Kool-Aid Jelly Beans

Welcome back to A Boy and His Beans! It’ll sadly be our smallest season yet, with only four reviews queued up – and two of those I held over from last year! I could only find a single new jelly bean product here in the United States of America, and the other was imported from Canada. Brach’s, which used to be a reliable source for a new variety each year, has declined (for a second year in a row) to put out a new offering. Frankford appears to be the new torchbearer in this country, and in 2026 they have come out with one of the wildest new offerings in years.

That will have to wait, though. We’re kicking off the season with a set of jelly beans that harkens back to one of my favorite childhood treats: Kool-Aid Jelly Beans!

Let’s get into it!

Size and shape

The average size of these jelly beans is right where it should be and there is clearly an effort made to represent a proper bean shape, but the consistency of both facets is horrendous.

There is a high proportion of double-beans and pointy extrusions. The dimpling process often results in a perpendicular flat side and most beans are not well-rounded, yet some beans are eggy and have no apparent dimple at all. And some of the dimples are so acute they resemble the mark left on a car by hail the size of a golf ball.

It’s just not a good first impression for these beans.

1 out of 5 beans

Chewability

Consistency is also a bit of a problem for this category, but not a major one. There is a range from easy-breezy to a mildly tough. On balance, they chew just fine, but there is also a bit of tooth-sticking on the chewier ones.

3 out of 5 beans

Texture

Kool-Aid Jelly Beans are strong in the texture department. The shells are a little thin but break down first into good-sized hunks and then further into fine granules.

The insides are not unpleasant, but a little smoother and this would be a perfect category.

4 out of 5 beans

Taste and flavor

This is a nice set of flavors. I wish my memories of the original Kool-Aid beverage flavors were better (and maybe a better reviewer would have gotten some Kool-Aid and compared directly), but some of them definitely seem on target.

Tropical Punch and Kiwi Strawberry are possibly the two flavors here that Kool-Aid is most known for, with the latter being launched in the early 90s alongside the famous Snapple flavor. Tropical Punch is pretty good, but subtle, and Kiwi Strawberry is excellent.

I don’t remember cherry Kool-Aid that well, but this is a delicious cherry jelly bean that doesn’t skimp on the acidity of a cherry at peak ripeness. Grape is also solid, but unremarkable.

Finally, we were a Tang household – or more accurately, my grandparents were a Tang household – so it may just be projection, but the orange bean reminds me very much of that classic astronaut beverage. Nostalgic in the best way.

8 out of 10 beans

The one-of-each test

Perhaps the ultimate test of a bag of jelly beans is how enjoyable it is to take one of each flavor and eat them all at the same time.¹

Here we have the right amount of beans with reasonable chewability and a solid collection of individual flavors, so this is a promising prospect, and indeed it delivers a strong wallop on the tongue. The only problem is that it all melds into a single flavor a bit too quickly. It’s a good flavor, but I’d rate it a bit higher if the flavors could stay distinct for a little longer.

7 out of 10 beans

Conclusion

That’s a good showing from Kool-Aid Jelly Beans to open the season! I can gladly recommend these to anyone who has fond nostalgia for Kool-Aid, or anyone who is just interested in some fruit jelly beans with flavors slightly outside the standard assortments.