Do British Candy Bars Taste Better? Serious Eats Investigates
Like many food lovers, I was enthralled by Kim Severson's story on British chocolate bars in the New York Times. Severson tries to explain why British chocolate bars have a different taste from their U.S. counterparts. She concludes that it is a combination of slightly different ingredients and processing techniques. You've heard of terroir, which is, according to Wikipedia, a "French term in wine and coffee used to denote the special characteristics that geography bestowed upon them." Let's call what Severson reported "factoir," or the special characteristics that factories bestow upon chocolate bars.
Even more interesting was the main story's taste-test sidebar, in which Severson concludes that "British chocolate bars do taste better." Not that we don't trust the esteemed writers at the Times, but I wanted to take those British candy bars out for my own test drive. So last evening I went down to Tea & Sympathy in New York City's Greenwich Village and bought two of every candy bar mentioned in the article—and a few others for good measure. I then bought some of their U.S. counterparts and brought them to the office for an official Serious Eaters Society–sanctioned taste test.
I tried the two Kit Kat bars first. Although they were "differently bad," as Eric Asimov described them, one was not in the end more delicious than the other. The same was true for the Cadbury Milk and Hershey's Milk Chocolate bars and for every confection I compared.
Here's my conclusion: The romantic feelings for British candy bars that Severson discovered are the same kinds of romantic feelings anyone has about the snacks and soft drinks they grew up with. People in the South love Goo Goo Clusters and Cheerwine soda and swear up and down that they're really better than other candy bars and sodas. Ask the people of Detroit about Vernor's Ginger Ale, and they'll swear up and down it really is much better than other ginger ales. And maybe it is. But that's not the whole story.
Snacks and soft drinks are incredibly resonant lightning rods for people's affection for either their adopted or original hometown. As a New Yorker, I love Joyva Jellies and Marshmallow Twists, and Goldberger's Peanut Chews, the candy of my youth, and I will go to my deathbed proclaiming their inherent superiority and deliciousness. And if I did comparative taste tests for each of them, I would be able to come up with some seemingly objective, clearheaded observations about how and why they are better and different. I might very well come up with the same kinds of winelike descriptors Severson and Asimov came up with: "more pronounced dairy flavor," "smoother in the mouth," and "melting with more tongue-coating indulgence."
In the end, Asimov was right in saying they're "differently bad." But that's not really the point. When it comes down to it, eating an inexpensive chocolate bar or a locally produced soft drink is an incredibly satisfying cheap thrill made even more resonant by some kind of hometown provenance.
I have to go now. I'm craving a Joyva Marshmallow Twist. They really are better, twistier, and more complex.
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21 Comments:
I think British sweets are pretty bad, but I have a soft spot for Maltesers (I'm actually eating one as I write this), and also for Cadbury Mini Eggs, which are 'seasonal' (hehe) - ie only available around Easter. I've never really been into sweets, but the ones I like are evocative of a time and place. Yesterday, for example, my boyfriend returned from the Roskilde Music Festival in Denmark and he brought back Anthon Berg chocolates, which are filled with boozy marzipan. As a teenager in Denmark I hated these chocolates, but when I had one yesterday it seemed extraordinarily delicious to me. I mean, my sense of its deliciousness was completely out of proportion with reality. It reminded me of being a stroppy seventeen year old, except without all the bad stuff that went along with it. I think that's as good as chocolate gets.
caley at 9:58AM on 07/13/07
Wow... I can't believe what I'm reading. While I can't speak to Cadbury Kit Kat's and all that garbage, you can't compare the real UK version of Cadbury Daily Milk to Hershey's Milk chocolate. Nostalgia aside (I grew up on Hershey), eating a Cadbury Daily Milk bar from the UK makes Hershey's Milk Chocolate taste like cardboard!
Are you sure you got imported milk bars for your test??? According to the article, the Cadbury Milk bars they sell in the US are manufactured by Hershey to taste more like Hershey chocolate. It makes sense too, because in the EU they require there to be 25% cocoa solids in anything labeled "Chocolate" (the US requires far less).
I demand a recount... or at least request that I be invited to the next chocolate taste testing panel!!!!
Zach Brooks at 10:24AM on 07/13/07
Testify Ed!
