Are you a fan of candy canes? Maybe not, only if you’re a kid under puberty — or you probably don’t mind what the heck, you just love sweets. Sweetie! Not only are candy canes delicious edibles we love to enjoy, but how they’re made in the factory is as mesmerizing as it is delicious. Here’s a video from the Science Channel that shows making candy canes and the process from start to finish. Get ready, it might be a little bit sticky.
Related media: CANDY CANES | How It’s Made
One Two, Buckle My Canes
Just as any good old recipe for making sweets, it starts with the basic ingredients: sugar, water, and corn syrup (sometimes aspartame), which are together blended into a blob of syrup. Other ingredients like starch and peppermint flavors mixed separately together help the flavor bind to the starch. The flavored mixture is later added to the syrup blob, which is then mixed up thoroughly in a machine until the mixture is evenly distributed with the minty flavor.
Here’s where it gets to look real. The automated pullers: two prongs twist the taffy lump around a metal pole in a straight satisfying tangle. This process involves the aeration of the blob turning it into a white lump. Rollers then roll and mold it into a huge pliable log, which is then garnished with a red-tinged stripe of candy dough. Altogether, this minty brick weighs roughly 45 kilograms (100 pounds). Does it sound sweet yet?
Three Four, Stretch ‘Em Canes
Now, things get to look a lot more real. The remaining parts of the process convert the mixed, stretched, and pulled candy into its final cane form. The log is stretched by a series of rollers and wheels that turns it into a long, slithering snake-like that looks like your average toothpaste, but in fact, it’s candy. These snake-like pastes (sounding creepy a bit) are then twisted, chopped into single pieces, and later wrapped in cellophane.
Finally, these single straight pieces of candy canes are then cooled; a machine later bends the tips of the canes’ to form its’ “J” signature crooks. This process of bending takes about a half hour for a factory to churn out a box of a dozen candy canes. Last stop: Your sticky little fingers, then into your mouth for savoring. That sounds sweet, isn’t it?
The History Of Caning
You might ask, where from the mystery behind the candy canes? True answer: we don’t know. The ubiquity of candy canes around during the Christmas festive season tends to rise to a plausible origin. One theory maintains that the cane’s red and white colors might probably represent the blood and purity of Jesus, and the shape mimics a “J.” However, there’s no evidence to back up this theory, so it’s probably baloney, or what do you think?
Yet another story: A choirmaster in Cologne Cathedral back in the 17th century shaped these edibles to symbolize the staff of a shepherd. He then gave these candy canes to children to be kept during Christmas Eve reenactment of the birth of Jesus. Yet again, there’s no evidence to back this story as well. But one thing we’ve learned about candy canes is that watching them being made is as mesmerizing as it is indeed delicious. Hope you grab a bite soon.
Merry Christmas!
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Written by: Nana Kwadwo, Thu, Apr 04, 2019.