Banana Candy: Why It Tastes Like That, and What to Buy

We import these cases and handle them in our California warehouse. Below: the chemistry behind the flavor, what testing has found about the Gros Michel theory, then the three banana cases we stock with their texture, sourness, dietary tags exactly as listed and case size.

Why doesn't banana candy taste like a real banana?

Classic artificial banana flavor comes from a single molecule, isoamyl acetate. Real bananas contain it too, but as the American Chemical Society's Reactions series explains, the main reason a banana does not taste like banana candy is that the fruit has many more smelly compounds than isoamyl acetate alone. A 2018 study of two banana cultivars detected 62 and 59 volatile compounds, with isoamyl acetate among the predominant ones.

The candy version came from the lab rather than the fruit. The same ACS episode traces isoamyl acetate to 1800s chemists experimenting with carbon-based molecules, one of whose fruity esters happened to match what they considered banana. A National Toxicology Program summary describes it as a liquid with a banana-like odor, used to flavor soft drinks, chewing gum and candies, and lists both banana oil and pear oil among its names.

Is banana candy based on the Gros Michel banana?

That is a popular theory, and as an origin story it does not hold up. The Gros Michel was the banana Americans ate for the first half of the twentieth century, until fungal disease, most notably Panama disease, devastated banana crops in the 1950s. By the 1960s it was effectively gone from large-scale growing, and the Cavendish took its place, as Science Friday reported in 2017. The theory says banana candy tastes like that lost banana. Two things complicate it:

• The flavor came first: flavor historian Nadia Berenstein found US banana flavoring formulas from the 1860s, at least a decade before the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial, which historians credit with launching the fruit into American public consciousness, according to the same Science Friday article.
• The chemistry is mixed: Science Friday reported that the Gros Michel contains more isoamyl acetate than the Cavendish. When the ACS Reactions team had about 30 banana samples analyzed for a 2021 episode, the Gros Michel and the Cavendish had the most isoamyl acetate of the varieties tested, but the Gros Michel did not seem to have more than the Cavendish. The team called those results preliminary, and most of its tasters found the two bananas tasted the same.

ACS describes the idea as a myth, while Science Friday concluded that banana candy offers "a taste of the bananas of the past."

What banana candy do we stock?

Sourness is a matter of taste, so treat those notes as a guide, and each product page shows the public Tier 1 case price. Our foam candy guide covers the chocolate-covered foam bananas Swedes call skumbananer, which we do not stock, and notes that BUBS uses a starch foam in its ovals.

• BUBS Banana: BUBS foam candy in a loose case. Our listing gives the flavor as banana, and the ingredient list we hold matches the one for the Goody Banana/Toffee bags below, apart from the glazing agent being named. Sweet, not sour. Tags as listed: gelatin-free, halal, vegan. A 6.17 lb (2.8 kg) case. The wider range is in our BUBS candy guide.
• BUBS Goody Banana/Toffee: the banana toffee oval that BUBS describes as perfectly soft, in retail bags: 12 bags of 3.2 oz (90 g) to a case, 2.38 lb in all. Sweet, not sour. Tags as listed: gelatin-free, halal, vegan. Sealed bags suit a shelf, a register basket or a gift bag.
• Aroma Sour Strawberry Banana: soft Swedish gelée (jelly candy) from Aroma that pairs banana with strawberry. Tags as listed: none. The ingredient list we hold names gelatin and carmine. A 3.97 lb (1.8 kg) case. It also appears in our strawberry candy guide.

Banana cases we stock

BUBS Banana 2,8kg/6.17 LB Swedish Candy

$47.90

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BUBS Goody Banana/Toffee 90gx12 Swedish Candy

$26.50

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Aroma Sour Strawberry Banana 3.97LB - Swedish Candy

$31.90

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Which banana candy should you buy?

• For a pick-and-mix wall: BUBS Banana, the loose case.
• For shelves, registers and gift bags: the Goody Banana/Toffee bags, sealed and ready to sell.
• For a sour note: Aroma Sour Strawberry Banana, the only sour banana piece of the three.
• For a vegan or halal customer: both BUBS lines are tagged gelatin-free, halal and vegan. The Aroma gelée carries no tags, and its ingredient list names gelatin and carmine, a color additive derived from an insect.

All three banana cases are in our store with their public Tier 1 prices. Shops order by the case, mix and match, with no order minimum, and US orders ship from Santa Fe Springs, California by UPS Ground or UPS Express. To order, apply for a wholesale account.