Harry: From calorie count to portion sizes,
we wanted to find out all the differences
between Kit Kat in the US and the UK.
This is "Food Wars."
In the US, our Kit Kats come in nine sizes.
Yes, really.
Down here we got the smallest, the minis unwrapped.
Then we go up to the thins.
After that, miniatures.
Right here, we got the snack size,
and then the classic, standard four-finger Kit Kat,
and then the big Kat,
the big Kat king size,
the king size,
and the XL.
In the UK, classic Kit Kat comes in three sizes.
As these adorable little bites,
as a two-finger Kit Kat,
or as a four-finger Kit Kat.
In the US, our Kit Kat sizes
come in obnoxious varieties of units and weights.
Too many to show you today. See?
But let's take a look at some of the biggest
two- and four-finger portion sizes you can get.
In the UK, the biggest size of the two-finger Kit Kats
is this 21-pack.
All of these add up to around 435 grams of Kit Kat,
half a kilo.
The biggest pack size for the four-finger Kit Kats
is a 24-pack, totaling 996 grams of Kit Kat,
basically a kilogram.
Although unfortunately, I couldn't find that today.
The UK will be stunned to learn
the two-finger size is not native to the US.
The closest thing we have is our snack size,
which is 7.75 grams smaller.
However, that being said, in the US,
you can get a snack-size bulk bag of 66 pieces,
which is 916 grams.
And then there's the four-finger size,
which comes in a 36-pack and is 1,512 grams.
Kit Kat, I have a bone to pick with you.
What is with the packaging of these new Kit Kats?
These two-finger ones had such iconic packaging in the UK.
It was wrapped in foil,
and then had this band of paper going around the outside.
And now they've replaced it with plastic.
Bring back the old packaging.
A four-finger Kit Kat in the UK will cost you £0.70,
which is around $0.87 in the US.
In the US, one of these costs $1.49,
or £1.20.
That's a 71% cost increase in the US.
71% more expensive in the US!
That's quite rare, particularly when it comes to snacks.
I feel like in the UK, we tend to get stung for snacks,
even more so than, like, fast food.
So, hey, we're doing something right.
Imagine if prices of these went up by £0.50 in the UK.
There would be riots.
Yeah, the streets would be burning.
Here are all the Kit Kat exclusives you can get in the US
you can't get in the UK, unless, of course,
your grocery store has an American section.
Here are all the UK Kit Kats you can't get in the US,
unless you have access to the internet.
Just about every portion size that we have,
save for the four-finger version, the UK does not have.
Get a closer look. The minis, the unwrapped.
And they want to act like this is for sharing,
but once your hand goes in there, it's yours, right?
Also with the minis,
they look a lot like your UK bites from the outside.
Now, from what I can tell, the inside of one of these
still kind of looks like a Kit Kat.
Yours look like ...
almost like a Crunch bar. Does that make sense?
Let's cut to Harry, where he's just bitten inside of a bite,
and tell us how it looks inside. Harry.
Yeah.
I don't know how much of this you can see,
but you're not getting the distinct wafer layers
that you're used to from a Kit Kat.
It's pretty much just solid chocolate
with little pieces of biscuity wafer in there instead.
I'm not quite sure what the point of the thins are,
because the smaller one has less calories.
But if you have a little bag of them,
you're just going to eat the whole bag, right?
Oh, God. The hazelnut,
that's not nearly as good as a regular Kit Kat.
Then we're on to my personal favorite range,
which is Kit Kat chunkies.
Firstly, you can get a standard Kit Kat chunky,
but in a duo pack.
This is just a standard unflavored Kit Kat chunky,
but in a two-pack.
Although they're not full-sized chunky bars.
There's, like, kind of two,
I guess, maybe two-thirds chunky bars.
So it's still bigger than a standard one,
but not an official double.
Now, this next size we got is the big Kat.
And I know what all you Kit Kat-heads
are saying in the UK right now.
It's not the chunky.
Your chunky is 40 grams. This one is 42 grams.
And it says right here on the package, "five crispy wafers."
And, Yuelei, if you can get a close-up on that pic there.
That is in fact five crispy wafers.
I'm looking at the pic of yours online.
Y'all got four. We got five.
Big, chunky, get outta here!
Firstly, why do you guys call these big Kats?
Because chunky is a way better name.
It's much more fun. Just call them Kit Kat chunky.
And then our biggest size, the XL,
which from what I can tell is three Kit Kats.
It's 12 pieces.
Put the price of a Kit Kat on-screen,
then put the price of the XL on screen.
Is it exactly three times?
Maybe sending one of these to the ocean
is better than sending three smaller ones.
I really don't know.
Then we're on to some of the exclusive Kit Kat flavors
you can find only in the UK.
