Starburst Gummies – Sour Berries
When it came to candy I could get easy access to as a kid, I tended to favour the berry varieties. Whether it was Starburst or Skittles, I tended to like the berry varieties more than the original. I guess you could say I’m a berry fruity guy. Sorry. I couldn’t help myself. I’m not sure why, but I feel like Skittles was the gateway into berry flavoured stuff. Eventually I branched out and tried Starburst too, which was different texturally, but essentially the same flavour wise, on account of being made by the Mars corporation.
One of the reasons I enjoyed the berry varieties, though not obvious to me as a child, was the fact that they all blended together very well. The contrast in flavours was never so great that I had any jarring experiences with it. Not so with other varieties, where one handful would be citrus, and another would be berry, only to be followed by apple. Blech. I guess berry was always within a certain range, so no matter what combination each handful gave me, it would never stray too far from the median. Typing it out makes me seem like a boring old man, but sometimes I appreciate something “curated” to a certain flavour, instead of a bunch of stark, contrasting ones coming together. It’s also hard to find apple flavoured things in berry varieties, so that’s always a huge plus for me.
Today’s product is thankfully, part of the berry spectrum. Starburst has been experimenting with different formats to go beyond their mainstay taffy candy. Gummies seems like a relatively natural transition. In fact, I feel like most candies branch out into gummies if they didn’t already. Something about gummies lends itself well to basically every sweet flavour profile. Low hanging fruit I guess. Whether it works in their favour or not, I guess we’ll find out. Starburst does tend to have very strong flavours, so I can imagine it working well in a gummy form if they can translate a similar profile.
There’s four flavours here – black raspberry, wild berry, berry punch and strawberry. The light pink one is strawberry, and it tastes exactly like a gummy version of the regular chewy candy. It’s almost scary how similar it is. The darker red one is berry punch, and this one tastes like the generic fruit punch drink that you would get here in North America. There’s no mistaking this flavour. If you grew up in the North, there’s a very high likelihood you’ve tried this flavour. Nostalgia bomb right here. Wild berry is the light purple looking one. This one is fairly mild in flavour, and I’m not sure what kind of berry it’s supposed to be. It’s like some sort of combination of blueberries, raspberries and blackberries. It’s not bad, and is somewhat refreshing when compared to the very strongly flavoured strawberry and berry punch. The final one is this dark purple one, which is black raspberry. I’ve never had a black raspberry so I can’t speak to how close it is in flavour, but this tastes like a mix between raspberry and blackberries. All in all these flavours are relatively sweet, but that’s to be expected from Starburst. The flavours are quite vibrant and strong, so it’s not just overwhelming sweetness. They are also quite faithful to the original starburst berry flavours, so that’s always a nice touch. Sometimes you want that flavour, but you don’t feel like the messy taffy like consistency of the chews.
The thing that surprised me about these gummies is how firm and chewy they are. I don’t expect much from most North American brands when it comes to gummy texture, but these are actually quite solid for what they are. I’m actually impressed. They aren’t quite as firm as Haribo, but they’re firm enough that they don’t just melt in your mouth and have a nice bounce in the chew. I tend to avoid most standard, generic, cheap gummy candies because they often are too soft and end up tasting more like jello than gummy. These are a pleasant surprise and aren’t flimsy, but nice and firm to chew. I like these.
These feel almost like a guilty pleasure gummy for me – I wouldn’t normally opt for these, and if I did, I would probably feel too ashamed to admit it. Probably because I’m always complaining how North American brands aren’t as great and are too artificial, or too sweet. While that’s kind of true in this case, it all seems to work and come together in something I would absolutely buy again. The cognitive dissonance is strong with this one. I would definitely consider getting the other varieties to give them a try, just to see if lightning strikes twice, or it’s a one off type of deal. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go find a pair of aviators and a trench coat to buy these in secret shame.
