This jelly candy recipe is a fun gift for anyone who has a sweet tooth. Made with gelatin, sugar and flavored drink mix, to create a sweet and tasty treat.
My husband is a big fan of fruit jelly candy. In fact, one of our girls had a friend who worked in a hardware store as a cashier in high school. One day she asked, “Is your dad the guy who comes in and buys Chuckles® all the time?” My mother loved them too, and although she has passed, I thought it would be fun to make some homemade jellies for my family and friends.
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After researching many recipes I decided to make them with gelatin, sugar and Kool-Aid® packets. It was the easiest way to get a few different flavors and colors, at a very affordable price. One problem I ran into was the fact that I could not find lime Kool-Aid® so I did use lime extract and green food coloring for one of the batches. After all, my husband was the muse for this idea, and that is his favorite flavor.
In the end the jellies turned out pretty good. The color and flavor was perfect. The firmness could have been better. This seems to be an issue for many recipes. One thing that helped is flipping the jellies over after 24 hours, and adding a coating of sugar to the top, then letting them dry out another day. Also, the smaller ones dried out better, so keeping them small is a good idea.
Jelly Candy
I have them packaged in Weck jars
They should last for a month or so, if kept in a sealed container. Probably longer in the refrigerator, unless of course, someone decides to gobble them up.
Homemade Jelly Candy
Ingredients
- 2 boxes gelatin (8 packages)
- 2 cups cold water
- 2 1/2 cups boiling water
- 6 cups sugar
- unsweetened Kool-aid packets or flavored extract with food coloring
- 2 cups sugar for coating
Instructions
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Prepare pans by lining them with plastic wrap and vegetable spray. I used three 8x8 oven pans and two bread loaf pans.
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Place cold water in a bowl and sprinkle gelatin over top. Stir slightly to get all powder incorporated. Set aside
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In a medium saucepan bring 2 1/2 cups of water to a boil. Add sugar and stir. Let simmer, stirring until all sugar is dissolved.
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Add gelatin mix to the sugar and water mix. Once all the ingredients have dissolved bring back to a boil and cook for 2-3 minutes.
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Remove from heat and let cool for about 1-2 minutes.
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Divide mixture into 5 bowls. Add one packet of drink mix to each bowl. If using extract add 3 teaspoons and enough drops of food coloring to get the color you wish. I used 5 drops of green for the lime candy.
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Mix with a wire whisk to ensure all the drink mix is dissolved.
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Pour into prepared pans and refrigerate overnight.
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Place a nice layer of sugar on parchment and flip the jelly candy on top. Then move to a new piece of parchment and use a pizza cutter to cut into small square or rectangular shapes.
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Let sit overnight. Then coat the bottoms of the candy in more sugar and let sit out overnight again with the newly coated side up.
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Place in bags or airtight containers.
Carole says
Neat idea and love those sweet treats you can make ahead of time, especially for gift giving. I have a book idea for you… Ask me about it…
D says
Do you think we can substitute Jello instead of gelatin and flavoring? They have some unique flavors at certain times of the year.
Patti Estep says
I definitely saw a least one article using jello so I’d say yes. You may need to play around with it to get it where you want it, ie cooking it on the stove, adding additional sugar or corn syrup… There are many recipes online with all kinds of ingredients. Lots of people were even using applesauce. Let me know how it turns out.