Anise Salt Water Taffy

One of the oldest flavors we make — and one most taffy makers gave up on.

A hundred years ago, anise was standard in every American candy shop. It was in the lozenges, the drops, the pulled sticks, and the taffy. Today you can walk a whole candy aisle and not find it once. We've been making anise taffy in southern Illinois since 1919, on the same recipe, because the people who want it don't want anything else.

What anise tastes like

Licorice — the real kind. Anise has that clean, sweet, faintly cooling licorice note, without the heavy molasses edge of a black licorice rope. It's bright rather than dark. Pulled into salt water taffy it goes soft and mellow, and it lingers longer than any other flavor in the box.

Why it disappeared from most taffy boxes

Anise is a flavor people have opinions about. Nobody is neutral on it. Modern assortments play it safe — strawberry, vanilla, banana, blue raspberry — because safe flavors don't get left in the bottom of the bag. We kept making anise because our recipe hasn't changed since 1919, and it was in the recipe.

The same taffy from the fair

It's the same recipe that sold over a million boxes at the 1939 New York World's Fair, made the same way ever since. If you had anise taffy at a fair a long time ago and have been looking for it since, this is it.

See all Sutter's flavors — 14 oz boxes, shipped

Want a specific flavor in your box? Say so in the order notes when you check out and we'll pack it that way. If rare flavors are what you're after, try our black walnut taffy too — it's our best seller and just as hard to find. More on where we came from over on our history page.