Guest Post: Chinese Candy Grab Bag – Xida Corn Flavor Jelly

Last week and this week, I’m turning the reviewing over to my friend Neil. He’s from upstate New York but is currently living in the Netherlands. Ironically enough, his guest posts are about Chinese candy.

A labmate went home to China to celebrate the New Year and brought back a lot of candy to share. I asked her to select some for me. Here were my impressions.

This past weekend, I had Surinamese food for the first time. The woman behind the counter, when asked about desserts, offered us cornmeal-based cookies on the house.

I haven’t thought of corn before as a basis for sweet things, but with the addition of the Xida Corn Flavour Jelly (XCFJ) to my belly, I’ve had 2 in 3 days. I hesitate to call it a trend, as it’s probably just that I’m opening my eyes to a worldwide phenomenon.

The XCFJ was sized and shaped like a very fat baby corn. It was sticky to the touch and had a fair amount of give, as is to be expected. The first bite was full of corn flavor and a fun, expected, gummy chewiness.

I wondered if this was just dyed, molded corn syrup? If so, kudos to Xida for figuring out a novel way to plump me up. Sometimes it was almost savory, but other times the sugar came through.

I couldn’t decide on whether it was more like canned corn, popcorn, corn oil, or corn on the cob. Finally it hit me: it’s like the Finger Lakes Distilling corn whiskey I bought from FLD’s first batch (the recipe’s changed for the better), minus the alcohol and plus some gooey fun!

I rationed my final bites to be sure of what I was tasting. Yep. Corn, corn, and nothing but the corn, so help me cob.  I’d call it at least an OM.

If you sat me down in a movie theater with a bucket of these and a 32 oz. Diet Coke, I’d probably eat a lot before the opening credits then feel a good bit overwhelmed, but not disappointed with myself.