Question: what is it in popping candy that makes it go pop?

James Hargreaves answered on 19 Jun 2011:

hey babygx,

I’ll tell you all about popping candy to try and explain how it goes pop! 🙂

Popping candy is made using ingredients including sugar, lactose (milk sugar), corn syrup, and flavouring. The candy is made by mixing its ingredients and heating them until they melt into dust, then exposing the mixture to pressurized carbon dioxide gas (about 600 pounds per square inch; approx. 41.37 Bar) and allowing it to cool. The process causes tiny high pressure bubbles to be trapped inside the candy. When placed in the mouth, coming into contact with saliva the candy breaks and dissolves, releasing the carbon dioxide from the tiny atmosphere bubbles, resulting in a popping and sizzling sound and leaving a slight tingling sensation. The bubbles in the candy pieces can be seen by looking at them with a microscope.

Rumours say that eating popping candy and drinking coca cola would cause a person’s stomach to explode. This is caused by the false assumption that Popping candy contain an acid/base mixture (such as baking soda and vinegar) which produces large volumes of gas when mixed through chewing and saliva

Popping candy therefore pops when the bubbles of carbon dioxide burst when the candy comes into contact with your saliva in your mouth. 🙂

Is this okay or is there something else you’d like to know? Give me a shout!