Space and Physics
PUBLISHED
They fascinated and frustrated most of us as children - what is in the middle of that damn gobstopper? After 24,234,029 licks was it actually getting any smaller?!
The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe to access the full content.So what makes jaw breakers so hard, and how are they made? The jaw breaker is formed around its center, either a gum or hard candy. Once the center has been made, they’re thrown into a coating pan along with a mixture of hot water, corn syrup and food coloring, along with a liberal sprinkling of dextrose. The pan rotates 20 minutes to dry the added ingredients before repeating the process again, up to 10 times: this is what creates the various layers of color and size of the breaker. After being left to dry for 24 hours, a worker will add a pinch of powdered carnauba wax that gives them their shiny finish. From start to finish, it takes an incredible four days to make a single jaw breaker. No wonder it's so strong!
These guys obviously have even less patience than the rest of us however, because instead of throwing it at a wall or giving it a crack with a hammer, they decided to superheat a nickel ball and place it on top of a giant gobstopper…because you know, why not?
It makes for some oddly fascinating, but for some reason slightly uncomfortable, viewing.
