24 corner-shop chocolate bars ranked in order of excellence

Which genius came up with the idea of cutting a KitKat in half, then blowing it up to twice its size? No matter: we love them. One thing, though – can you believe it’s been 16 years since it launched in 1999? Sixteen years!

Filth. Absolute filth. Delicious filth, though. Gooey, lip-smacking, glance-sideways-on-stepping-out-of-newsagent-before-shoving-the-whole-thing-into-your-mouth filth. 

So damn satisfying to crunch into that you can almost ignore that the gentlest bite will compact this into a rock-hard tooth cavity filling. Besides, we kind of enjoy winkling out that little bit of caramel and having it for a second course. Just don’t tell our dentist.

Kinder Surprise = cheapo crap. Kinder Bueno = cheapo crap that we can’t help love. That’s hazelnut cream in the middle, you know. Hazelnut cream! Sounds like something you’d find in a Michelin-starred dessert. So maybe it’s not cheapo crap. Maybe that makes it classy (it doesn’t and we don’t care).

There is such a thing as too much chocolate, and this bar proves it. Consider the following: Dairy Milk = pretty good, but a whole bar’s a bit much. Chuck in some fruit and nuts to pep it up? Nom nom nom. All gone!

You could run a marathon on this hefty, nut-packed behemoth (hence, presumably, its original name). It’s so chunky and rich, we don’t even think of it as a snack. More a meal. Don’t judge us.

Ironic, really. Nowadays, adding milk is the chocolate equivalent of adding brick dust to cocaine. Still, despite this bar’s odd pride about how it waters (or milks) down its cocoa content, there’s no doubting it: this is hands-down the best unadorned chocolate bar. It’s the little black dress of the confectionary world. The Beatles of the brown stuff.

Back in the ’80s, they didn’t place caramel in the centre of choc bars, they went right ahead and blended it in. And, frankly, we like it. Although a bit of food colouring wouldn’t go amiss. I mean, we’ve heard of white chocolate. We’ve heard of dark chocolate. But, erm, what exactly is that shade? Baby poo chocolate? 

When Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder sang ‘Ebony and Ivory’, they could’ve been singing about the way the Bounty teams a pearl-white coconut centre with a smooth chocolatey outside. They weren’t, of course – it’s a song about racial unity – but still. 

Sure, the bar itself is a delicate, flaky (natch) cocoa-based treat. But the best bit? Inhaling the tiny little strands that collect in the packet. Come on, we’ve all done it.

An amazing invention. Not just for its surprisingly rare combo of biscuit, caramel and chocolate. But also because of the fact that the combo of the three is some kind of amazing mouth-based equivalent of super-glue. Very impressive. Or, as we say after eating one: ‘Mmff mfff mmmfff’.

So bubbly, it’s like eating a chocolate bubble bath. It’s light, it’s fluffy and… Mmm, chocolate bubble bath. Sorry, what were we saying?

Alright, alright. We know that 90 percent of the wrapper’s contents are the thin air that lies between this chocolatey plait’s holes. But the price!