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Please do not repost this outside of vapingunderground.com.
HIC's Pink Bubble Gum recipe: Double Bubble, Bazooka, Hubba Bubba... - so many variations in pink bubble gum, yet not ONE vendor's bubble gum flavor tastes like ANY of them! I quit trying to fix vendor versions, researched bubble gum history, learned the actual chemicals used in American pink bubble gum, and made my own recipe with flavorings that use those same chemicals. This is the flavor of original 1928 pink Double Bubble. The detailed, nerdy notes are not just highly entertaining - they tell you substitutes for fine-tuning your results - so be sure to read everything.
2% TFA Wintergreen OR 2% Nature's Flavors Organic Wintergreen
2% Vanillin (available ready-to-use here)
1% TFA Cinnamon Spice
1% FlavourArt Orange
Even if you're too young to remember those jaw-exercising pink wads of Double Bubble, you'll recognize this as kiddie sweet, pink bubble gum. Even after you've mixed it yourself, you'll be hard-pressed to identify any of the 4 flavors that combine to create that familiar bubble gum flavor. Such a cool flavor trick!
Wintergreen: By the time the first pink bubble gum was invented, methyl salicylate, which we recognize as wintergreen, was commonly synthesized from numerous sources. TFA's Wintergreen IS methyl salicylate, so it is perfect here. NF's Organic Wintergreen also works, perhaps using actual wintergreen extract. Another possible substitute is FW Teaberry. Teaberry was one of the earliest gum flavors, using extract from the Gaulteria procumbens (aka 'eastern wintergreen') plant. Though that plant was also the first source of synthetic wintergreen flavoring, by 1928, numerous cheaper sources were more widely used.
Vanillin: By the late 1800s, synthetic vanillin had become so popular, the market for real vanilla was depressed. Cheap, readily-available vanillin would have been in the 1928 recipe. Substituting vanilla flavoring will change your results; vanillin is ideal. If you use vanilla flavoring, avoid any cupcake or custard versions. FlavourArt Vanilla Classic will do. TFA Vanilla Bourbon does okay. More exotic vanilla flavors will mess it up. If you want great pink bubble gum, use vanillin.
Cinnamon: By 1928, cinnamic aldehyde was widely used in America - much cheaper than cassia cinnamon. Eugenol was often used with the aldehyde. So - it would appear TFA's plain Cinnamon flavor would be ideal (it also include citrus chemicals, which you'll see do have a place here when you read about Orange below) but I don't have it! If you do, it would be excellent here. TFA Cinnamon Spice tastes perfect to me. If you use TFA Cinnamon Red Hot, use only 0.75% or you'll taste Dentyne mixed in your bubble gum. Do not use FlavourArt Cinnamon Ceylon. Bakery Ceylon flavor has no place here.
Orange: The original Double Bubble used orange oil (popular gum flavor beginning in the 1870s), and FA Orange is working perfectly to complete the authentic flavor for me. But THIS is the source of flavor variation between different brands of pink bubble gum! This element just has to be something fruity, sweet, with an optional floral note. There is a certain set of compounds in orange oil that's also found in many surprising sources, from jasmine flowers, to whiskey by-products (important source of 1800s tutti-fruity gum flavors and the original flavoring in Juicy Fruit gum), to other floral fruits. When I played with this last element, I started tasting all the different brands of pink bubble gum. If you want a less "kiddie" version, more like a stick of gum called bubble gum flavor, use FA Passionfruit here. If you like gumballs from a gumball machine, use FA Tutti-Fruity instead. TFA has a Tutti-Fruity I haven't tried, but it likely works similarly, because it includes the compounds found in orange oil. TFA Mandarin Orange also includes those compounds, but I haven't tried it. The most surprising acceptable substitute I found was FA Concord Grape. I used only 1% to complete the bubble gum effect, but if you want grape bubble gum, you'd need a bit more. FA Mangosteen works exceptionally well. Just look through your flavors for fruity, sweet, perhaps a little floral - I'm sure there are additional great substitutes. But try Orange first for the most authentic flavor! (If you can detect the orange flavor - just one friend of mine could - an extra 0.5% Wintergreen will make it vanish.)
Isn't DIY fun?! <--that's me blowing a bubble, ha!
