From calorie count to portion sizes, we wanted to find out all the differences between Kit Kats in the US and the UK. This is Food Wars.
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00:00 From calorie counts to portion sizes,
00:01 we wanted to find out all the differences
00:03 between Kit Kat in the US and the UK.
00:05 This is "Food Wars."
00:06 In the US, our Kit Kats come in nine sizes.
00:12 Yes, really.
00:13 Down here, we got the smallest, the minis, unwrapped.
00:16 Then we go up to the thins.
00:18 After that, miniatures.
00:20 Right here, we got the snack size,
00:22 then the classic, standard, four-finger Kit Kats.
00:26 And the big cat, the big cat king size, the king size,
00:32 and the XL.
00:36 In the UK, classic Kit Kat comes in three sizes.
00:39 As these adorable little bites, as a two-finger Kit Kat,
00:43 or as a four-finger Kit Kat.
00:47 In the US, our Kit Kat sizes come
00:49 in an obnoxious varieties of units and weights.
00:51 Too many to show you today.
00:53 See?
00:54 But let's take a look at some of the biggest
00:56 two- and four-finger portion sizes you can get.
00:58 In the UK, the biggest size of the two-finger Kit Kats
01:00 is this 21-pack.
01:02 All of these add up to around 435 grams of Kit Kat,
01:05 that's half a kilo.
01:06 The biggest pack size for the four-finger Kit Kats
01:08 is a 24-pack, totaling 996 grams of Kit Kat,
01:11 basically a kilogram.
01:13 Although, unfortunately, I couldn't find that today.
01:14 The UK will be stunned to learn the two-finger size
01:17 is not native to the US.
01:19 The closest thing we have is our snack size,
01:21 which is 7.75 grams smaller.
01:23 However, that being said, in the US,
01:25 you can get a snack-size bulk bag of 66 pieces,
01:29 which is 916 grams.
01:31 And then there's the four-finger size,
01:33 which comes in a 36-pack and is 1,512 grams.
01:38 Kit Kat, I have a bone to pick with you.
01:39 What is with the packaging of these new Kit Kats?
01:42 These two-finger ones had such iconic packaging in the UK,
01:45 it was wrapped in foil and then had this band of paper
01:48 going around the outside.
01:49 And now they've replaced it with plastic.
01:51 Bring back the old packaging.
01:53 A four-finger Kit Kat in the UK will cost you 70p,
01:56 which is around 87 cents in the US.
01:58 In the US, one of these costs $1.49, or £1.20.
02:03 That's a 71% cost increase in the US.
02:07 71% more expensive in the US?
02:10 That's quite rare, particularly when it comes to snacks.
02:13 I feel like in the UK, we tend to get stung for snacks,
02:16 even more so than, like, fast food.
02:18 So, hey, we're doing something right.
02:20 Imagine if prices of these went up by 50p in the UK.
02:23 There would be riots, yeah.
02:25 The streets would be burning.
02:26 Here are all the Kit Kat exclusives
02:31 you can get in the US.
02:32 You can't get in the UK,
02:33 unless, of course, your grocery store
02:35 has an American section.
02:36 Here are all the UK Kit Kats you can't get in the US,
02:39 unless you have access to the internet.
02:41 Just about every portion size that we have,
02:43 save for the four-finger version,
02:45 the UK does not have.
02:47 Get a closer look.
02:48 The minis, the unwrapped.
02:50 I don't want to act like this is for sharing,
02:52 but, like, once your hand goes in there,
02:53 it's yours, right?
02:55 Also, with the minis,
02:56 they look a lot like your UK bites from the outside.
02:59 Now, from what I can tell,
03:00 the inside of one of these
03:01 still kind of looks like a Kit Kat.
03:04 Yours look like, almost like a Crunch Bar.
03:06 Does that make sense?
03:07 Let's cut to Harry,
03:08 where he's just bitten inside of a bite,
03:10 and tell us how it looks inside.
03:11 Harry.
03:12 - Yeah.
03:14 I don't know how much of this you can see,
03:17 but you're not getting, like, the distinct wafer layers
03:20 that you're used to from a Kit Kat.
03:21 It's pretty much just, like, solid chocolate
03:23 with little pieces of biscuity wafer in there instead.
03:26 - I'm not quite sure what the point of the thins are,
03:28 'cause a smaller one has less calories,
03:30 but if you have a little bag of them,
03:31 you're just gonna eat the whole bag, right?
03:33 Oh, God.
03:35 The hazelnut?
03:36 That's not nearly as good as regular Kit Kat.
03:38 - Then we're onto my personal favorite range,
03:39 which is Kit Kat Chunkies.
