Why Jell-O And Utah Share A Special Connection 

From Texas BBQ and Georgia peaches to Idaho's famous potatoes, U.S. states are well-known for their strong ties with certain foods. Many of these culinary connections arise from hundreds of years of agricultural tradition. However, one of the foods most commonly associated with Utah is far more modern and seemingly random: Jell-O. Utah residents, or Utahns, are famous for their sky-high Jell-O consumption, often in the form of delightful, definition-defying Jell-O salads. Utahns love Jell-O so much that the jiggly ingredient was named the official state snack by the Utah State Legislature in 2001, the same year that the state declared the second week of February National Jell-O Week. However, Jell-O's special relationship with Utah is far newer than many might expect.

Jell-O salad was a cultural phenomenon across America in the mid-20th century, but the jiggly dessert began to fall out of favor in the 1970s and '80s. To combat declining sales, the company focused its marketing on families. Advertisements sold Jell-O as a fun, kid-friendly treat that brought children and parents together. It seems this marketing campaign was particularly successful in Utah, most likely because Utah is home to lots of kids — the Beehive State boasts the largest average household size in the country, and children make up a higher percentage of the population than in any other U.S. state.

At the end of the 20th century, Jell-O continued to thrive in Utah even as sales fell across much of the country, and the stereotypical association of Utah with Jell-O was firmly set. Utah's now-legendary love of Jell-O has only been rivaled by the Midwest — in fact, when Des Moines, Iowa, claimed the crown of the city with the highest Jell-O sales per capita in 1999, Utah residents launched a campaign to "take back Jell-O."  Subsequently, Jell-O became the official state snack in 2001 and was adopted as the unofficial food of the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics.

Jell-O is particularly linked with Utah's Mormon population (which also helped popularize "dirty" soda shops). A diverse array of Jell-O dishes is a staple of Latter-Day Saints' gatherings, and the boundary-pushing green Jell-O salad (featuring lime Jell-O, cottage or cream cheese, nuts, and crushed pineapple) is also known as Mormon Jell-O salad. These days, many Americans see Jell-O as an old-school ingredient for kitschy retro recipes, making Utah's enduring and unironic love for both sweet and savory Jell-O-based dishes all the more notable. Jell-O's popularity in Utah is thanks to a variety of cultural, historic, and demographic factors, but one thing is undeniably clear — Utah and Jell-O are deliciously stuck together, and they're not likely to split up anytime soon.