Jell-O (written in all capital letters) is an American brand that makes a variety of powdered gelatin desserts, such as fruit-flavored gels and jellies, pudding, and no-bake cream pie mixes. The original gelatin dessert, commonly called jello, is the most well-known product of the brand. "Jell-O" is a registered trademark owned by Kraft Heinz, and the company is based in Chicago, Illinois.
The dessert became very popular during the first half of the 20th century. The original gelatin dessert was created in Le Roy, New York, in 1897, when Pearle Bixby Wait registered the name Jell-O as a trademark. He and his wife, May, made the product by mixing sugar, granulated gelatin (which had been patented in 1845), and flavorings such as strawberry, raspberry, orange, and lemon. To prepare the dessert, the powder is mixed with boiling water and then cooled to form a gel.
Description
Jell-O is sold as ready-to-eat products or in powder form. It comes in many colors and flavors. The powder includes gelatin, flavorings, and either sugar or artificial sweeteners. To prepare it, the powder is mixed with hot water, then chilled until it becomes firm. Fruits, vegetables, and whipped cream can be added to create decorative snacks that can be shaped into different forms.
Some pudding and pie-filling products that do not contain gelatin are sold under the Jell-O brand. Regular Jell-O pudding is cooked on the stove with milk and then eaten warm or cold. Instant Jell-O pudding is mixed with cold milk and chilled. It becomes firm without needing to be cooked. To make pie fillings, the same pudding products are prepared with less liquid.
History
Gelatin is a protein made from collagen found in boiled bones, connective tissues, and other animal parts. It has been used in food, especially desserts, since the 15th century.
In the Victorian era, gelatin became popular in New York with impressive and intricate jelly molds. At that time, gelatin was sold in sheets and required purification, which took a lot of time. Gelatin desserts were enjoyed mainly by royalty and people with more money. In 1845, industrialist Peter Cooper received a patent for powdered gelatin. Cooper also built the first American steam-powered locomotive, called the Tom Thumb. This powdered gelatin was easier to make and use in cooking.
In 1897, in LeRoy, New York, carpenter and cough syrup manufacturer Pearle Bixby Wait trademarked a gelatin dessert called "Jell-O." Wait and his wife, May, added strawberry, raspberry, orange, and lemon flavoring to granulated gelatin and sugar. In 1899, Wait sold Jell-O to "Orator Francis Woodward," whose Genesee Pure Food Company produced the successful Grain-O health drink. A legal agreement between Woodward and Wait addressed the similar name "Jell-O."
Several factors helped Jell-O become a popular product: new technologies like refrigeration, powdered gelatin, and machine packaging; home economics classes; and the company's marketing efforts.
At first, Woodward had trouble selling the powdered product. Starting in 1902, Woodward's Genesee Pure Food Company advertised Jell-O in the Ladies' Home Journal, calling it "America's Most Famous Dessert." Jell-O had limited success until 1904, when Genesee Pure Food Company sent salesmen to distribute free Jell-O cookbooks, a new marketing strategy.
Within a decade, Genesee Pure Food Company added three new flavors: chocolate (discontinued in 1927), cherry, and peach. The company also launched Jell-O in Canada. Celebrity endorsements and recipes appeared in advertisements featuring actress Ethel Barrymore and opera singer Ernestine Schumann-Heink. Some Jell-O advertisements were painted by artist Maxfield Parrish.
In 1923, the company rebranded as the Jell-O Company and launched "D-Zerta," an artificially sweetened version of Jell-O. Two years later, Postum and Genesee merged, and in 1927 Postum acquired Clarence Birdseye's frozen foods company to form the General Foods Corporation.
By 1930, congealed salads became popular in American cuisine, and the company introduced lime-flavored Jell-O to match the ingredients cooks added to these salads. Common Jell-O recipes included ingredients like cabbage, celery, green peppers, and cooked pasta.
In 1934, comedian Jack Benny became Jell-O's spokesperson. At this time, Post introduced a jingle ("featured" by the agency Young & Rubicam) that was used for many years. The jingle included the spelling "J-E-L-L-O" over a rising five-note musical theme.
The jingle was written by Don Bestor, who was the bandleader on Jack Benny's radio show, "The Jell-O Program Starring Jack Benny."
In 1936, chocolate returned to the Jell-O lineup as an instant pudding made with milk. It became very popular, and other pudding flavors were later added, such as vanilla, tapioca, coconut, pistachio, butterscotch, egg custard, flan, and rice pudding.
By the 1950s, salads became so popular that Jell-O responded with savory and vegetable flavors like celery, Italian, mixed vegetable, and seasoned tomato. These flavors were later discontinued.
