Switched at Birth

Published on Wednesday, August 27, 2008, by MiriamWolf / Edit Post

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but packaged food isn’t getting any better. In fact according to a piece on NPR’s Marketplace, rising commodities costs are leading food-makers to substitute cheaper ingredients in processed foods.

Reporting on a Wall Street Journal article (subscription required), the Marketplace piece noted that the McCormick spice company is steering its corporate clients away from fresh garlic and toward easier-to-ship garlic concentrate. Meanwhile Pillsbury has replaced the pecans in its turtle cookies with walnuts, which is a little sad, because isn’t the very definition of a chocolate turtle a confection that contains pecans?

Speaking of chocolate, the article notes that Hershey’s will begin formulating its chocolate with a higher percentage of vegetable oil (and, of course, a lower percentage of cocoa butter). Although the companies say there will be no difference in the taste or quality of the final product, I predict that there will be less pilfering of Hershey bars from my daughter’s Halloween haul this year.

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  • chargeorge - the FDA rejected the request to let them call mockolate chocolate. Basically Hershey's is pushing ahead with the fake chocolate, they just can't pass it off as the same thing.

    Miriam - here's another article on the same subject with a bit more info:

    http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/Financial-Industry/Ingredients-squeezed-out-by-commodity-pressures

    As of late last year (hitting...+READ

    chargeorge - the FDA rejected the request to let them call mockolate chocolate. Basically Hershey's is pushing ahead with the fake chocolate, they just can't pass it off as the same thing.

    Miriam - here's another article on the same subject with a bit more info:

    http://www.foodnavigator-usa.com/Financial-Industry/Ingredients-squeezed-out-by-commodity-pressures

    As of late last year (hitting shelves this year), Hershey's Kissables are no longer chocolate.

    Other non-chocolate products: Almond Joy, Take 5, Mr. Goodbar, Krackel (miniatures), 5th Avenue and Whatchamacallit.

    Hershey's is not alone. Nestle's has changed the Carlos V bars and now calls them "chocolate style bars".

    I've been covering a lot of this (including Hershey's & Mars price increases) at Candy Blog. It's quite disheartening ... and makes me want chocolate to soothe the anxiety, which makes me sad all over again.-COLLAPSE

  • Whatever happened with that push to allow chocolate companies to rebrand "Chocolate flavored products" with no cocoa butter as "chocolate?" IS this an offshoot of that, or just hershey being a massive corporation foccussed on cost reduction instead of quality?

  • Whatever happened with that push to allow chocolate companies to rebrand "Chocolate flavored products" with no cocoa butter as "chocolate?" IS this an offshoot of that, or something else.