Crunchie

A Crunchie split in half.

Crunchie is a brand of chocolate bar with a "honeycombed" sugar centre. It is made by Cadbury UK and was originally launched by J. S. Fry & Sons in 1929. Fry had merged with Cadbury in 1919 and Crunchie later became a Cadbury brand.

A vaguely similar chocolate bar, Violet Crumble, is available in Australia.

Size and variations

A close up of its honeycomb centre

The Crunchie is sold in several sizes, ranging from "snack size" – a small cuboid – through to "king size". The most common portion is a single-serve bar, about 1 inch wide by about 7 inches long, and about 3/4 of an inch deep.^{[citation needed]}

In the early 1960s, there were a range of limited edition Crunchies on sale in the UK. These included a lemonade bar and a Tango Orange bar, in which the chocolate contained the different flavourings. A champagne-flavoured bar was launched for New Year's Eve 1999. In South Africa, Cadbury sold a white chocolate version in a blue wrapper until recently.

In 2003, a short-lived bourbon Crunchie was launched in test markets across the Nashville, TN area in partnership with 7-Eleven. The bourbon Crunchie was not well received because of a boycott initiated by western factions of the Southern Baptist Coalition and production was subsequently discontinued.

As is common with other chocolate brands, Crunchie brand ice cream bars and cheesecake are also sold in some countries. Such products contain nuggets of the bar within the ice cream or cheesecake.

In 2006, a "Crunchie Blast" variety of the product was launched, which featured "popping candy" inside the bar. However, it was discontinued shortly afterwards. However, an ice cream of the same name, which is Magnum (ice cream) shaped honey comb ice cream with popping candy covered in milk chocolate is sold in the UK and Ireland.

In 2010, Cadbury's launched Crunchie Rocks, a mixture of chocolate, cornflakes and Crunchie.

Until September 2010, Crunchie was produced in the Somerdale, Keynsham plant in Somerset, UK; however, production has now transferred to Cadbury's new plant in Skarbimierz, Poland. Labels for these products do not state a country of origin, instead stating "Made in the EU under license from Cadbury UK Ltd".

Availability

The Crunchie bar is widely available in the United Kingdom, Republic of Ireland, India, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. It is imported in other countries, including the United States of America, Malaysia, Singapore, Philippines, Hong Kong, Malta, Cyprus, Saudi Arabia, Panama, Tahiti and Sri Lanka.^{[citation needed]}

Manufacturing

In the UK, Crunchie bars are manufactured at a dedicated plant on a Rockwell Automation distributed control system (DCS), which replaced the original Ferranti ARGUS DCS system prior to 2000.

During manufacturing of the Crunchie bar, the honeycomb toffee is produced in large slabs, and is cut up using a highly focused jet of oil. The use of a blade would lead to fragmentation, while the use of water would result in the honeycomb toffee dissolving. Oil prevents both of these scenarios and results in uniform sharp-edged portions. The honeycomb toffee is then covered with chocolate, cooled, and packaged.^{[citation needed]}

Crunchie Tango and other Limited Editions

In 2000, a short-lived (but successful) sister chocolate bar was launched entitled Crunchie Tango. It was co-produced by Cadbury and Britvic and featured Tango Orange flavouring. Other limited edition flavours included Lemonade, Champagnge and Mint. In the 1960's a Crunchie Peppermint was also available.

Nutrition information

Average Values (UK)	Per 100 g	Per Bar 40 g
Energy (kJ)	1940	775
Energy (kCal)	465	185
Protein	4.0 g	1.6 g
Carbohydrate	69.5 g	27.8 g
Fat	18.9 g	7.6 g

Advertising

In Australia and New Zealand, Crunchie bars are widely known for having the country's longest-running television advertisement, the "Crunchie Train Robbery" which won many awards and ran in unchanged form for over 20 years from the late 1970s.

In the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland, the Crunchie has been advertised since the 1980s with the slogan "Get that Friday feeling". Prior to the 1980's Crunchie was advertised as " Crunchie makes exciting biting"

Literary references

The Crunchie bar is mentioned in Enid Bagnold's 1935 novel National Velvet, as the Brown sisters' sweet of choice for the year.

External links

• Get that Friday feeling
• Cadbury UK