We'll start with this one, which is a vegan Kit Kat.
Hang on. Hang on a minute.
I've only just gotten this.
Vegan Kit Kat, and then right at the top,
there's a little warning label that says,
"May contain milk."
You had one job, guys!
I think I should do a blind taste test.
Charlie has confirmed that they do look different,
so my eyes are staying closed.
Thank you, Charlie.
This one feels very smooth.
I mean, I'm already pretty sure that's the vegan one.
I'm confident this is the regular one.
But this isn't bad.
Sometimes when you have a vegan option,
it's, like, actively bad.
This one isn't offensive by any means.
Was I correct? Charlie: Yes.
I was correct. Cool.
So, we have four flavor options in the UK
which I believe you will not find in the US.
We have a white chocolate Kit Kat.
That's fine. I'm not the biggest white chocolate guy.
An orange chocolate Kit Kat.
See, I'm not normally a big orange chocolate fan either,
but that's not bad. It's quite a subtle orange flavor,
not too in-your-face.
And here we have the caramel Kit Kat, which I think is new.
It's pretty good.
I get more, like, honeycomb than caramel from this.
Definitely sweeter than the standard Kit Kat.
And a dark chocolate Kit Kat.
I don't normally go for dark chocolate,
but I will eat it sometimes,
and that's not particularly good dark chocolate.
Four flavors that I have seen before
that currently don't seem available anywhere online,
couldn't get my hands on them:
apple pie Kit Kat, the lemon crisp Kit Kat,
the key lime Kit Kat, which is very good,
and, of course, the birthday cake Kit Kat.
But what I could get my hand on are the Kit Kat duos,
which are different chocolate flavors
on the top and the bottom.
OK, mint and dark chocolate.
Oh, yeah, look at that.
See, look at that.
Yeah, like a Thin Mint.
This is pretty good.
Mocha and chocolate. Mocha and chocolate?
What's the difference between mocha and chocolate?
That's the difference. Coffee.
Ooh, last but not least,
strawberry and dark chocolate.
Oh, look, it's kind of like my color palette.
[ominous music]
Mm.
This is the best one. This is the best one.
The next exclusive flavor
is the Kit Kat chunky peanut butter.
These are incredible.
These are one of my favorite chocolate bars,
I would say, in the UK.
The king of chocolate bars.
Can we get a little crown
on the Kit Kat chunky peanut butter, please?
Thank you.
The next exclusive chunky flavor is the caramel.
We also have this in the standard Kit Kat version.
But let's give the chunky one a try real quick.
Ooh!
This is very different to the two-finger Kit Kat.
This one has an actual layer of caramel in it,
which is kind of what I was expecting from these ones.
But this one's good.
Next up we have the Kit Kat chunky white chocolate.
And while I couldn't find the individual bars today,
you can also get a Lotus Biscoff Kit Kat chunky.
I was able to find this in the form of bites,
so I'll give one of these a try
and give my thoughts on the flavor.
I think because you get the balance of the chocolate
and a little bit of biscuit in with the Biscoff flavoring,
it's not that bad. It's not overwhelming.
Is it enough to convince me to start liking Biscoff?
Probably not. But not bad.
Also, you can get Kit Kat sundae cones
and Kit Kat ice cream.
We have no freezer.
I didn't want them melting in the studio.
We actually do have Kit Kat ice cream in the UK.
I was able to find some in a Food Warehouse by Iceland.
However, I didn't buy them
because I wasn't going somewhere with a freezer afterwards,
so would've been melty and a bit of a disaster.
Here's what they do look like if you do find them in the UK.
In the UK, Kit Kat offers a range of seasonal products
depending on which season you're in.
We're filming this in April, so we've just had Easter,
and they had these adorable little Kit Kat bunnies on offer.
These came either as a single one
or as a little multipack.
Slightly worryingly, I was able to find a Christmas Kit Kat
in one of the corner shops that I visited.
Apparently, these are fine until September this year,
so we're fine.
That's quite cute, actually.
It's quite a nice little design.
The final exclusive I was able to track down is a fun one.
It's Kit Kat breakfast cereal.
As the packaging suggests, it's new.
I don't think it's in every supermarket or shop yet.
I had to go to a Waitrose to find this.
They look like little tiny cereal pillows.
I know this is not the fairest
and most accurate way to test cereal,
but they're pretty good.
I was actually able to find two of your US exclusives, Joe.
I have the Kit Kat birthday cake
and the duos mocha and white chocolate.
As many Brits will know,
our high streets are plagued by American candy stores,
which are these bizarre shops
which import American snacks and chocolates
and play really loud music
and I'm pretty sure are a front for something or other,
but I was finally able to benefit from them by buying these.
This does have all of those
lovely, forbidden food colorings
that we don't usually get in the UK.
