The Real Willy Wonka: Three-Course Meal in a Single Stick of Chewing Gum

By on October 11, 2010 in News 8

WillyWonkaMoviePosterBy Niall Firth for the Daily Mail:

It didn’t work out that well for poor Violet Beauregarde in Willy Wonka’s factory.

But now researchers say they may have cracked the secret behind creating a sweet that replicates three meals in a single stick of chewing gum.

Scientists at the Institute of Food Research (IFR) say the latest technology could be used to turn Willy Wonka’s eccentric invention into reality – but without the unpleasant side effects.

Food scientist Dave Hart believes that recent advances in nanotechnology, which deals with structures just millionths of a millimetre in size, could capture and release flavours in a precisely controlled way…

[continues in the Daily Mail]

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  • mole_face

    Commence the “schnozberries” references!

  • fuzzgun

    Commence the “schnozberries” references!

  • Namelesswon

    There you go, more “Researchers” and scientists “saying stuff”.

    • Dave Hart

      Actually Namelessone that is EXACTLY what it is. Along with a number of others I was approached by the organizers of The National Science and Engineering Competition and asked to write an essay, to publicize their event,on a given science problem. As I work in food research mine was “Would it be possible to make Willy Wonka’s three course meal chewing gum a reality?” So after work one night I wrote a 1500 word essay saying how a sweet could probably be made using normal kitchen techniques, how it might be possible to make a gum using a technique developed by Prof Tony Dinsmore at U Mass, why it probably wouldn’t work, and setting a challenge for kids to criticize the idea further and improve on it.

      I’m not actually working on the product; I have no intention of working on the product. I am a research scientist, and I work with a lot of local schools – that’s why I was given the task.

      It is just amazing the interest this tiny item has generated – and kind of annoying; you work for years on important stuff and no one really cares. Spend two hours having a bit of fun and the world goes crazy.

  • Namelesswon

    There you go, more “Researchers” and scientists “saying stuff”.

  • Hadrian999

    i’d rather just have the actual food, thankyou

  • Hadrian999

    i’d rather just have the actual food, thankyou

  • Dave Hart

    Actually Namelessone that is EXACTLY what it is. Along with a number of others I was approached by the organizers of The National Science and Engineering Competition and asked to write an essay, to publicize their event,on a given science problem. As I work in food research mine was “Would it be possible to make Willy Wonka’s three course meal chewing gum a reality?” So after work one night I wrote a 1500 word essay saying how a sweet could probably be made using normal kitchen techniques, how it might be possible to make a gum using a technique developed by Prof Tony Dinsmore at U Mass, why it probably wouldn’t work, and setting a challenge for kids to criticize the idea further and improve on it.

    I’m not actually working on the product; I have no intention of working on the product. I am a research scientist, and I work with a lot of local schools – that’s why I was given the task.

    It is just amazing the interest this tiny item has generated – and kind of annoying; you work for years on important stuff and no one really cares. Spend two hours having a bit of fun and the world goes crazy.