Mentos 3D Gum

I find it odd how in such a small market, like the local Israeli market, in the span of one week three companies have come out with new gums. Last week I told you about Orbit's White line of gums, today I’ll write about Mentos’s 3D Gums and I also have a new Must line of gum to review later in the week. I would think that each brand would want to try and spread it out so they don’t have such a strong competition with the initial launch but maybe they don’t know when the other companies are introducing their new product so they can’t really control when things like this happen. I don’t know but it just struck me as interesting how all three of them hit the shelves at the same time, now onto Mentos’s 3D gum.

We first got Mentos Gum here in Israel around March of 2011; you can read my blog post about them here. Even though I wasn’t super duper impressed with them the press release for this 3D line claims those original Mentos gums were a major hit here in Israel so the company decided to bring the 3D gum line here as well.

According to the press release I read, the concept behind the Mentos 3D Gum is that each gum has 3 layers which are intended to add more flavor and dimension to the gum. With the fruit gums each layer is a different flavor; thereby making for a more unique and interesting combination of flavors that may change a bit as you chew the gum and the different flavors take “center stage”.

From a quick Google search I learned that this Mentos 3D line of gums has been available in other parts of the world for quite some time so you may have had a chance to try them by now but they are new to me . In other countries they have many more creative flavors aside from the 4 flavors that have just launched here. The ones they chose to sell in Israel right now are two gums from the Fruity Fresh category;

מסטיק מנטוס 3D

1 Fruity Fresh: A sugar free strawberry, green apple and raspberry gum.

2 Fruity Fresh: A sugar free watermelon, pineapple and melon gum

Then we have 2 in the mint family of gums;

1 Pure Fresh: A sugar free breath-freshening gum with 3 layers of mint.

2 Pure Black: A sugar free gum which combines mint and licorice flavors.

I’ve mentioned in the past that I prefer mint and tart/sour gums to sweet fruit gums so I decided to try the Pure Fresh gum. I’m not a fan of licorice flavors so although that seemed more unique I just couldn’t bring myself to try it. Since I thought it would only be fair to also give you a review of one of the 3D fruit flavored gums I went for the one I thought may be a little tart at times; the strawberry, green apple and raspberry one.

Pure Fresh: A sugar free breath-freshening gum with 3 layers of mint.

When I first opened the pretty and rather elegant wallet-like package a heavy mint aroma hit me. Being that I like strong mint flavors that seemed like a good thing to me. Once the gum was in my mouth I tasted a very overpowering mint flavor to start with. So much so it may be a little too much for some people but with a few minutes of chewing the flavor calmed down a bit but stayed rather minty. For me that was a good thing because, like I said, I enjoy very minty gums. I often find that most mint gums lose the mint flavor way too fast for me so I was willing to put up with the initial strong mint toothpaste-like taste so that I can have a good mint flavor for a longer time.

The main problem I had with this Pure Fresh 3D Mentos Gum was as I chewed it the gum became way too soft and sticky. Normally I find that gums become somewhat harder as I chew them but this one just kept getting softer and gooier, that really annoyed me. To the point that I just had to get rid of the gum after about 10 minutes of chewing even though it still had plenty of mint flavor left in it, I just could not stand how sticky and “stringy” it had become.  

Now onto the

Fruity Fresh: sugar free Strawberry, Green Apple & Raspberry Gum
 

Although the mint gum clearly had 3 layers they were all in the blue/white family whereas from the photo on the elegant wallet-like packaging of the Fruity Fresh gum it looked as though this gum had three different color layers; light pink strawberry, light green apple and reddish pink raspberry. When I actually opened the gum the light pink was way lighter than I thought it would be, more toward a white than a pink, and the reddish pink was closer to a light pink but I wasn’t going to let the color of the gum bother me, even if it was different to what I was anticipated. After all once the gum was chewed a bit it all turned a light mint/green apple color so who cares what colors it started out as.

As with the mint 3D gum this fruit gum also had a strong aroma as soon as I opened the package but this time it was artificial strawberry I smelled and not mint.

As I mentioned before of the two Fruity Fresh options I chose to try the strawberry, green apple, raspberry one hoping it may be a little on the tart side, given that it has green apple and raspberry in it, both those fruits can be a bit tart sometimes. At first all I could taste was a very strong sweet artificial strawberry flavor that I really disliked. Although I wanted to just throw out the piece I had in my mouth right then and there I decided to give it a little longer to see if maybe the green apple flavor would come through and be a little more tart and enjoyable to me. Low and behold quite quickly I began tasting the tartness of the green apple. I enjoyed that part a whole lot more than the strawberry flavor, but disappointing for me the strawberry flavor never really disappeared enough for me to totally enjoy this gum. Had I not known there was raspberry flavor in this gum I’m not sure I would have noticed it, the other two flavors seemed to overpower the raspberry for me but if I “looked for it” I could find it in the mix from time to time.

This Fruity Fresh gum did go softer and stickier as I chewed it but no way near as bad as with the mint one, I told you about earlier. I didn’t feel the need to get rid of it for that reason as I did with the Pure Fresh one but it was softer and gummier than many other gums I’ve had.

The flavor lasted a fairly good amount of time, I’d say about 12-15 minutes. Every now and again I would get a pop of one of the flavors that wasn’t the dominating flavor of the moment. So on that note I think Mentos lived up to the claim they made in the press release; that the flavor sort of evolves and changes as you chew it.

Bottom Line: Mento’s 3D Gum was kind of part hit part miss for me. I liked that both of them were very flavorful and can be long lasting gums. Some of you may think the mint one tastes too much like toothpaste and not something you want in your mouth for too long. But my main issue with the Pure Fresh 3D Gum was how soft and gummy it became. I really didn’t enjoy the consistency. Regarding the 3D Fruity Fresh Mentos Gum I tried, had it been a gum with three tart/sour flavors I would’ve enjoyed it much more but given that it has such a dominating sweet artificial strawberry flavor mixed in this is not a gum I plan on buying again. 

14 pieces per pack- 33 grams- 6.49NIS

Kosher parve Badatz חתם סופר    

 Disclaimer: All items were purchased by me. No one is paying me for this review. All opinions are my own.