My dad introduced me to the majority of candies I have ever tried. One of his favorites which still exists today is Dots. First established in 1890 by Mason, they were all black licorice-flavored as Crows. In 1945, the original fruit-flavored Dots – which boast the title of most popular gumdrop in the world – debuted in small yellow boxes found in Tootsie’s Fun Size mix. My dad had me sample both of these versions and I didn’t care for either, not being a fan of black licorice and finding the fruit-flavored too sticky and stale.
When I was a teenager, Tropical Dots debuted, which I bought not so much because I thought they would be any good, but rather because it was like seeing the first two installments of a bad horror film; you feel obligated to watch the next one so you’ll be able to claim to have seen them all. To my surprise, I actually loved the tropical version and it has since become a staple candy in my cabinets.
All these years later, I was shopping in a Walgreens in Los Angeles and a purple, movie-sized box of Yogurt Dots tempted me from the checkout line, and for only a dollar too. Having reasoned that Dots have progressively improved with each new version (black licorice = yuck, fruit = eh, tropical = yum), I was excited to taste the newest spinoff.
