Lolly medicine

I realised something this week - there's a reason that cherry flavours aren't abundant in Australia. (Yeah, I know they have cherry ripe.) Only recently did I find a bottle of grenadine, something which is in almost every supermarket in the States, usually next to the peanuts. Grenadine makes a nice cherry flavoured drink when you mix in some Sprite (Australian lemonade) on a hot summer day.  Sure you're just making cherry 7-up, but it's nice to be able to control the proportions. In Australia they have cordial, which is a flavoured syrup used in the same way as grenadine, but they don't have any in the cherry flavour.

This epiphany only happened when I offered some Twizzlers to a work colleague.  Normally they are strawberry flavoured, but in the care package Grandma sent they were cherry.  They have licorice over here, just not ramped up on sugar to the same level as in the States. When I offered some to my work friend she first commented that they had no taste. After another work friend inspected the package, read the label to confirm that there was a lot of sugar, she then commented, "Oh, it smells like medicine." Suddenly the other friend who had been eating a piece agreed, "Yeah, it does taste like medicine."  In that moment I had my answer for why cherry flavouring in Australia would never be a success.

In the pharmaceutical companies' rush to make their products more palatable for children, they have plagued a whole portion of the lolly industry with an undesired stigma.  Never again will and Australian child say that their medicine tastes like lollies.  Nay, their once pleasant cherry lollies now all taste like medicine.  The puzzle for me now, though, is why do American children not have the same reaction?