The stay-at-home dad: Young foodies fail Sour Patch test

I’m a sucker for cooking competition shows, preferably ones hosted by Gordon Ramsey or someone equally “TV angry.” It’s delightful to hear him call someone an (expletive deleted) “doughnut” after a boneheaded decision.

I’m all for an inclusive, safe work environment in real life, by the way, though it’s fairly obvious that Ramsey’s frequent fits of rage are (mostly) an act. But before I get distracted trying to defend my idiotic TV viewing habits, I want to celebrate a particular challenge that often pops up on these shows.

In short, I love watching experienced, talented chefs fail blind taste tests. Whenever a competitor fails to distinguish a piece of pork from chicken or an apple from a pear, Ramsey appropriately flips his lid.

Turns out, having an excellent palette is a rare quality, as most humans rely on the combination of multiple senses in order to decipher flavor.

Subjecting your children to blind taste tests can be as entertaining as watching Chef Ramsey lose his temper over a cold-in-the-middle Beef Wellington.

Some TikTok-inspired taste tests we’ve tried include the Oreo-dipped-in-pickle-juice experiment and the Make-Your-Own-Dr. Pepper by mixing a certain combination of Coca-Cola and root beer. The Coke-root beer experiment worked OK, but, as you might guess, the Oreo-dipped-in-pickle-juice challenge came close to Vomitville. I generally make it a rule to never eat anything with pickles, so I happily watched this challenge from a distance and retained my pristine opinion of the world’s best cookie.

Our most recent (and most entertaining) challenge involved Sour Patch Kids. The delicious sour/sugar gummy that’s a staple of movie theater snack consumption. We were sharing a bag as a family, and I noted how distinct the flavors were compared to other fruit-flavored candies. I tested this theory by blindly tasting a few of the gummies, which prompted my kids to try it themselves (mostly as a way to get more candy, of course).

Four kids, ages 4-10, took turns covering their eyes while my wife selected individual candies for them to try. The task was simple — identify the color of the Sour Patch Kids — Red, green, yellow, orange or blue.

How the game unfolded said more about my kids’ personalities than their ability to identify flavor.

For the first round, my 8 and 10-year-olds each guessed green. My 6-year-old said blue, and my 4-year-old stuck his tongue out, looked down at the gummy and said orange.

The correct answer: Everyone had a green gummy. And now I’m worried that my 4-year-old doesn’t know his colors.

In the next round, three kids guessed yellow, and the other guessed blue. When my wife told them, “None of you are correct,” my 8-year-old son insisted he was right about yellow, my 10-year-old daughter disparaged herself and guessed red instead of her original guess of yellow, and my 6-year-old daughter (who idolizes her older sister) switched to red as well. My 4-year-old son reached into the bag and stole another couple candies (color undetermined).

Answer: Everyone got orange.

At this point, I wondered if I was clear about the flavors assigned to each color, so we reviewed — Orange is orange, yellow is lemon, green is lime, blue is raspberry and red is… well, like, maybe cherry or strawberry or something? Anyway, it tastes different than the others.

Editor’s note: The Sour Patch Kids website lists the red flavor as “redberry,” which is absolutely not helpful.

With (most of) the flavors reviewed, we tried another round, this time with everyone getting a different flavor of gummy. Before she ate hers, my 10-year-old said, “If I get yellow I’m going to know it because the lemon is really distinctive.” Nice word use, but I’ll spoil the round now and tell you she incorrectly guessed lemon instead of blue raspberry.

My 8-year-old son guessed green and got it right. My 6-year-old daughter followed her sister again and got it wrong, and, by some miracle, my 4-year-old son correctly guessed green.

Me: “Good job, bud. Did you taste the lime?”

Him: “What a wime?”

After playing alongside them for a few more rounds, I’ve determined the following things about my family:

1) I have the best palette. Give me an application to “MasterChef.”

2) My 8-year-old son thinks the Sour Patch people conspired to make flavors that sometimes don’t match the color.

3) My 6-year-old daughter is OK being wrong so long as her older sister is also wrong.

4) My 4-year-old son has a little more work to do before he starts kindergarten.

5) Eating too many Sour Patch Kids will numb your tongue for three days.

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Tyler Wilson is a freelance writer and stay-at-home dad to four kids, ages 4-10. He was not paid by Sour Patch Kids to write this column, but will happily take handouts. He can be reached at twilson@cdapress.com.