Critical DMs: Chicago Mix, the Vince Vaughn of popcorn

Vital DMs are calmly edited Slack conversations by members of the MPR Information arts group about Minnesota artwork and tradition.

This week, arts editor Max Sparber and humanities reporter and critic Jacob Aloi focus on Candyland’s Chicago Combine popcorn.

Max Sparber: All proper, popcorn ahoy.

Jacob Aloi: Regardless of presently being in Chicago, I used to be unable to obtain Chicago Combine. However I believe that’s okay, contemplating it isn’t actually from Chicago, proper?

Sparber: It’s not clear the place the idea of it developed — blended popcorns have been round ceaselessly. However you’re appropriate: The title is a Minnesota invention. Particularly, Candyland in Minneapolis, St. Paul and Stillwater.

Garrett Popcorn in Chicago referred to as their combine Chicago Combine, and Candyland sued.

Aloi: Chicago Combine does roll off the tongue higher than “Twin Cities Combine.” Sorry MSP metropolitan space.

Sparber: That’s what Candyland thought after they named it. Chicago Combine simply appears like popcorn you’d need to eat.

Let’s describe it.

Aloi: Candyland’s Chicago Combine is a mix of cheese popcorn, carmel popcorn and what’s been described as “seasoned” popcorn.

Sparber: The cheese is cheddar powder, and lest any spice-timid Midwesterners panic concerning the seasoning, it’s popcorn oil and salt.

I’ve had blended popcorn the place they add scorching pepper seasoning — this isn’t that.

Aloi: Salt is certainly a seasoning — good advertising!

Sparber: No lies right here!

Aloi: What I recognize concerning the combine is that it’s a good mix of savory and candy, with an additional kick of sodium from the “seasoned” popcorn.

Sparber: Yeah, it’s a staple in my residence. I eat numerous it, my girlfriend eats numerous it, and our canine bullies us to offer him as a lot as potential.

Aloi: Do you’ve gotten all of it yr spherical? I at all times related it with wintertime, till I began working at MPR, the place it’s the assembly snack of alternative.

Sparber: I get it every time I cross Candyland. Since I reside close to downtown Minneapolis and there’s a Candyland a couple of blocks from our St. Paul workplace, that’s very often.

I additionally purchase the Chicago Combine knockoffs you discover in grocery shops. Which have their deserves, however most do not need the seasoned popcorn, so it’s an actual conflict of candy and savory.

Aloi: Yeah, I believe you want the common stuff to chop by way of the stronger flavors.

Sparber: I agree. Regardless of its title, the Candyland model feels just like the iconically Minnesotan model.

I believe there’s something very Minnesotan about hiding the truth that you’re Minnesotan. Like Prince telling Matt Damon that he lives inside his personal coronary heart.

Aloi: Chicago Combine: the Prince of snack meals.

Sparber: That could be a excellent slogan.

Aloi: The snack meals formally often known as Chicago Combine.

Sparber: Chicago Combine: It lives inside your personal coronary heart, Matt Damon.

Truly, it’s extra like Vince Vaughn. He was born in Minneapolis however insists he’s a Chicagoan, the place he was raised.

Aloi: Effectively, no matter it’s, I believe Candyland has earned the title of definitive provider of Chicago Combine.

Sparber: By regulation!

It’s bizarre to me that everyone went bananas for the Jucy Lucy a couple of years in the past and but Chicago Combine would not really feel prefer it has the identical type of native meals cache.

Aloi: Identify recognition. It’s a complicated title that makes it very marketable and precludes it from being a hometown hero. 

Sparber: Yeah, I assume if the Jucy Lucy had referred to as itself the Santa Fe Lucy none of us can be speaking about it.

Chicago Combine giveth and Chicago Combine taketh away.