UK vs. USA Halloween chocolate: The Great Showdown
by the staff of The Trellis Occasional
It is safe to say that candy is one of the most important elements of Halloween. Running up to a house to say “trick or treat!” and hoping that they have your favorite candy will always remain an excitement. While sour candies and gummies are an example of this tradition, chocolate is, and always will be, a classic. And what about chocolate from other places? Read on to see our ratings of both American and British chocolate. Note: We used The New York Times 0-4 star scale for our ratings.
Freddo Dairy Milk ⭐️⭐️⭐️
This British milk chocolate bar is enclosed in a purple wrapper with a little frog character on it- Freddo. If you were to smell the chocolate bar, you might notice that it smells a bit nutty. Its break is nice and smooth, but it has a slightly gritty or “airy” texture. When you first bite into it you will get a very strong milk flavor; then it softens into a more classical chocolate taste that is surprisingly rich. It doesn't have an apparent aftertaste, but the taste does last for a while in your mouth.
Fudge ⭐️⭐️
Fudge was a delicious, albeit slightly odd, experience. It’s a chocolate made by Cadbury that includes a delectable chocolate outside with a chewy fudge interior. The chocolate outside tasted the same as the dairy milk chocolate bar, presumably as they are made by the same company, and was the best part of it. However, our staff generally agreed that the fudge inside was mediocre. It had a taffy, almost tootsie roll-like texture with a milky white chocolate and caramelly flavor with S.D. noting that she “couldn’t eat a bunch of them”. We agreed it wasn't the best, but it wasn't bad either.
Twirl ⭐️⭐️⭐️
It looks quite a lot like a misshapen log, and on the inside it had a sort of swirlied lattice structure. When you bit into it the structure would crumble, and one staff member wrote “As soon as I bit into it, it kind of just went everywhere.” The outside was a sort of shell of more milk chocolate, but less textured. The Twirl was a similar chocolate to the Freddo Dairy Milk in taste, but perhaps more subtle and even nuttier, or oily.
Hershey's ⭐️
Hershey’s chocolate is perhaps the most classic American chocolate. Overall, it wasn't very smooth or creamy. It was kind of hard to bite, and it had a little bit of a strange aftertaste. Compared to the incredible experience of Freddo Dairy Milk, Hershey's fell short of our chocolate expectations.
3 Musketeers ⭐️
3 Musketeers is a very simple, but enjoyable, candy. It's in a small square-ish shape with a chocolate outside, that on the bottom is zig-zagged and is drizzly on top. The soft nougat inside is extremely, extremely, chewy and almost crumbly. The milk chocolate was essentially the same as Hershey's, perhaps a bit squishier. However the nougat inside was a combination of nutty, caramelly, and sour. Notably it didn't really have a smell. Overall it wasn't a very remarkable experience
Kit Kat ⭐️⭐️
Kit Kats are an American chocolate, and a fairly common one presented in a red wrapper. The smell of the candy is faint, but your standard milk chocolate. The company name is imprinted on this candy, with “logs” of chocolate being stuck together ready to be broken. On the inside, it has three wafer layers. One staff member noted “It is less chocolatey inside than Twirl, [and] it is more crunchy and flaky and sort of like cereal.” and that “The wafer is not as crunchy as you would want.” However it was also decided that the milk chocolate shell and the wafer worked well together. It had a nutty milk aftertaste that also wasn't necessarily unpleasant.
Overall, our staff members decided they liked the UK chocolates better than the American ones. The UK ones had more depth and flavor compared to the almost bland American chocolates. Let us know at theoccasional@trellislearning.org if you’ve tried any of these chocolates before!