03:41 Firstly, you can get a standard Kit Kat Chunky,
03:43 but in a Duo Pack.
03:45 This is just a standard, unflavored Kit Kat Chunky,
03:47 but in a Two Pack.
03:49 Although they're not, like, full-size Chunky bars.
03:51 There's, like, kind of two,
03:52 I guess maybe two-third Chunky bars.
03:54 So it's still bigger than a standard one,
03:55 but not like an official double.
03:57 - Now, this next size we got is the Big Kat,
04:01 and I know what all you Kit Kat heads
04:03 are saying in the UK right now.
04:04 It's not the Chunky.
04:06 Your Chunky is 40 grams.
04:07 This one is 42 grams,
04:09 and it says right here on the package,
04:11 "Five crispy wafers,"
04:14 and you can get a close-up on that pick there.
04:17 That is, in fact, five crispy wafers.
04:19 I'm looking at the pick of yours online.
04:21 Y'all got four, we got five.
04:23 Big Chunky, get out of here.
04:26 - Firstly, why do you guys call these Big Kats?
04:29 Because Chunky is a way better name.
04:30 It's much more fun.
04:31 Just call them Kit Kat Chunky.
04:32 - And then our biggest size, the XL,
04:34 which from what I can tell is three Kit Kats.
04:38 It's 12 pieces.
04:39 Put the price of a Kit Kat on screen,
04:42 then put the price of the XL on screen.
04:45 Is it exactly three times?
04:47 Maybe sending one of these to the ocean
04:49 is better than sending three smaller ones.
04:50 I really don't know.
04:51 - Then we're on to some of the exclusive Kit Kat flavors
04:53 you can find only in the UK.
04:54 We'll start with this one, which is a vegan Kit Kat.
04:57 Hang on.
04:58 Hang on a minute.
04:59 I've only just clocked this.
05:00 Vegan Kit Kat, and then right at the top,
05:03 there's a little warning label that says,
05:04 "May contain milk."
05:05 You had one job, guys.
05:07 I think I should do a blind taste test.
05:09 Charlie has confirmed that they do look different,
05:11 so my eyes are staying closed.
05:13 Thank you, Charlie.
05:15 This one feels very smooth.
05:17 I mean, I'm already pretty sure that's the vegan one.
05:22 I'm confident this is the regular one,
05:27 but this isn't bad.
05:28 Sometimes when you have a vegan option,
05:29 it's actively bad.
05:31 This one isn't offensive by any means.
05:33 Was I correct?
05:34 - Yes.
05:35 - I was correct, cool.
05:36 So we have four flavor options in the UK,
05:38 which I believe you will not find in the US.
05:40 We have a white chocolate Kit Kat.
05:42 It's fine.
05:46 I'm not the biggest white chocolate guy.
05:47 An orange chocolate Kit Kat.
05:49 See, I'm not normally a big orange chocolate fan either,
05:57 but that's not bad.
05:58 It's like quite a subtle orange flavor.
05:59 Not too in your face.
06:00 And here we have the caramel Kit Kat,
06:02 which I think is new.
06:03 It's pretty good.
06:08 I get more like honeycomb than caramel from this.
06:11 Definitely sweeter than the standard Kit Kat.
06:13 And a dark chocolate Kit Kat.
06:15 I don't normally go for dark chocolate,
06:19 but I will eat it sometimes.
06:21 And that's not particularly good dark chocolate.
06:24 - Four flavors that I have seen before
06:26 that currently don't seem available anywhere online.
06:29 Couldn't get my hands on them.
06:30 Apple pie Kit Kat, the lemon crisp Kit Kat,
06:33 the key lime Kit Kat, which is very good.
06:35 And of course the birthday cake Kit Kat.
06:38 But what I could get my hand on are the Kit Kat duos,
06:41 which are different chocolate flavors
06:45 on the top and the bottom.
06:46 Okay, mint and dark chocolate.
06:48 Oh yeah, look at that.
06:50 See, look at that.
06:51 Yeah, like a cinnamon.
06:59 It's pretty good.
07:00 Mocha and chocolate, mocha and chocolate?
07:02 I've never seen mocha and chocolate.
07:04 This is good with coffee.
07:07 Oh, last and not least, strawberry and dark chocolate.
07:12 Oh look, it's kind of like my color palette.
07:14 Mm, this is the best one.
07:21 This is the best one.
07:22 - The next exclusive flavor
07:23 is the Kit Kat Chunky Peanut Butter.
07:25 These are incredible.
07:26 These are one of my favorite chocolate bars,
07:28 I would say, in the UK.