I've been saying this for years ... yes, some candies are better than others on the basis of quality, but you can't argue with people's tastes and the last thing anyone should do is go around saying that they're stupid for liking what they like. I'm not a better person because I can appreciate at 6 dollar chocolate bar over a 75 cent one. I think perhaps the better person is the one that can take simple pleasure in both.
Food preferences have long been used as a measuring stick full of sterotypes (beer drinkers are uneducated, wine drinkers are snobs) that are simply silly and limiting.
cybele at 10:31AM on 07/13/07
Hmm. I both agree and disagree with you on this, Ed.
I disagree in that I think Maltesers are awesome and that I second Zachs' comment that you can't even compare the Hershey's to Cadbury Dairy Milks. I had a coworker at a former job who brought both of these in to the office after her frequent trips to England, and there's no doubt that the British items were better.
I would agree to some extent, however, that local provenance, romanticism, and/or growing up with an item does play in to it. I simply don't understand what's so great about those damn black and white cookies that most New Yorkers are gaga over. Big effin' deal—they're tasteless too-cakey cookies dipped in tasteless icing. Yet every native New Yorker loves these things. Whatevs.
Adam Kuban at 10:34AM on 07/13/07
Has anyone had Galexy chocolate? It's like Cabury, but I personally like it better, and the fruit and nut kind has hazelnut instead of almond. Plus, the caramel Galexy is nicer (I think) than the caramel Cadbury, because the filling is thinner and drippier. Don't know if you can find them in the States though.
I agree about Cadbury being better than Hershey, but then, I've always thought that Hershey is vile.
I also agree, Adam, about those wretched black and white cookies. My childhood was spent on the UWS and I still think they're horrible. I've been told that it's just because I haven't had a good one, but I don't actually believe that a good one exists!
caley at 10:53AM on 07/13/07
Joyva Marshmallow Twist...tell me where you get 'em!
Goldenberg's Peanut Chew were my father's favorite candy. You mean they didn't have them in Nebraska?
annien at 11:02AM on 07/13/07
English chocolates are much tastier than American chocolates which are far too sweet with less of a "chocolatey" taste.
Go with an open mind and have a tasting and see for yourself.
flakevanille at 11:21AM on 07/13/07
Anyone here remember the older version of Joyva;'s Marshmallow Twist that would get hard as a rock and crack when frozen. I wonder what they did to the recipe to change that?
crackblind at 11:52AM on 07/13/07
The Boost bar in England is much more satisfying that the closest American approximation, the Twix, if only for its heft. My research tells me that the Boost bar is made in Cadbury’s Irish factory and called Moro there – Moro Gold in New Zealand.
I studied at an English university for a year and was once taken aside by Alistair the librarian who was flummoxed by a box of Hershey’s sent to him by some friends across the pond. He closed the door of his office and beseeched me to take them and share with any Americans I knew. And while he allowed for acquired taste in his apology, but I swear I saw him shiver.
Phoebe Damrosch at 12:02PM on 07/13/07
Adam Kuban--not all black-and-whites are created equal. Most of the ones I've tasted are pretty bad, in fact: dry cake bottom with sugary tasteless frosting.
BUT! (You knew that was coming, right?) In my neighborhood, Nussbaum & Wu sell a black-and-white that is a POEM. Tender, crumbly cake bottom, and an icing more like that on a petit-four, with the chocolate tasting really chocolatey. My cousin in Massachusetts is addicted to black-and-whites, and I brought him some Nussbaum&Wus and he agreed that they were the best he'd ever tasted.
So, don't condemn the genre for a few bad eggs, OK?
klg19 at 12:59PM on 07/13/07
I'm torn on this one. I grew up on Canadian chocolate bars (which I've heard some say are in between American and British-like so many other things in Canadian society... but I digress) and I definitely prefer some British chocolate bars after travelling to the UK and trying them a couple of years ago. I can't really explain what is better, but it just is. But on the other hand, to each her own, so who really cares what anyone else says, just eat the chocolate you like best!
psychsarah at 12:59PM on 07/13/07
I'm from Dublin and I just can't express how unlike chocolate Hershey stuff is. I understand why it's referred to as candy. Subjectively I just can't stand it, but even objectively it just should not be classified as chocolate. As for differences between countries within brands,they do exist in my opinion. Like Coke is formulated for different countries, I have found differences. I'm in Japan at the moment and while a KitKat is almost exactly the same as an Irish one (albeit available in a lot more flavours,including a bizarre green tea flavour one!), a Snickers is a slightly different shape with different tasting chocolate. I guess the differences exist for some reason,but I would love to know who gets to represent the population of a country when a big corporation wants to decide what that country likes in terms of chocolate!
