The New Caffeinated Snickers Bar: A Taste Test

A few weeks ago, a box of the new caffeinated Snickers Charged arrived on the desk of our fantastic features intern, Nick Pandolfi. Preferring to consume caffeine only in my coffee, I asked him to test it out and record his reactions. (We never said it was easy being an F&W intern.) Here is his full report:

"While it might seem repulsive to food snobs who only get their organic chocolate from Fair Trade farmers in South America and their coffee from small batch roasters in Seattle, Snickers Charged sounded brilliant to me since I'm often in need of a lift but strapped for cash and time. I ate a whole candy bar and waited for the buzz to kick in.

The thing is, I don’t usually drink a cup of coffee in less than 2 minutes and I never combine it with 25 grams of sugar (more than 2 tablespoons). Shortly after downing the Snickers (which didn’t have the metallic chemical taste I was expecting—just plain chocolate, caramel, nougat and peanut goodness), my heartbeat began to accelerate. Within minutes, my hands were trembling and my stomach was a bit upset, but I was typing about twice as fast as I usually do.  

The combined sugar and caffeine crash was about as unpleasant as the spike, and an hour later, as the trembling subsided, I found myself needing another boost. Next time I pick up a Snickers, I think I'll stick to decaf."