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Heyhey, it’s #TicTacTuesday!! IT’S BACK! The 132nd variety added to the Tic Tac collection: Tropical Adventure. I haven’t posted anything about Tic Tacs in about two years because it’s appeared that during the pandemic Ferrero stopped releasing new flavors. Maybe things are starting to crank back to life over there as I’ve found this lovely new flavor mix at my local convenience store.
Tropical Adventure appears to be very similar to a flavor I received from my friend Trist Curless who nabbed them in Australia while on tour with Manhattan Transfer in 2014. Back then, “Tropical” had a mix of pineapple, passionfruit, and mango. Now North American “Tropical Adventure” has one-upped our friends down under by adding banana!!! Woohooo! Okay, it’s not all that exciting but it’s surely something new.
This mix includes real dried mango, passionfruit, banana, and pineapple. There are also no artificial colors, as these use natural beet red, curcumin (turmeric), and beta carotene. Interestingly, the label on these Canadian-made candies states “Artificially flavored mints” so who knows what’s going on.
The colors are a nice ombré gradient from light yellow to dark orange. When eaten all together, it is really a lovely tropical mix that offers just a wee bit of respite for this Chicagoan in the dead of winter.
RATING: 4/5
Just found these a couple days ago In the Indy area (so, 2/10/22 or so…) i think they’re pretty good. Must be the mango one with a strange bite, but when i tried all 4 together they were quite nice! I think every (fruit) candy should have a passionfruit flavor.
A thought on the Canadian label: the fact that it is labeled artificially flavored even though all the flavors are natural may reflect a difference in regulations between the lax USA and our neighbors to the north. In the USA, we tend to be minimalist about our regulations on additives, while many other countries (particularly in Europe) are more strict and their definitions and what they require you to identify or prohibit you from including. So it’s possible that Canada says if the flavoring comes from an extract rather than actual fruit or fruit juice, it’s not allowed to be called natural flavoring, whereas the USA is the country that lets you label a bunch of different ingredients under a vague heading like “spices” or “fragrance.”