Sugar Savvy

Southern California may have Disneyland, but Northern California has its own version of kid-swamped chaos: the Jelly Belly Factory in Fairfield, just east of the Napa Valley.

Faith Kramer did an excellent article about the tour, so I decided to take it since I was staying just a few miles down the road. However, I guess I picked the wrong time to go: the line to take the tour would be over an hour!

As much as I love Jelly Bellies, I looked at the line, the happy yet sugar-high children, and decided that the tour would have to be another day.

It didn’t stop me from still going to the factory store though. You can buy “Belly Flops,” their slightly imperfect jelly beans, for $8 / 2.5 lb. bag. And they even had them buy 3, get 1 free! The only thing is that the flavors are all mixed together, so you probably end up with some you don’t like. Great for a candy dish or a fun random sampling though.

Instead, I went with the U-pull dispensers of their perfect jelly beans, priced at $8 / lb. In the process of filling my bag up, I mastered the technique of the mini-pull: pull the dispenser slowly and carefully, and you can control the amount of jelly beans you want. It’s perfect if you only want 5 or 6 of one flavor.

There were some interesting flavors there, including the gross Harry Potter beans. Some funky ones included bacon and buttered toast. Will fried eggs be next?

Here are the Jelly Bellies I chose, I seem to especially like the flavors that begin with the letter P!

A&W Cream Soda- you get only a slight cream flavor
Caramel Apple- not very apple-y, caramel was very much like a maple flavor
Crushed Pineapple- good but pineapple flavor wasn’t strong enough
Juicy Pear- one of my favorites, with a strong Bartlett pear taste
Mango- disappointing, it didn’t taste like mango at all
Orange Sherbet- you get a hint of creaminess before the orange takes over; a decent take on the creamsicle flavor combination
Peach- a strong contender against Juicy Pear as my favorite
Pink Grapefruit- strong grapefruit flavor but no bitter edges
Plum- my new favorite find: just try it and be wowed
Tangerine- nice and refreshing citrus flavor

Jelly Belly Factory
One Jelly Belly Lane
Fairfield, CA 94533
Open Daily from 9-5 (tours end at 4), factory in production only on weekdays