Though many fancy tea time dishes served between the 1920s and 1950s used expensive ingredients like caviar or lobster, Jell-O became an affordable option for women to create elegant, light, and delicate dishes that matched the standards of refined tea time fare during that period. By the Jazz Age, nearly one-third of salad recipes in an average cookbook were gelatin-based, with fillings like fruit, vegetables, or cream cheese.
Typical recipes from the early 20th century included exotic fruits like figs, dates, and bananas, or lemon-flavored gelatin paired with maraschino cherries, marshmallows, and almonds. One sweet gelatin-based dessert called "Good Salad" included vanilla pudding, tapioca pudding, pineapple, mandarin oranges, and orange gelatin. The pudding mixes were made with juice from canned fruit and flavored gelatin, and the dessert was refrigerated to set.
A savory recipe published by the Des Moines Register in Iowa is for a tomato soup gelatin salad. The salad, served chilled, is made from lemon gelatin, tomato soup, cream cheese, stuffed olives, and other ingredients.
The baby boom led to a rise in Jell-O sales. Young mothers lacked the support systems of earlier generations, so marketers promoted easy-to-prepare prepackaged foods. By this time, making a Jell-O dessert required simply boiling water, mixing it with Jell-O, and refrigerating the mixture in Tupperware molds for a short time.
New flavors were added and unsuccessful ones removed: in the 1950s and 1960s, apple, black cherry, black raspberry, grape, lemon-lime, mixed fruit, orange-banana, pineapple-grapefruit, blackberry, strawberry-banana, tropical fruit, and more intense versions of strawberry, raspberry, and cherry. In 1966, the Jell-O "No-Bake" dessert line was launched, allowing cheesecake to be made in 15 minutes. In 1969, Jell-O 1∗2∗3 (later Jell-O 1•2•3), a three-layer gelatin dessert, was introduced. It was widely available until 1987 but is now discontinued. In 1971, packaged prepared pudding called Jell-O Pudding Treats was introduced. Jell-O Whip 'n Chill, a mousse-style dessert, was introduced and remains available in limited areas today. A similar dessert called Jell-O Soft Swirl was introduced in 1972, with flavors like Chocolate Creme, Strawberry Creme, Vanilla Creme, and Peach Creme. Florence Henderson appeared in TV ads for this product.
In 1964, the slogan "There's always room for Jell-O" was introduced, promoting the product as a "light dessert" that could be eaten after heavy meals.
From the 1960s through the 1980s, Jell-O sales steadily decreased. Many Jell-O dishes became special occasion foods rather than everyday items. Marketers blamed this decline on smaller family sizes, a fast-paced lifestyle, and women's increasing employment. By 1986, a market study found that mothers with young children rarely
Jell-O shots
An alternative recipe includes adding an alcoholic drink to the mixture, which makes up about one-third to one-half of the liquid added after the gelatin has dissolved during boiling. A serving of this mixture is called a "Jell-O shot" or "Jello shot" at parties. The amount and time when alcohol is added are important because Jell-O shots cannot be made with alcohol alone. The gelatin in the recipe contains protein chains that need hot liquid to change shape before they can form a thick, jelly-like mixture. Pure alcohol cannot be heated enough to break these proteins because it evaporates quickly.
Vodka or rum is often used in Jell-O shots, but almost any type of alcohol can be used. When trying different liquors, it is important to balance the amount of alcohol and cold water so the mixture will set properly. Jell-O shots can be served in shot glasses or small paper or plastic cups. Paper or plastic cups are easier to eat from, but shot glasses look more attractive. The alcohol in Jell-O shots is inside the gelatin, so the body absorbs it more slowly, making it harder for people to know how much alcohol they have had. Drinkers should watch how much they consume because of this.
American singer-songwriter Tom Lehrer is said to have created the Jell-O shot in the 1950s to avoid rules about alcohol at the army base where he lived. An early recipe for an alcoholic gelatin drink was published in 1862 in How to Mix Drinks, or The Bon Vivant's Companion by Jerry Thomas. His recipe for "Punch Jelly" included adding gelatin to a drink made with cognac, rum, and lemon juice. Thomas warned that the strength of the punch was "artfully concealed" by the gelatin.
Manufacturing and tourism
In 2012, LeRoy, New York, became famous as the home of Jell-O. The town has the only Jell-O Museum in the world, which is on the main road. Jell-O was made in LeRoy until General Foods shut down the factory in 1964 and moved production to Dover, Delaware. The Jell-O Gallery museum is managed by the Le Roy Historical Society at the Le Roy House and Union Free School. These buildings were added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1997.
