Do you like black licorice?

[The Late Night Gourmet]

When I was a kid, if I were given a choice of Good and Plenty (with candy-coated black licorice) and Good and Fruity (which has candy-coated red licorice) it was no contest. I always wanted the Good and Fruity. If I got a Good and Plenty, I would gnaw off the candy coating and spit out the licorice.

As I got older...I still didn't appreciate black licorice until I visited Iceland. I was surprised by how much I liked their candies with chocolate coated black licorice. Apparently, Icelanders have known about this for some time.

I recently read the following article, which talks about black licorice, and theories of why people might not love it. I have reproduced it here in case you can't access it for some reason. But, I am curious to find out what you think.

===============================================================================================================================
Why do so many of us hate black licorice? A few theories

By Meghan Holohan

When the American Licorice Company announced on Wednesday it was voluntarily recalling its black licorice Red Vines because of high levels of lead, about half the country paused and thought, “Wait, people eat black licorice?” The other half (presumably mostly curmudgeonly grandfathers and uncles) became disappointed to learn it would be harder than ever to find the sweet treat.

Licorice, which comes from the root of Glycyrrhiza glabra plant, flavors what we call black licorice (which is redundant), liqueurs such as Jagermeister, and medicines such as NyQuil, which relies on the pungent flavor to mask the medicinal taste. Even though it commonly appears in products, licorice seems polarizing.

“People either love it or hate it and, as far as I can tell, it’s not a learned like or dislike,” says Marcia Pelchat, an associate member of the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, a nonprofit center, which researches taste and smell.

“I don’t know a specific gene that is associated with liking and disliking licorice. [But] it does seem to be something that people are born with.”
While experts haven’t conducted much research on licorice preference, Pelchat — who dislikes the flavor but is married to a lover of licorice — shares a few theories as to why licorice divides us between the lovers and the haters.

When we eat, we use both the sense of taste and smell to detect flavor. Taste includes sweet, bitter, salty and sour. When we bite into a piece of licorice, we taste glycyrrhizin, a natural sweetener in licorice root, which can taste, to some, like saccharin, the artificial sweetener found in Sweet 'n' Low. With licorice, this sickly sweet lingers, causing some to wrinkle their noses in displeasure.

“What this suggests to me is maybe liking and disliking licorice is related to liking and disliking saccharin,” Pelchat says.

 

[CraigC]

View attachment 88535

When I was a kid, if I were given a choice of Good and Plenty (with candy-coated black licorice) and Good and Fruity (which has candy-coated red licorice) it was no contest. I always wanted the Good and Fruity. If I got a Good and Plenty, I would gnaw off the candy coating and spit out the licorice.

As I got older...I still didn't appreciate black licorice until I visited Iceland. I was surprised by how much I liked their candies with chocolate coated black licorice. Apparently, Icelanders have known about this for some time.

View attachment 88536

I recently read the following article, which talks about black licorice, and theories of why people might not love it. I have reproduced it here in case you can't access it for some reason. But, I am curious to find out what you think.

===============================================================================================================================
Why do so many of us hate black licorice? A few theories

By Meghan Holohan

When the American Licorice Company announced on Wednesday it was voluntarily recalling its black licorice Red Vines because of high levels of lead, about half the country paused and thought, “Wait, people eat black licorice?” The other half (presumably mostly curmudgeonly grandfathers and uncles) became disappointed to learn it would be harder than ever to find the sweet treat.

Licorice, which comes from the root of Glycyrrhiza glabra plant, flavors what we call black licorice (which is redundant), liqueurs such as Jagermeister, and medicines such as NyQuil, which relies on the pungent flavor to mask the medicinal taste. Even though it commonly appears in products, licorice seems polarizing.

“People either love it or hate it and, as far as I can tell, it’s not a learned like or dislike,” says Marcia Pelchat, an associate member of the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, a nonprofit center, which researches taste and smell.