Mitsi at 1:28PM on 07/13/07
I'm with zach... are you sure you got the imports? They share a relatively similar label, if not the exact same label (I can't exactly remember)... I rejoice whenever I find an aero bar (mmm sweet mint aero) in the states....
pbisNOTmyname at 1:44PM on 07/13/07
I've never had British candy to be honest but I MUST say that Israeli chocolate bars are far superior to American chocolate bars and that you if you're reading this, you should try chocolate from Elite! And no, I don't work for them.
Chew on That at 2:40PM on 07/13/07
With you, Adam, on the black and whites. Never had a good one and even klg19's rhapsodic description of the apparent cream of the crop still sounds pretty wretched to me (maybe because I hate petit-fours, too).
The perfect marriage of cookie and candy to me will always be Nabisco's finest, the Mallomar.
kqrbob at 5:18PM on 07/13/07
Born-n-bred New Yorker, and I could care less about black and white cookies. But VERNORS, man, that is the ginger ale of the gods. I discovered it 20 years ago while doing a particularly dire play in the suburbs of Detroit, and it was the only thing that compensated for an otherwise nightmare-ish experience. Dean & DeLucca used to carry it, and I would make pilgramages downtown just for a fix. These days my ex brings me cases of the stuff when he visits his family in Cinci.
maggiesara at 5:39PM on 07/13/07
I was excited to see this because I read the Times article too and decided to do some investigating on my own. I am a native Texan and never had British chocolate until yesterday. I went to a local HEB grocery who does supply a few imported items and purchased four Nestle Yorkie bars. I went home, and opened the first one with anticipation. This chocolate bar is pure chocolate with nothing (cookies, wafers, etc) added. All I can say is "WOW"! There is a distinct difference in taste from what I have grown up with (Hershey's). The creamy texture, the rich chocolate taste that envelops your taste buds, the satisfying thickness of the segmented chunks of delicious chocolate. I am absolutely sold, and spent a large part of the evening cruising British food websites trying to decide which others to try next. I am reading that Mars bars are supposed to be sublime.
pirick at 8:33AM on 07/14/07
why did you not go to economy candy on rivington between ludlow and essex?? their bars are definitely imported and from all over the place too. it's pretty much one of my favorite places on earth. did you try a crunchie?? crunchies are the bomb.
and also, yes, i am from detroit, but vernor's truly is the best ginger ale on the planet. hands down. no kidding.
crafty at 10:48AM on 07/16/07
I registered for this site just to make a comment on this point.
I lived in Ireland for over 6 years and was a devout chocaholic but when I moved back to Canada I found the chocolate here rather boring, tasteless and bland.
Fortunately I had brought back several huge Cadbury chocolate bars and a 1.5K tin of Roses' chocolates with me. Once they were gone, I tried to feed my habit on the vast variety of Canadian chocolate bars only to be disenchanted.
Make no mistake about it, British/Irish chocolate (we must not forget Belgium) is the best tasting in the world.
I confess that I enjoy having a Coffee Crisp once in a while but I just finished a Galaxy Ripple bar which I bought (along with a whole pile of UK goodies from an import source near me) and there is no comparison. It was moanful (not mournful) to say the least and I felt that I had indeed had a good chocolate fix.
Those who disagree have no taste buds!
Flaxman at 10:20PM on 11/05/07
I am from Wales in the UK and I have a Second home in LA, and I go there around 6-7 times a year. The thing I miss the most going there is having Cadbury's Dairy Milk. there are so many gorgeous chocolates in the UK - Mars, Galaxy, Snickers, etc. And they just cant compare to the chocolate in the US. I will say the sweets/candy in the US in great, but the chocolate cant compare.
i will defend the black/white biscuits, they are kinda nice. everyone likes them in the UK!
cassiee at 10:07AM on 08/27/09
i mean the US chocolates cant compare to the UK ones ! sorry!
cassiee at 10:10AM on 08/27/09