9 Sweets with surprising origins

Sweets like candies and chewing gum are the flavors of our childhood. Full of sweetness and color, they are the ideal gift for any loved one, including ourselves. A little candy is able to brighten our day in a simple and immediate way, since sweets improve our mood (they increase our endorphin levels), guarantee extra energy and please all the senses.

If you are passionate about sweets and also a curious person, you have certainly stopped in the middle of a snack to wonder where chocolate originated or where sweets were invented. For that reason, the awesome.club wants to honor the delights that sweeten our lives by telling the stories of the most popular sweets. In the end, we prepared a bonus to let you know the safe amounts for consumption of these foods.

They are among the cutest and most famous sweets around the world. Sometimes, we are even in doubt whether we should chew or hug those cute little bears, but we end up devouring them because their aromas and fruit flavors are simply addictive.

They are a type of gelatin with lots of sugar in the shape of a teddy bear. They usually measure no more than three centimeters and come in bags with different flavors and colors. Most are based on gelatine of animal origin. However, products based on gum arabic and agar-agar are also available on the market.

According to the official page of Haribo, one of the main manufacturers of the delicacy, the edible animals appeared in Germany, around the year 1920, when the confectioner Hans Riegel and his wife, born in Bonn, founded their own candy factory. He prepared the sweets and she distributed them on her bicycle.

Business was not going well, so the cook decided to experiment by creating candies based on gelatin and fruit juice, softer and easier to chew than those already on the market. To make the product more attractive, he decided to shape the sweets into bears, as dancing bears were very popular at festivals and circuses in Europe.

The new product was a huge success. At the time of World War I, the Riegel couple’s company already had 400 employees and produced tons of teddy bears every day to meet demand.

Eating this simple sweet is the closest experience we can have to savoring a cloud of a magical universe. Its spongy appearance and mild flavor make it a great protagonist in parks and fairs, and it transports us directly to very happy afternoons of our childhood.

The delicacy is made from melted sugar threads and wrapped around a wooden stick or a paper cone. Without the addition of dyes, it is white. But it is more common to find it in colored versions in pink, blue or purple.

In Italy, in the 1400s, some confectioners used a fork to make strands of melted sugar to decorate desserts. However, as the procedure took a long time, it was not very popular. Only in 1900, in France, a machine capable of making and winding sugar threads was presented at a fair🇧🇷 The invention and dessert became a success, conquering other fairs and inspiring the emergence of new and better machines. The product was initially called “fairy silk”, but the cotton-like appearance and texture helped to popularize the name we now know.

One of the most popular treats in the world, they can now be found in almost any grocery store, and can also be prepared at home. They are direct descendants of gingerbread, which was made in Europe during the 10th century.

The first food called biscuit was a very baked and flat bread that the crew of ships and members of armies ate in the fourteenth century. They were durable, tasty, and easy to store. Since then, biscuits have evolved and changed according to each part of the world, until they gave rise to the range of sweet and savory versions that we know today.

Chocolate is the sweetest of sweets. The delicacy has been revered for a long time, as it has one of the most intense and pleasant flavors in the world. It is natural, healthy (at least in the purest versions) and can be prepared in different ways, being enjoyed all over the world by people of all ages.

The candy we know today, in the form of firm-textured bars and bonbons, is the result of a series of events and experiments carried out throughout history in different cultures. It is estimated that the chocolate began to be consumed in the year 3000 BC., prepared as a drink made from cocoa and spices by the Mayan, Aztec and Olmec civilizations.

Thick, the drink was ingested salty. This changed when Spain, after the colonization of America, started to take cocoa to Europe and sweeten the food with sugar and cinnamon, thus changing its traditional formula. With this, chocolate conquered the European and Asian public.

The chocolate remained liquid until 1828, when, in Holland, the famous chemist Coenraad van Houten first used the hydraulic press to extract cocoa butter. This made the Europeans know more about the fruit and developed techniques that improved the handling process. Chocolate became the main ingredient in desserts and pies, although the manufacture of a solid product became the property of the scientist, who patented the invention.

Solid chocolate was handcrafted, and when van Houten’s patent expired, mass production of the treat began all over the world, leading to the emergence of numerous companies that made new discoveries in the preparation of bars and bonbons.

Ice cream is one of the favorite desserts of many people. It has as many flavors and varieties as there are stars in the sky, which is why it adapts to the most varied tastes.