Please do not repost this outside of vapingunderground.com.
HIC's Pink Bubble Gum recipe: Double Bubble, Bazooka, Hubba Bubba... - so many variations in pink bubble gum, yet not ONE vendor's bubble gum flavor tastes like ANY of them! I quit trying to fix vendor versions, researched bubble gum history, learned the actual chemicals used in American pink bubble gum, and made my own recipe with flavorings that use those same chemicals. This is the flavor of original 1928 pink Double Bubble. The detailed, nerdy notes are not just highly entertaining - they tell you substitutes for fine-tuning your results - so be sure to read everything.
2% TFA Wintergreen OR 2% Nature's Flavors Organic Wintergreen
2% Vanillin (available ready-to-use here)
1% TFA Cinnamon Spice
1% FlavourArt Orange
Even if you're too young to remember those jaw-exercising pink wads of Double Bubble, you'll recognize this as kiddie sweet, pink bubble gum. Even after you've mixed it yourself, you'll be hard-pressed to identify any of the 4 flavors that combine to create that familiar bubble gum flavor. Such a cool flavor trick!
Wintergreen: By the time the first pink bubble gum was invented, methyl salicylate, which we recognize as wintergreen, was commonly synthesized from numerous sources. TFA's Wintergreen IS methyl salicylate, so it is perfect here. NF's Organic Wintergreen also works, perhaps using actual wintergreen extract. Another possible substitute is FW Teaberry. Teaberry was one of the earliest gum flavors, using extract from the Gaulteria procumbens (aka 'eastern wintergreen') plant. Though that plant was also the first source of synthetic wintergreen flavoring, by 1928, numerous cheaper sources were more widely used.
Vanillin: By the late 1800s, synthetic vanillin had become so popular, the market for real vanilla was depressed. Cheap, readily-available vanillin would have been in the 1928 recipe. Substituting vanilla flavoring will change your results; vanillin is ideal. If you use vanilla flavoring, avoid any cupcake or custard versions. FlavourArt Vanilla Classic will do. TFA Vanilla Bourbon does okay. More exotic vanilla flavors will mess it up. If you want great pink bubble gum, use vanillin.
Cinnamon: By 1928, cinnamic aldehyde was widely used in America - much cheaper than cassia cinnamon. Eugenol was often used with the aldehyde. So - it would appear TFA's plain Cinnamon flavor would be ideal (it also include citrus chemicals, which you'll see do have a place here when you read about Orange below) but I don't have it! If you do, it would be excellent here. TFA Cinnamon Spice tastes perfect to me. If you use TFA Cinnamon Red Hot, use only 0.75% or you'll taste Dentyne mixed in your bubble gum. Do not use FlavourArt Cinnamon Ceylon. Bakery Ceylon flavor has no place here.
Orange: The original Double Bubble used orange oil (popular gum flavor beginning in the 1870s), and FA Orange is working perfectly to complete the authentic flavor for me. But THIS is the source of flavor variation between different brands of pink bubble gum! This element just has to be something fruity, sweet, with an optional floral note. There is a certain set of compounds in orange oil that's also found in many surprising sources, from jasmine flowers, to whiskey by-products (important source of 1800s tutti-fruity gum flavors and the original flavoring in Juicy Fruit gum), to other floral fruits. When I played with this last element, I started tasting all the different brands of pink bubble gum. If you want a less "kiddie" version, more like a stick of gum called bubble gum flavor, use FA Passionfruit here. If you like gumballs from a gumball machine, use FA Tutti-Fruity instead. TFA has a Tutti-Fruity I haven't tried, but it likely works similarly, because it includes the compounds found in orange oil. TFA Mandarin Orange also includes those compounds, but I haven't tried it. The most surprising acceptable substitute I found was FA Concord Grape. I used only 1% to complete the bubble gum effect, but if you want grape bubble gum, you'd need a bit more. FA Mangosteen works exceptionally well. Just look through your flavors for fruity, sweet, perhaps a little floral - I'm sure there are additional great substitutes. But try Orange first for the most authentic flavor! (If you can detect the orange flavor - just one friend of mine could - an extra 0.5% Wintergreen will make it vanish.)
Isn't DIY fun?! <--that's me blowing a bubble, ha!
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