When I first had the idea for this post my plan was to set the stage of what I saw as an epic battle. Heath, the standard bearer of the (American mass-produced) English toffees versus Skor, the inscrutably named (possibly Scandinavian) butter toffee. It was the knock-down, drag-out, pull-no punches fight of the century. Bitter rivals, they had fought a hard war for years in the chocolate candy battlefield, each one steadfastly refusing to give ground. That was until I noticed that both candies are made by Hershey.
I was discouraged until I took a look at Wikipedia, and found that the Heath Bar was created in 1928 by Bayard and Everett Heath, a pair of Illinois brothers who owned a candy shop. The Skor bar had been created in 1981 (the same year that this humble choco-journalist rolled off the assembly lines) by Hershey to try to compete with the Heath Bar. Later, in 1996, Hershey acquired the company that made Heath Bars and began producing them themselves.
So now here they are, mismatched like some bad buddy cop movie. In the Chocolate Candy City Police Department (C3PD) Heath is the grizzled old veteran one day from retirement who is given a brand new partner. That partner is Skor. Young and inexperienced, he’s ready to make a name for himself.
“Blah blah blah,” you say, “how do they TASTE?”
Right, sorry. Got a bit distracted. Well to be honest they’re about as different as you’d expect two toffee bars made by the same company to be. Externally they’re nearly identical, but inside the Skor is a darker toffee. Skor has more of a buttery taste (it is butter toffee after all) while Heath has a hit of almond flavor to it. While they’re similar in taste, I have to give the edge to the Heath bar, because the buttery taste of the Skor tends to linger a little longer than I’d prefer.
March 6th, 2011 at 6:32 pm
Woo! I totally agree, Heath bars are far superior to Skor…I could eat 10 Heath bars every day if I wouldn’t get fat and suffer a mouthful of tooth decay!