Chocolate is a funny thing. Almost everyone loves it, few despise it, and most people, when you start chattin’ it up about the candy aisle, have strong feelings about types of chocolate – most notably dark and white.

While standard milk chocolate is agreeable to most palates, some find white too sweet or boring, and others find dark too strong or bitter. Seemingly running out of ideas, or, being struck with the idea of brilliance in simplicity, it’s more common these days that candy companies put an alternate choco-spin on an already existing product than come out with an entirely new one to see how their classic bars stand up to the light or the dark.

The latest of this hot trend is Twix Dark, which takes the signature cookie and caramel mashup of the original and dunks it in a dark coating.

The first thing that jumps out at me when opening the package is that the bar seems smaller, and upon comparing it to the original I can confirm that it is shorter in both width and height than the milk version.

After further investigation, it turns out that Twix actually has different sized bars in their regular and king sized versions, with slightly smaller ones in their king sized, clocking in at 110 calories instead of 125 for both varieties – interesting.

Flavor-wise, the dark chocolate is thin, smooth, sweet, and reminds me a lot of the chocolate coating on a Milky Way Midnight with a touch more creaminess. It isn’t super dark, more semisweet, and while it’s definitely different from the milk chocolate Twix, it’s only slightly bitter and melds with the caramel well in a cohesive and not too dominant way.

The chocolate is almost too thin for my taste and seems thinner than on the original version, but the balance between the components is on point and the flavors feel focused and refined.

The cookie, as expected, is crunchy, crumbly, and dry, with a slight butteriness that steers far away from shortbread but isn’t bland either. The caramel is soft and sweet with the perfect ratio of dense and chewy providing most of the sugar burst I want from a candy bar. The dark chocolate really comes into play here, as the overall flavor is less sweet and buttery than on the milk chocolate version.

Through and through, it’s a Twix, covered in dark chocolate, and done really well. Unlike the White Twix, which suffered greatly from a low quality, bland white coating, and the Peanut Butter Twix, which I find falls flat, the chocolate here is executed well and is just as enjoyable as a regular Twix. It’s a more complex, less sweet and buttery experience with a more chocolate-focused profile than the original, and while I can’t say it’s better than the O.G., I like it, and will definitely buy it again.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 bar – 110 calories, 45 calories from fat, 5 grams of fat, 3 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 35 milligrams of sodium, 14 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of fiber, 9 grams of sugar, and 1 grams of protein..)

Purchased Price: $1.49
Size: 3.02 oz (4 To Go)
Purchased at: Vallero
Rating: 9 out of 10
Pros: Smooth and creamy dark chocolate. Classic Twix taste. Not too sweet. Great shiny purple wrapper.
Cons: Chocolate coating a little thin. Less buttery than the original.