07:30 The king of chocolate bars.
07:33 Can we get a little crown
07:34 on the Kit Kat Chunky Peanut Butter, please?
07:37 Thank you.
07:38 The next exclusive Chunky flavor is the Caramel.
07:41 We also have this in the standard Kit Kat version,
07:43 but let's give the Chunky one a try real quick.
07:45 Ooh.
07:48 This is very different to the Two Finger Kit Kat.
07:50 This one has an actual layer of caramel in it,
07:52 which is kind of what I was expecting from these ones.
07:55 But this one's good.
07:55 Next up, we have the Kit Kat Chunky White Chocolate.
07:58 And while I couldn't find the individual bars today,
08:00 you can also get a Lotus Biscoff Kit Kat Chunky.
08:03 I was able to find this in the form of bites,
08:06 so I'll give one of these a try
08:07 and give my thoughts on the flavor.
08:08 I think because you get the balance of the chocolate
08:13 and a little bit of biscuit in with the Biscoff flavoring,
08:16 it's not that bad.
08:17 It's not overwhelming.
08:18 Is it enough to convince me to start liking Biscoff?
08:21 Probably not, but not bad.
08:23 Also, you can get Kit Kat Sundae Cones
08:26 and Kit Kat ice cream.
08:28 We have no freezer.
08:29 I didn't want it melting in the studio.
08:31 We actually do have Kit Kat ice cream in the UK.
08:33 I was able to find some in a food warehouse by Iceland.
08:36 However, I didn't buy them
08:37 because I wasn't going somewhere with a freezer afterwards,
08:40 so it would have been melty and a bit of a disaster.
08:42 Here's what they do look like if you do find them in the UK.
08:45 In the UK, Kit Kat offers a range of seasonal products,
08:47 depending on which season you're in.
08:49 We're filming this in April, so we've just had Easter,
08:51 and they had these adorable little Kit Kat bunnies on offer.
08:54 These came either as a single one
08:56 or as a little multi-pack.
08:58 Slightly worryingly, I was able to find a Christmas Kit Kat
09:01 in one of the corner shops that I visited.
09:04 Apparently, these are fine until September this year,
09:06 so we're fine.
09:08 That's quite cute, actually.
09:10 It's quite a nice little design.
09:11 The final exclusive I was able to track down is a fun one.
09:14 It's Kit Kat breakfast cereal.
09:16 As the packaging suggests, it's new.
09:18 I don't think it's in every supermarket or shop yet.
09:20 I had to go to a waitress to find this.
09:23 They look like little tiny cereal pillows.
09:26 I know this is not the fairest
09:31 and most accurate way to test cereal,
09:34 but they're pretty good.
09:35 I was actually able to find two of your US exclusives, Joe.
09:38 I have the Kit Kat birthday cake
09:41 and the Duo's mocha and white chocolate.
09:43 As many Brits will know, our high streets are plagued
09:46 by American candy stores, which are these bizarre shops
09:49 which import American snacks and chocolates
09:52 and play really loud music,
09:53 and I'm pretty sure are a front for something or other,
09:56 but I was finally able to benefit from them by buying these.
10:00 This does have all of those lovely forbidden food colorings
10:03 that we don't usually get in the UK,
10:04 so if I'm really hyperactive after this, we'll know why.
10:07 That is colorful.
10:08 Yeah, that's pretty sweet.
10:16 You guys don't hold back on the sugar, do you?
10:18 Yeah, that's excessive.
10:20 That's too much, guys.
10:21 Chill out.
10:22 After the birthday cake,
10:23 I'm hoping for something slightly more savory.
10:26 Pretty strong coffee flavor.
10:29 Yeah, this one's fine.
10:31 I like this.
10:32 A US Kit Kat bar is 210 calories.
10:36 It's 11 grams of fat, 7 grams of saturated fat,
10:39 20 milligrams of sodium, 28 grams of carbs,
10:42 23 grams of sugar, and 2 grams of protein.
10:45 In the UK, a standard Kit Kat bar contains the following.
10:48 209 calories, 10.2 grams of fat,
10:50 of which 5.6 grams are saturated,
10:52 40 milligrams of sodium, 26.1 grams of carbs,
10:55 of which 21.3 grams are sugars,
10:58 and 2.8 grams of protein.
10:59 That's less in every category other than protein and sodium,
11:02 where for some reason we have double the US figure.
11:04 Our most calorific Kit Kat is the Kit Kat XL.
11:08 It contains a total of 640 calories.
11:11 In the UK, our most calorific item
11:13 is a peanut butter Kit Kat Chunky.