The delicacy is perfect to share with friends or eat on a sunny day, given its refreshing taste and texture.

Although it is hard to believe, the ice cream was born thousands of years before the first refrigerator. The food appeared in China in the 7th century BC and was based on mountain snow, milk, rice, honey and fruit.

Although many societies have used snow to make drinks and desserts, it was not until the 13th century that the Italian navigator Marco Polo brought Asian recipes to Europe which, in turn, ended up impressing the Italian court, and this led to the development of new recipes based on snow. in different ingredients. The tradition of Italian gelato would begin there.

The origin of candies is almost as old as the discovery of honey and the sweet taste. They were born with the human need to have a small, light food that would guarantee energy and be easy to transport. There are records that, in Ancient Egypt, in 2000 BC, sweets based on honey, fruits, nuts and cereals were already prepared.

According to the official page of Spanish Papabubble sweets, India was the first to use solid sugar in the preparation of sweets, after the discovery of sugar cane. Even the term “caramel” (used in Spanish as a synonym for candy) comes from the Latin “canna melis”, which means honey cane. In that Asian country, the custom was to cook sugar and let it dry to produce sweet pastilles that dissolved in the mouth.

Over time, the recipe became more popular and improved. According to the culture of each region, flavors of fruits and spices, such as ginger and mint, were added. But it was only in 1850 that the production of candies on an industrial scale began in the USA, with the addition of dyes, flavorings and other ingredients.

Drageas are small portions of jelly, chocolate or gelatin covered in a thin layer of crunchy candy, leaving them crunchy on the outside and soft on the inside. Generally, the coating is colored to make the treat more attractive. Its origin is associated with two desserts: lokum (Turkish dessert based on gelatin covered with sugar) and sugared almonds, which were very popular in Europe in the 17th century.

The first sweet dragees were created in England in 1882. They were called “chocolate beans”🇧🇷 They became very popular during World War II and the Spanish Civil War, as they were ideal for soldiers: the little treats could be carried in their pockets without melting, thanks to the thin cover.

Today, they can be found in all flavors, colors and fillings. But the most popular ones are filled with chocolate, chewing gum, soft caramel and gelatin.

What’s better for relieving anxiety than delicious fruity bubble gum? Chewing gum is among the oldest sweets in history. There are records that in Ancient Greece, Egypt and even in the Neolithic, humans already chewed plants and tree resins to take advantage of the taste and medicinal properties.

The Mayans can be considered the “fathers” of modern chewing gum, as more than 2,000 years ago, in the jungles of southeastern Mexico, they used to collect the sap of the sapodilla tree to produce a chewing gum that helped with cleansing. teeth and to endure hunger during periods of fasting. The product was called “sicte”, a word that meant “blood”, and was traded with other peoples of Mesoamerica. The Aztecs named the delicacy “tzicli”, which meant “to stick”. Then, when the product arrived in Spain, it became known as chicle. All over the world, after its popularization, chewing gum was used for hygiene purposes, but its mass production as a delicacy began in the United States, in the 19th century🇧🇷 At the time, former Mexican President Antonio López de Santa Anna proposed to American scientist Thomas Adams the use of chewing gum as a substitute for rubber.

The bubblegum was not successful as an alternative to the material, but as a chewable treat. Then, the product started to be marketed in 1871 with colors and flavors. To this day, it is consumed all over the world due to its pleasant taste, texture and oral health benefits. There are many sugar-free versions for weight management and teeth care.

In many cultures, it is traditional to gather friends around a campfire and roast marshmallows. This delicacy is highly appreciated all over the world for its softness and flavor.

Even though it’s hard to believe, marshmallows have botanical origins. In truth, its main ingredient is a plant called Althaea officinalis, known as white mallow and originating from tropical forests. The Greeks were the first to use it as a medicine, thanks to its analgesic and anti-inflammatory properties. The Egyptians mixed this plant with honey to enhance its flavor, and that’s how the habit of consuming it as a sweet was born, according to the ITM Culinary Institute website.

In 1850, in France, the habit of mixing the sap of the plant with sugar and eggs emerged. to get the result we all know. Later, the plant was replaced by gelatin, and one of the favorite delicacies of Americans and Europeans emerged.

The marshmallow can be consumed alone, chilled or roasted over the fire, melted between two…