The product is made of four ingredients: salt, artificial butter flavor, and Yellow #5 and Yellow #6. Manufactured by Gold Medal, Flavacol is the “secret sauce” most movie theaters use in order to produce that quintessential popcorn flavor only found in cinemas, stadiums, and the like.įlavacol is a butter-flavored, popcorn seasoning salt made of extra fine salt flakes. Time to find out what the real secret ingredient is in every bucket of movie theater popcorn. The secret ingredient is Flavacol It’s used for cooking popcorn. (Although, a medium popcorn at certain theaters can contain over 1,000 calories.)ģ. Because they can be as liberal as they please with salt, oil, and butter (or shall we say “buttery flavor,” which we’ll get to in a minute), there’s no telling how much any given movie theater is pumping into its popcorn production. That said, there’s nothing to prevent them from really going overboard. | Thinkstockīags of microwave popcorn have to display a nutrition label. Movie theaters don’t have to provide nutrition labels There are probably way more calories than you think. And while most grocery stores sell a variety of kernels, all popcorn starts as regular, unseasoned, untouched kernels. In fact, all batches of popcorn, regardless of location, begin as a large amount of kernels. The reason that movie theater popcorn is so damn tasty has nothing to do with the popcorn itself, and everything to do with the process. All popcorn starts off the same It all starts off the same. And the next time you find yourself with a post-movie-theater-bucket stomach ache, don’t say we didn’t warn you.

So sit back, relax, and prepare to learn just how movie theater popcorn is made. As you begin chowing down on your bucket of buttery goodness, the question inevitably pops into your head: How come my homemade popcorn never tastes this good? Well, you’re about to find out.

You’re sitting at the movie theater waiting for the latest blockbuster to hit the screen.

Movie theater and popcorn