What is a Sugar Plum?

 We all know the story of "A Visit from St. Nicholas", right? No? Oh! You might know it by a different name, "'Twas the Night Before Christmas". If you don't read the book, you know the tale in some form, whether from it being read in a movie/t.v. show or from a variation of it from someone/somewhere, you know the story. Digimon Season 2 did a variation on it A Very Digi Christmas and Jeff Dunham did a reading of the story with many interruptions and interpretations by Peanut.

But there is a line where the children in the story are "were nestled all snug in their beds/ While visions of sugar plums dance in their heads." I have always wondered what a sugar plum was, but my parents didn't know what it was. They said what everyone thinks, that it is a sugar coated plum... yuck! Well, guess what? They were wrong!

A sugar plum is any candy that has a kind of "seed" at it's center with layers of hardened candy around it. In a process called "panning", the layers are added onto the "seed" until it is the desired thickness. During this process, the "seed" is spun in a vat to get the layers of candy on them. So, what would classify as a sugar plum?

Jawbreakers are sugar plums.

Jellybeans are sugar plums.

M&Ms are sugar plums.

And so on, the plum "shape" is purely coincidental or to make it easier in the "panning" process. No, MilyWays and 3Muskateers are not sugar plums, despite the different layers. The "seed" must go through the "panning" process and candy bars don't.

So now you know what a sugar plum is and when someone asks, you can tell them what a sugar plum actually is.

Wait! This means that the Sugar Plum Fairies from The Nutcracker are candy fairies! Who knew?!