“I don’t know a specific gene that is associated with liking and disliking licorice. [But] it does seem to be something that people are born with.”
While experts haven’t conducted much research on licorice preference, Pelchat — who dislikes the flavor but is married to a lover of licorice — shares a few theories as to why licorice divides us between the lovers and the haters.

When we eat, we use both the sense of taste and smell to detect flavor. Taste includes sweet, bitter, salty and sour. When we bite into a piece of licorice, we taste glycyrrhizin, a natural sweetener in licorice root, which can taste, to some, like saccharin, the artificial sweetener found in Sweet 'n' Low. With licorice, this sickly sweet lingers, causing some to wrinkle their noses in displeasure.

“What this suggests to me is maybe liking and disliking licorice is related to liking and disliking saccharin,” Pelchat says.

I'm Choo Choo Charlie!

 

[TastyReuben]

I love it, always have. I just polished off a big bag of black Twizzlers, allowing myself three a day until gone.

I once ate an entire bag of Twizzlers, the big bag, during a movie and it made me puke, which can lead to a lifelong aversion to it, but not me. I was right back at it a day or two later.

 

[The Velvet Curtain]

Liquorice and anise are flavours that jar on my pallet, so I never try them these days.

 

[Morning Glory]

I adore it. As a kid we used to be able to buy liquorice sticks ( literally, the woody root) to chew on. I also like the Scandinavian style super salty liquorice. I much prefer hard liquorice to soft.

 

[karadekoolaid]

I´m probably as passionate about liquorice as I am about F1.
"snore".

 

[JAS_OH1]

View attachment 88535

When I was a kid, if I were given a choice of Good and Plenty (with candy-coated black licorice) and Good and Fruity (which has candy-coated red licorice) it was no contest. I always wanted the Good and Fruity. If I got a Good and Plenty, I would gnaw off the candy coating and spit out the licorice.

As I got older...I still didn't appreciate black licorice until I visited Iceland. I was surprised by how much I liked their candies with chocolate coated black licorice. Apparently, Icelanders have known about this for some time.

View attachment 88536

I recently read the following article, which talks about black licorice, and theories of why people might not love it. I have reproduced it here in case you can't access it for some reason. But, I am curious to find out what you think.

===============================================================================================================================
Why do so many of us hate black licorice? A few theories

By Meghan Holohan

When the American Licorice Company announced on Wednesday it was voluntarily recalling its black licorice Red Vines because of high levels of lead, about half the country paused and thought, “Wait, people eat black licorice?” The other half (presumably mostly curmudgeonly grandfathers and uncles) became disappointed to learn it would be harder than ever to find the sweet treat.

Licorice, which comes from the root of Glycyrrhiza glabra plant, flavors what we call black licorice (which is redundant), liqueurs such as Jagermeister, and medicines such as NyQuil, which relies on the pungent flavor to mask the medicinal taste. Even though it commonly appears in products, licorice seems polarizing.

“People either love it or hate it and, as far as I can tell, it’s not a learned like or dislike,” says Marcia Pelchat, an associate member of the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, a nonprofit center, which researches taste and smell.

“I don’t know a specific gene that is associated with liking and disliking licorice. [But] it does seem to be something that people are born with.”
While experts haven’t conducted much research on licorice preference, Pelchat — who dislikes the flavor but is married to a lover of licorice — shares a few theories as to why licorice divides us between the lovers and the haters.

When we eat, we use both the sense of taste and smell to detect flavor. Taste includes sweet, bitter, salty and sour. When we bite into a piece of licorice, we taste glycyrrhizin, a natural sweetener in licorice root, which can taste, to some, like saccharin, the artificial sweetener found in Sweet 'n' Low. With licorice, this sickly sweet lingers, causing some to wrinkle their noses in displeasure.

“What this suggests to me is maybe liking and disliking licorice is related to liking and disliking saccharin,” Pelchat says.

I can't stand it from the moment it hits my taste buds. I do not like anise, fennel, black jellybeans, or any liquers that have that flavor, etc. But, occasionally I like a few fennel seeds in meatballs, which I suppose is a little weird.