The compressed dextrose candy has long been a staple item of childhood candy diets. Never heard of it? You probably know it better as SweeTarts, Runts, and dozens more – that hard, yet powdery, melt-in-your mouth candy with the tangy flavor and slight cooling effect.
With Pucker Pieces Gourmet Candy Tarts, Creative Concepts Inc. (best known for its Pucker Powder powdered candy dispensers) seems to be trying to do for the compressed dextrose candy what Jelly Belly did for the jelly bean: use unique flavors and creative marketing to “gourmet-ify†it, transforming it into something that will appeal to adults as well as kids. Like Jelly Bellies, Pucker Pieces are displayed in bulk dispensers, allowing for the creation of custom flavor mixes.
If you know how compressed dextrose candies are made, it seems like a total no-brainer for a company that specializes in a powdered dextrose candy like Pucker Powder to move to hard tabs: just like the name implies, a powder made from dextrose (a type of sugar) and other ingredients is pressed into molds at super-high pressure, forming it into hard, yet still powdery, candy treats. (Pills are made the same way.) It seems like it would be a very simple matter to press straight-up Pucker Powder (or something very similar) into a more portable, less messy version of Creative Concepts’ flagship product.