11:15 One of these contains 226 calories,
11:17 which is still less than half of the US Kit Kat XL.
11:20 While Kit Kats are now beloved all around the world,
11:24 they were invented in the UK.
11:25 The first modern Kit Kat bar was created
11:27 by the Roundtree Company back in the '90s.
11:29 It was first introduced back in 1935,
11:32 although then it was called a Chocolate Crisp.
11:34 It wasn't until 1937 that they first used the name Kit Kat,
11:37 renaming it to the Kit Kat Chocolate Crisp.
11:39 The bar exploded in popularity,
11:41 so much so that it even survived rationing
11:43 during the Second World War.
11:44 Despite milk shortages,
11:45 rather than halting production completely,
11:47 the Roundtree's changed the recipe
11:48 to use plain chocolate instead.
11:50 So as not to confuse customers with the new taste,
11:52 they changed the packaging to a blue wartime color.
11:55 After the war, when rationing was lifted
11:56 and normal production resumed,
11:57 Kit Kat became the red color that we know and love today.
12:00 The popularity of Kit Kat continued to grow
12:02 and they were exported all over the world.
12:04 In the 1970s, Roundtree gave Hershey a license
12:06 to manufacture and distribute Kit Kats in the US.
12:09 This agreement remained in place
12:10 even after Nestlé acquired Roundtree in 1988.
12:13 The popularity of Kit Kat has actually turned out
12:15 to be something of a double-edged sword for Hershey.
12:17 As part of their deal with Roundtree,
12:19 if the company is ever sold,
12:20 they lose their license to manufacture and produce Kit Kat.
12:23 Kit Kat is the single most popular product
12:24 sold by Hershey in the US,
12:26 and they're able to sell the company should they ever want to.
12:29 My kingdom for a Kit Kat.
12:30 In the US, a Kit Kat is made up of sugar,
12:35 wheat flour, cocoa butter, nonfat milk,
12:38 chocolate, refined palm kernel oil,
12:40 lactose milk, milk fat,
12:43 and contains 2% or less of soy lecithin,
12:46 PGPR, which is an emulsifier,
12:48 yeast, artificial flavor, salt, and sodium bicarbonate.
12:53 A UK Kit Kat has the following ingredients.
12:55 Wheat flour, which contains calcium, iron,
12:58 thiamine, and niacin,
13:00 milk powders, whole and skimmed,
13:02 cocoa mass, cocoa butter,
13:04 vegetable fats, lactose, and proteins from whey,
13:07 whey powder, emulsifier, sunflower lecithin,
13:11 yeast, raising agent, sodium bicarbonate,
13:14 butterfat, and natural flavorings.
13:16 If you've seen the Snickers episode,
13:17 you might remember that in the UK,
13:18 we tend to feel our chocolate is of a higher quality
13:20 than that found in the US.
13:21 It's generally a bit richer and a bit smoother.
13:23 The reason for this is a higher cocoa and fat content
13:26 found in our chocolate.
13:27 According to UK rules,
13:28 chocolate must contain no less than 25% cocoa solids
13:32 to be considered milk chocolate.
13:34 The milk used in each country's Kit Kat production
13:36 also differs slightly.
13:37 In the UK, Nestlé uses milk crumb,
13:39 which is a dehydrated, slightly sweetened milk product.
13:42 In the US, Hershey uses nonfat milk and milk fat.
13:45 And in the US, the rules are our milk chocolate
13:48 must contain no less than 10% of chocolate liqueur,
13:51 which is roughly equal part mix of cocoa salads
13:53 and cocoa butter.
13:54 Unlike most US chocolates, like Snickers, for instance,
13:57 our Kit Kats do contain sugar
13:59 and not high fructose corn syrup.
14:01 Really?
14:02 Yeah.
14:05 - It's worth pointing out that in the UK,
14:07 Kit Kats are made by Nestlé,
14:08 while in the US, they're made by Hershey.
14:10 - Furthermore, in 2015, Hershey did a deal
14:13 with Let's Buy British Imports
14:15 to stop importing all Cadbury's chocolate made overseas,
14:18 and in the same deal, agreed to halt imports
14:21 of so many British chocolates like Kit Kat.
14:24 Also, and this can be for another episode,
14:26 the license agreement allows Hershey to make,
14:28 for example, Cadbury chocolate in the US
14:30 with the same packaging as in the UK,
14:33 but with a different recipe.
14:35 Ooh.
14:36 This, by the way, is the exact same grams
14:38 as a standard Kit Kat,
14:40 so it's just a Kit Kat in a different shape.
14:45 I don't know why we need that.