Back in 1956, General Foods chemist William A. Mitchell came up with the original Pop Rocks candy, a carbonated candy made from assorted sugars and flavorings, heated to the melting point, exposed to carbon dioxide at a pressure of 600 pounds per square inch, and then cooled. The cooling process traps tiny bubbles of high pressure gas in the candy, and when you dissolve them in your mouth, they tingle, sizzle, and pop.

The candy created a huge sensation when it was finally released on the market in 1975, and from 1979 until 1983, General Foods battled rumors that consuming Pop Rocks and cola would cause kids to literally explode (witness the urban myth that Mikey of Life Cereal’s “He’ll Eat Anything” ad fame exploded in such a manner). General Foods gave in to the pressure and took the candy off of the market in 1983; Kraft bought the rights in 1985 and sold the candy as Action Candy, but that was short-lived. Since 1979, Zeta Espacial S.A. of Barcelona has manufactured, sold, and exported the candy.

The frontier of culinary science: Pop Rocks experiments from their website

It was near Barcelona that Pop Rocks and food finally merged. Avant-garde deconstructionist chef Ferran Adrià of El Bulli, just up the Costa Brava, first played around with Pop Rocks, or Peta Zetas as they are known in Spain, incorporating them into some of his dishes, desserts, and cocktails. But the chef who has had perhaps the most lasting impact with Pop Rocks has been master chocolatier Oriol Balaguer of Barcelona. His Peta Zetas truffles are the stuff of tingly dreams: sensuous flavored chocolate bombs that subtly explode in the center. Heston Blumenthal, molecular gastronomy chef of England’s three-Michelin-starred the Fat Duck has created a luscious chocolate mousse cake with a hazelnut-Pop Rocks base (recipe below). For the definitive history of the candy, read Pop Rocks: The Inside Story of America’s Revolu­tion­ary Candy, available at www.specialtypublishers.com. See the full line of Pop Rocks products (including bulk sales) at www.zetaespacial.com; order at www.poprockscandy.com. Pop Rocks can be purchased locally at Big Top Candy Shop (1706 S. Congress, 462-2220).

This article appears in July 25 • 2008.

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Mick Vann is a retired Austin chef who is a food writer and restaurant critic, cookbook author, restaurant consultant, and recipe developer. He moonlights as a University of Texas horticulturist with a propensity for ethnic eats and international food, particularly of the Asian persuasion, but he also knows his way around a plate of soul food or barbecue.