Nik-L-Nip
Tiny wax bottles filled with a swallow of sweet, fruit-flavored syrup. You bit the top off, drank the little sip inside, and then — the part that made no sense and everyone did anyway — chewed the leftover wax like gum.
Nik-L-Nip is an old-timey candy that dates back to the early twentieth century, which makes it one of those things a 90s kid experienced as brand-new while it was in fact decades old. The name is a small history lesson in itself: it combines the original nickel price with 'nips' — the tiny bottles that miniature liquor came in — and the act of nipping the top off to get at what's inside.
The format never changed and never needed to. Each pack held a set of small, brightly colored wax bottles, each holding a mouthful of fruit-flavored syrup. You bit or twisted off the top, tipped back the sip of sugary liquid, and were then left holding a wad of flavorless wax that, by unspoken kid tradition, you chewed anyway until it lost all appeal and got spat out.
Marketed in modern times by Tootsie Roll Industries, Nik-L-Nip is still made, which means the ritual survives — the same tiny bottles, the same too-small sip, the same slightly baffling chew-the-wax finish that every kid figured out on their own.
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