Whatchamacallit is a

chocolate Chocolate is a food made from roasted and ground cocoa beans that can be a liquid, solid, or paste, either by itself or to flavoring, flavor other foods. Cocoa beans are the processed seeds of the cacao tree (''Theobroma cacao''); unprocesse ...

candy bar A candy bar is a type of portable candy that is in the shape of a bar. The most common type of candy bar is the chocolate bar, including both bars made of solid chocolate and combination candy bars, which are candy bars that combine chocolate wi ...

marketed in the United States by

The Hershey Company The Hershey Company, often called just Hershey or Hershey's, is an American multinational corporation, multinational confectionery company headquartered in Hershey, Pennsylvania, which is also home to Hersheypark and Hershey's Chocolate World. T ...

History

Whatchamacallit bars were first introduced in 1978. The name was devised by Patricia Volk, the writer of ''STUFFED: Adventures of a Restaurant Family'', when she was the associate creative director at Doyle Dane & Bernbach, and was in charge of new brands on the Hershey account. From 1978 to 1987, Whatchamacallit consisted of a bar of

peanut The peanut (''Arachis hypogaea''), also known as the groundnut, goober (US), goober pea, pindar (US) or monkey nut (UK), is a legume crop grown mainly for its edible seeds. It is widely grown in the tropics and subtropics by small and large ...

-flavored crisp that utilized

peanut butter Peanut butter is a food Paste (food), paste or Spread (food), spread made from Grinding (abrasive cutting), ground, dry roasting, dry-roasted peanuts. It commonly contains additional ingredients that modify the taste or texture, such as salt, ...

as the flavoring agent, coated in a thin layer of chocolate. From 1987 to 2008, Whatchamacallit has included peanut-flavored crisp that utilizes peanut butter as the flavoring agent, with a layer of

caramel Caramel ( or ) is a range of food ingredients made by heating sugars to high temperatures. It is used as a flavoring in puddings and desserts, as a filling in bonbons or candy bars, as a topping for ice cream and custard, and as a colorant ...

and a layer of chocolate coating. Hershey's Whatchamacallit is found in recipes for various food items, including

pie A pie is a baked dish which is usually made of a pastry dough casing that contains a filling of various sweet or savoury ingredients. Sweet pies may be filled with fruit (as in an apple pie), nuts ( pecan pie), fruit preserves ( jam tart ...

cookie A cookie is a sweet biscuit with high sugar and fat content. Cookie dough is softer than that used for other types of biscuit, and they are cooked longer at lower temperatures. The dough typically contains flour, sugar, egg, and some type of ...

cheesecake Cheesecake is a dessert made with a soft fresh cheese (typically cottage cheese, cream cheese, quark or ricotta), eggs, and sugar. It may have a crust or base made from crushed cookies (or digestive biscuits), graham crackers, pastry, ...

s, and

cupcake A cupcake ( AmE, CanE), fairy cake ( BrE), or bun ( IrE) is a small cake designed to serve one person, which may be baked in a small thin paper or aluminum cup. As with larger cakes, frosting, icing and various other cake decorations such as ...

s. The advertising for the Whatchamacallit peaked in the 1980s; after this period Hershey Company ran noticeably fewer advertisements for this product. However, despite the lack of attention the company gives it compared to its other products, the Whatchamacallit is still in production as of 2024. In Canada, an identical candy bar is marketed by Hershey's as Special Crisp, but does not have the wide distribution in Canada that the Whatchamacallit has in the United States.

Ingredient changes

In 2008 the Hershey Company began to change the ingredients for some of its products, replacing the relatively expensive

cocoa butter Cocoa butter, also called theobroma oil, is a pale-yellow, edible Vegetable oil, fat extracted from the cocoa bean (''Theobroma cacao''). It is used to make chocolate, as well as some ointments, toiletries, and pharmaceuticals. Cocoa butter h ...

with cheaper oil substitutes. Such cost-cutting was done to reduce production costs and avoid price increases for its products. Hershey's changed the description of the product and altered the packaging slightly along with the ingredients. Though the new formula still contains chocolate, according to United States

Food and Drug Administration The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA or US FDA) is a List of United States federal agencies, federal agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Health and Human Services. The FDA is respo ...

food labeling The packaging and labeling of food is subject to regulation in most regions/jurisdictions, both to prevent false advertising and to promote food safety. Regulations by type Multi-faceted * Codex Alimentarius (international voluntary standard ...

laws, products that do not contain cocoa butter cannot legally be described as ''

milk chocolate Milk chocolate is a form of solid chocolate containing Chocolate liquor, cocoa, sugar and milk. It is the most consumed types of chocolate, type of chocolate, and is used in a wide diversity of chocolate bar, bars, tablets and other confectione ...

''; instead, such products are often referred to as ''chocolate candy''.

Thingamajig

In 2009 Hershey's introduced Thingamajig, featuring chocolate,

cocoa Cocoa may refer to: Chocolate * Chocolate * ''Theobroma cacao'', the cocoa tree * Cocoa bean, seed of ''Theobroma cacao'' * Chocolate liquor, or cocoa liquor, pure, liquid chocolate extracted from the cocoa bean, including both cocoa butter and ...

crisps Potato chips (North American English and Australian English; often just chip) or crisp (British English and Hiberno-English) are thin slices of potato (or a thin deposit of potato paste) that has been deep fried, baked, or air fried until ...

, and

inside. It was reintroduced in late 2011 on a supposedly permanent basis. However, as of 2012, according to

Hershey's Chocolate World Hershey's Chocolate World is the name of five visitor centers that started in Hershey, Pennsylvania, United States. Open year-round, Hershey's Chocolate World offers marketplace shops and restaurants, specializing in Hershey's chocolate products. ...

in Pennsylvania, the Thingamajig candy bar is no longer being produced.

Whozeewhatzit

In 2021 Hershey's unveiled the Whozeewhatzit bar featuring the chocolate, cocoa crisps, crisped rice, and peanut butter ingredients of the Thingamajig bar from 2009. Hershey's held a naming contest for the new bar, with a $5,000 prize for the most creative name, along with a year's supply of the confection. After more than 43,000 entries the Whatchamacallit brand declared the name Whozeewhatzit the winning entry. The Whozeewhatzit wrapper identifies the contest winner: Lisa M. from

Framingham, Massachusetts Framingham () is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts, United States. Incorporated in 1700, it is located in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, Middlesex County and the MetroWest subregion of the Greater Boston ...

with inspiration from Michael Scott

The Office ''The Office'' is the title of several mockumentary sitcoms based on a British series originally created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant as '' The Office'' in 2001. The original series also starred Gervais as manager and primary charac ...

References

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