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Nottingham Post
Nottingham Post
Entertainment
Lynette Pinchess

We compare Mars Bars with two supermarket brands costing a fraction of the price

Mars Bars aren't just one of the UK's favourite chocolate bars but one of the most popular in the world. When you need a sugar fix it's top of the chocs, a real satisfying sweet treat.

Before we get down to the serious business of a taste test, here's some trivia (you never know when it might be a question in a pub quiz). The chocolate bar isn't named after the Roman god of war or the planet. Instead it was called Mars, after the family of confectioners who created it.

Mars Bars were first manufactured in 1932, in Buckinghamshire, by Forrest Mars Snr. They're still made at the same Slough factory more than 90 years on and a whopping 200 million bars are sold in the UK and Ireland every single year.

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I'm not revealing exactly how many of that colossal figure are consumed by the Pinchess family. Suffice to say, we're helping to make the Mars family one of the richest in the world.

According to the old slogan 'A Mars a day helps you work, rest and play' but how does it stand up to cheaper supermarket comparisons? For the latest in our series of taste tests of popular household items I enlisted the help of the whole family to find their favourite, comparing multi-packs of Mars Bars, Titan from Aldi and Dreamy Caramel from Tesco.

Mars Bar

The well-known brand's multipack of four bars was obviously the costliest in this trial. Compared to the other two samples it was slightly bigger in length but otherwise it looked pretty much the same.

Biting in there was the undeniable taste of Mars. Sweetness personified, with smooth nougat and gooey caramel wrapped up in a blanket of chocolate loveliness.

Our verdict: "That's the real one - the nougat is different," and "it tastes more naughty, the nougat is richer."

Cost: £1.65 for four bars

Score: 5/5

Titan

Aldi's version of Mars Bars has a powerful name, meaning someone who is strong, intelligent or important but for us, sadly, it doesn't live up to the hype. The nougat is chewier and if feels like a "meaty" chocolate bar but it doesn't satisfy our sugar craving the same way as a Mars Bar. That indulgent sweetness simply isn't there.

The sugar content is 3g less and it tells. That's beneficial if you want to cut down on sugar - but for me a chocolate bar is a treat and I want full fat and full sugar, not a 'healthier' version.

Our verdict: "Something about the texture doesn't feel right" and "it's nothing special."

Cost: 99p for six bars

Score: 3/5


Dreamy Caramel

In keeping with the other brands, it should have less wishy-washy name - something like Zeus or Apollo. Dreamy Caramel gives me visions of me wearing a flowing white dress, lounging on a sofa with a purring cat on my lap, in a softly lit room listening to classical music.

In reality I'm wearing shorts and a T-shirt, sitting at my desk. My neighbour's burglar alarm going off in the background and a dog is barking in the street which kills the mood. Looks-wise, it's the most attractive of the three, topped with rippled chocolate. Taste-wise, once again it's chewier than a Mars Bars and the caramel isn't as gooey.

Our verdict: "The chocolate is nice but it's not the real deal" and "I'm getting a weird after-taste."

Cost: £1.30 for six

Score: 3/5

The winner

Our other test tastes for tomato ketchup and baked beans have demonstrated that big name brands don't always taste the best. But in this case there's no competition - the Mars Bar is the runaway winner, for sweetness and gooier nougat and caramel.

Don't write off the cheaper brands through if you want to save cash. They're not bad, they're just not as good.

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