So if I'm really hyperactive after this, we'll know why.
That is colorful.
Yeah, that's pretty sweet.
[clears throat]
You guys don't hold back on the sugar, do you?
Yeah, that's, that's excessive.
That's too much, guys. Chill out.
After the birthday cake,
I'm hoping for something slightly more savory.
Pretty strong coffee flavor.
Yeah, this one's fine. I like this.
A US Kit Kat bar is 210 calories.
It's 11 grams of fat, 7 grams of saturated fat,
20 milligrams of sodium, 28 grams of carbs,
23 grams of sugar, and 2 grams of protein.
In the UK, a standard Kit Kat bar contains the following:
209 calories, 10.2 grams of fat,
of which 5.6 grams are saturated,
40 milligrams of sodium, 26.1 grams of carbs,
of which 21.3 grams are sugars,
and 2.8 grams of protein.
That's less in every category other than protein and sodium,
where for some reason we have double the US figure.
Our most calorific Kit Kat is the Kit Kat XL.
It contains a total of 640 calories.
In the UK, our most calorific item
is a peanut butter Kit Kat chunky.
One of these contains 226 calories,
which is still less than half of the US Kit Kat XL.
While Kit Kats are now beloved all around the world,
they were invented in the UK.
The first modern Kit Kat bar was created
by the Rowntree company back in 1935,
although then it was called a chocolate crisp.
It wasn't until 1937
that they first used the name Kit Kat,
renaming it to the Kit Kat chocolate crisp.
The bar exploded in popularity, so much so
that it even survived rationing during the Second World War.
Despite milk shortages,
rather than halting production completely,
the Rowntrees changed the recipe
to use plain chocolate instead.
So as not to confuse customers with the new taste,
they changed the packaging to a blue wartime color.
After the war, when rationing was lifted
and normal production resumed,
they adopted the iconic red color
that we know and love today.
The popularity of Kit Kat continued to grow,
and they were exported all over the world.
In the 1970s, Rowntree gave Hershey
a license to manufacture and distribute Kit Kats in the US.
This agreement remained in place
even after Nestlé acquired Rowntree in 1988.
The popularity of Kit Kat has actually turned out to be
something of a double-edged sword for Hershey.
As part of their deal with Rowntree,
if the company is ever sold,
they lose their license to manufacture and produce Kit Kat.
Kit Kat is the single most popular product
sold by Hershey in the US,
so it makes it much harder to sell the company
should they ever want to.
My kingdom for a Kit Kat.
In the US, a Kit Kat is made up of sugar,
wheat flour, cocoa butter, nonfat milk,
chocolate, refined palm kernel oil,
lactose (milk), milk fat,
and contains 2% or less of soy lecithin,
PGPR, which is an emulsifier,
yeast, artificial flavor,
salt, and sodium bicarbonate.
A UK Kit Kat has the following ingredients:
sugar, wheat flour,
which contains calcium, iron, thiamine, and niacin,
milk powders (whole and skimmed),
cocoa mass, cocoa butter, vegetable fats,
lactose and proteins from whey, whey powder,
emulsifier sunflower lecithin, yeast,
raising agent sodium bicarbonate,
butterfat, and natural flavorings.
If you've seen the Snickers episode,
you might remember that in the UK,
we tend to feel our chocolate is of a higher quality
than that found in the US.
It's generally a bit richer and a bit smoother.
The reason for this is a higher cocoa and fat content
found in our chocolate.
According to UK rules,
chocolate must contain no less than 25% cocoa solids
to be considered milk chocolate.
The milk used in each country's Kit Kat production
also differs slightly.
In the UK, Nestlé uses milk crumb,
which is a dehydrated, slightly sweetened milk product.
In the US, Hershey uses nonfat milk and milk fat.
And in the US, the rules
are our milk chocolate must contain
no less than 10% of chocolate liquor,
which is roughly equal part mix
of cocoa solids and cocoa butter.
Unlike most US chocolates, like Snickers for instance,
our Kit Kats do contain sugar
and not high-fructose corn syrup.
Really?
Yeah.
It's worth pointing out that in the UK,
Kit Kats are made by Nestlé,
while in the US they're made by Hershey.
Furthermore, in 2015,
Hershey did a deal with Let's Buy British Imports
to stop importing all Cadbury's chocolate made overseas,
and in the same deal agreed to halt imports
of so many British chocolates, like Kit Kat.
Also, and this can be for another episode,
the license agreement allows Hershey to make, for example,
Cadbury chocolate in the US
with the same packaging as in the UK,
but with a different recipe.
Ooh.
This, by the way,
is the exact same grams as a standard Kit Kat.
So it's just a Kit Kat in a different shape.
I don't know why we need that.