuesday, May 06, 2008

The Best Jellybean Flavor

Ronald Reagan wrecked jellybeans.

Before Reagan became president, jelly beans were just jelly beans. But Reagan, as you'll recall, was known for one thing and one thing only: his love of "Jelly Belly Jelly Beans," those smaller, more gourmet, fancier, weirdly-flavored jellybeans, the idea for which J.K. Rowling stole when she created "Bertie Botts' Every Flavor Beans."

I bet you J.K. Rowling didn't think of that when she was busy suing a guy for making a little money while publicizing her creation. I bet you J.K. Rowling didn't guess that she might be on the end of a lawsuit brought against her by Big Jelly Bean. It would serve her right.

But J.K. Rowlings' stealing of an idea from a candy company is not the major issue here; the major issue is that Reagan's sole achievement in office, the popularizing of small, fancy jellybeans with flavors like "Buttered Popcorn" and "Toasted Marshmallow," came at the expense of old-school jellybeans, which had flavors like "red" and "white."

Now, when you go to the store to buy jellybeans, which you only do at Easter because jellybeans haven't really caught on as a candy outside of Easter time, even though there's no real reason they should be associated solely with Easter -- they could just as easily be a year-round candy if Big Jelly Bean would get to some marketing-- when you go to the store to buy jellybeans, you've got to wade through Jelly Bellys and Starburst Jelly Beans and God knows what else, all these upstart "Gen-Y" jellybeans that bear about as much resemblance to real jelly beans as Starbucks coffee does to something palatable.

That's a shame, really. It's a shame because in the long run, history will judge Reagan harshly for his role in the Great Jelly Bean Shame, and it's a shame because jelly beans should be simple. Jelly beans should be honest. Jelly beans should not have "real" flavors.

There's a lot of debate over what "flavor" jelly beans are. Take Yahoo! Answers, for example. Yahoo! Answers is the only site I've ever found that's less helpful and less accurate than Wikipedia. The way I understand Yahoo! Answers to work is that people pose a question, and then ordinary shmoes like you and me can give answers, and other ordinary shmoes can vote on who they think is the most right.

That's an answer? That's an answer? I can't believe that Yahoo! Answers is allowed to exist. Has our society really devolved to a point where simply saying something makes it a fact? Really? Because if that's the point we're at, I am as handsome as a young Tom Selleck. And also I'm rich.

It gets worse: in a stunning combination of the two most inaccurate references ever, Yahoo! Answers relied on Wikipedia to answer the question What flavor is a white jellybean? The answer(s) given by Yahoo! users -- who no doubt have impeccable credentials in the field of Jelly Bean Flavoring, judging by the fact that their user names include such luminaries as "Brak Hates Hillary Clinton," include vanilla, coconut, "coconut ;) ", "they all taste the same," "tropical," "creme soda," and my personal favorite: "Mystery."

That answer sums up in one word exactly what's wrong with Wikipedia and Yahoo! Answers. Somebody went online to answer the question "What flavor is a white jellybean?" and that somebody admittedly had no answer!

All right. Deep breath.

Jelly beans should not be flavors that are identifiable as real-world flavors. They should be flavors that exist only in jelly bean world, flavors like "green" and "red" and "white" and, of course, "black." I say "of course" because Black is The Best Jelly Bean Flavor.

Black as a jelly bean flavor has two things going for it: First, it's the only flavor that stands out from the other jelly bean flavors. Try this experiment. (You'll need a friend!)

1. Get a bag of real, non-yuppified jelly beans.
2. Sort them by color.
3. Get your friend to blindfold you. (Don't forget to wear safety glasses!)
4. Have your friend give you one jelly bean at a time and try to guess the color. (Note: Make sure that you have a trusted friend who will not put a bug in your mouth.)

You will only be able to identify black with any consistency or accuracy.

Black, as a jelly bean flavor, has also another strong point: it colors your tongue. Foods that turn your mouth colors are great. None of the other jelly beans do that. You can eat all the green jelly beans you want -- as though you'd want to -- and they won't turn your tongue green. But black jelly beans turn your tongue, not black exactly, but a sort of purpley-black.

Those are two very very strong arguments in favor of Black as the best flavor for jellybeans. But I've got one other point that supports my thesis and is irrefutable: Black jelly beans are the only flavor of candy that is redundant.

"Black" jelly beans are described, by everyone, as being the flavor of "Black licorice." So what flavor is "black licorice?" It's licorice flavored. If "licorice" is "licorice flavored," and black jelly beans are "licorice flavored," then Black jelly beans are "black jelly beans flavored."

It's simple arithmetic. Remember the transitive property? If A=B, and B= C, then A=C. It works on Jelly Bean Flavors. The Transitive Property Of Jelly Bean Flavors is:

If Black Jelly Beans = black licorice and

Black licorice= licorice

Then Black jelly beans = licorice.

But since black jelly beans and licorice are the same thing, it's equally correct to say:

Black jelly beans = black jelly beans.

That does not work with other colors of Jelly Beans. Take, for example, red. The Transitive Property of Flavors doesn't add up for Red Jelly Beans.

Red jelly beans = ?

? = Mystery flavor.

Nor does the Transitive Property of Jelly Bean Flavors apply to other foods. Let's try it on Peanut Butter:

Peanut butter = peanut flavored butter.

Butter = creamy flavored dairy product.

Not equal to the same thing at all. So through that simple exercise, I have proven that black jelly beans are the only thing in the world that is flavored like itself.

I am the Stephen Hawking of candy.