“Oohh, cool! New Tic Tac flavors! I think I might grab one of these mango ones… and one of these… wait! What? What the heck is a Tropical Acerola? How do you even pronounce acerola? Ahh, who cares, best buy one anyway.” That was pretty much the conversation I had in my head as I found myself looking at these “summer edition” Tic Tacs.
Eventually a bit of search engine action solved the mystery – acerola is actually a wild tropical cherry native to the West Indies. One has to wonder the thought process of a Tic Tac flavor guy sitting around and thinking, “Hmmm! I know! Let’s introduce a totally obscure fruit flavor! What about the acerola?” I, for one, am glad he didn’t choose to go with durian (hint: the ripe fruit is meant to smell like rotting human flesh). (And I bet you didn’t think you would ever see the expression “rotting human flesh” on a candy website! Hey, I like to keep it interesting.)
Having never tried an actual acerola, I can only say that the Tic Tac version is quite nice. It actually tastes like a cross between raspberry and mint, with a decidedly “hot” feeling on your tongue. It works really well as a more gentle type of mint with an added dash of the tropical, and it really did have a summery taste to it.
Mango is one of those flavors which I think is very hard to reproduce in candy – a bit like banana, you never really get a true fruit flavor coming through. This one, like the acerola, is slightly spicy in nature. The first taste is actually pretty mango-ish and the flavor stays around for quite a while.
While neither of these set my world on fire, they were nice additions to the Tic Tac flavors already out there. Given that it’s currently winter Down Under, they served as a nice reminder of days by the beach and drinks by the pool. Now if only I could somehow convince Candy Addict to sponsor an acerola tasting trip to the West Indies….
Buy Tic Tacs online:
- at Amazon.com
- at Candy Direct
- at Old Time Candy