The museum shows how Jell-O began. Visitors start at East Main Street and walk along the Jell-O Brick Road, where each stone has the name of a former worker. The museum displays materials used to make Jell-O, like sturgeon bladder and calves' hooves, as well as different molds.
Today, the Jell-O plant owned by Kraft Heinz in Mason City, Iowa, makes all of America's ready-to-eat Jell-O gelatin desserts and pudding cups.
Advertising
Jell-O's early advertising campaign was first led by William E. Humelbaugh and later by Frank LaBounty. The campaign first appeared in the Ladies' Home Journal in 1904. Print advertisements often included recipes and colorful illustrations and became very popular. Artists such as Rose O'Neill, Maxfield Parrish, Coles Phillips, Norman Rockwell, Linn Ball, and Angus MacDonall helped create the campaign. Franklin King, who worked for the Dauchy Company, showed his daughter Elizabeth in many illustrations, making her the well-known "Jell-O Girl."
Jack Benny's highly rated radio program began advertising Jell-O in 1934. The show did not have breaks for commercials; instead, announcer Don Wilson included speeches about Jell-O at appropriate times, often to Jack Benny's humorous frustration. The show introduced the five-note "J-E-L-L-O!" jingle, which was later used in Jell-O's advertising. Lucille Ball's radio show My Favorite Husband, the predecessor to I Love Lucy, was sponsored by Jell-O for most of its 124-episode run, starting January 7, 1949. Ball's character, Liz Cooper, often greeted listeners with the cheerful phrase, "Jell-O, everybody!"
Comedian Bill Cosby was linked to Jell-O and Jell-O pudding, appearing in many commercials promoting both products. He was later fired after accusations in 2014. Later shows, such as Mad TV, The Simpsons, and Saturday Night Live, made jokes about Cosby using references to Jell-O, such as "pudding pop." In the 1960s, the cast of the sitcom Hogan's Heroes appeared in a commercial with Carol Channing, showing Colonel Hogan, his men, Kommandant Klink, and Sergeant Shultz enjoying Jell-O and Dream Whip for dessert. Additionally, in the first few seasons of Lucille Ball's 1960s television series The Lucy Show, cast members like Vivian Vance often appeared in Jell-O commercials.
In 1995, Jell-O used the tagline "It's alive!" and included the phrase "J-E-L-L-OOOOOOO!" in its advertising. In August 2018, Jell-O released an animated series titled JELL-O Wobz on YouTube and Amazon Prime Video, produced in partnership with DreamWorksTV. In 2023, Jell-O updated its brand design for the first time in a decade, making the logo bolder and blockier and featuring very realistic images of pudding and jelly fruit. In September 2024, Jell-O launched The Jelly Collection, an inflatable furniture series inspired by classic Jell-O molds.
In culture
Jell-O is mentioned in the 1936 popular song "A Fine Romance" by Dorothy Fields (with music by Jerome Kern), where it is humorously called a simple choice compared to the excitement of romantic love. In 1980, American composer William Bolcom wrote a humorous song about Jell-O called "Lime Jello Marshmallow Cottage Cheese Surprise," which made fun of how Jell-O is sometimes used in dishes that mix sweet and savory flavors, like Jello salad.
In 1992, Ivette Bassa won the second Ig Nobel Prize in chemistry for inventing blue Jell-O.
The rock group Green Jellÿ was originally named Green Jellö, but had to change their name because Kraft Foods sued them, saying the band was using the Jell-O trademark without permission.
Jell-O is especially popular among Mormons, so much so that the Mormon Corridor region is nicknamed the Jell-O Belt. In 2001, the Utah Senate recognized Jell-O as "a favorite snack food of Utah," noting that Utah had the highest per-capita consumption of Jell-O for many years. The recognition was also linked to Utah's culture, petitions from Utah residents, and efforts by Brigham Young University students. Bill Cosby, a longtime spokesperson for the Jell-O brand, appeared before the Utah Legislature to support the resolution. He said he thinks Utah residents love Jell-O because it is great for families, and Utah is known for its strong family values.
The stereotype of Mormons loving Jell-O does not have a long history. Media reports from 1969 and 1988 about foods popular among Mormons or in Utah did not mention Jell-O. A 1988 article noted Jell-O as a Lutheran tradition. In the late 1980s, Jell-O ran a campaign promoting the snack and its Jigglers recipe as fun for children and easy for parents, which appealed to family-focused Mormons. In 1997, Kraft released sales figures showing Salt Lake City had the highest per-capita Jell-O consumption.
Current flavors
Here are the flavors of Jell-O products that are being made now:
Available in a sugar-free or low-calorie version. Only available during certain times of the year. Only sold as a ready-to-eat product.