Ever Wonder Why Haribo Gummies Are So Stretchy? This One Ingredient Makes The Difference

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We all love gummy bears, like the beloved ones from Haribo, for their bright, fruity flavors and most of all that chewy, bouncy texture. (By the way, we ranked every single Haribo variety we could find.) Tug on a gummy bear and you'll get quite a stretch. That entertaining quality comes from one ingredient: gelatin. Yep, the same gelatin you'll find in Jell-O, which we thankfully don't use much for salads anymore. 

Gelatin is also responsible for making soups and stocks velvety and full-bodied without adding any extra fat. It's derived from cooked-down collagen, and when the gelatin is heated to a liquid state it's mixed with sweeteners and flavoring before it cools off in those adorable, bear-shaped gummy molds. When the gelatin cools back into a solid, it traps the sweeteners and flavors in place, but since it's heat sensitive it'll still melt in your mouth while you're eating it; giving you an even more pleasant texture. While there are other ingredients like pectin that can be used to make a chewy candy, gelatin provides a singular eating experience which you simply can't get with any other ingredient.

These gummy candies come from a very specific source. Gelatin is an unflavored, animal-based product commonly made from either pork or beef collagen. So, for those people on a strictly non-animal-based diet, it's not vegan- or vegetarian-friendly despite the candies being commonly fruit-flavored. Again, there are alternate gelling ingredients, like pectin and agar-agar, but they provide a slightly different mouthfeel. 

Thankfully, vegan gummy candies do exist by using these alternate ingredients, so it's not like vegetarians are left in the dust. If nothing but Haribo will do, the company has an array of vegetarian- and vegan-friendly candies, including its Giant Strawbs. In this case, starch is used to thicken the candy and give it a chew. Now that you know gelatin is really what makes the original gummy bears special, one thing you can do is make them at home. There's plenty of gummy bear recipes online which can help with proper ingredient ratios, though you may not be able to capture that exact Haribo feeling.