I remember that when I was a young kid, there were these weird commercials for Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. One person would be eating peanut butter out of a jar for some reason, out in public like at a movie theatre, and another person would be eating a chocolate bar. Something would happen, and the chocolate bar would wind up in the peanut butter. This would agitate both people - "You got chocolate in my peanut butter!"; "You got peanut butter on my chocolate!" until both people would realize they'd created a marvelous new combination.
I was thinking about that old ad thsi weekend, and I was wondering if Reese's ran these ads to convince people that this combination of the two ingredients was a good idea. Were chocolate and peanut butter desserts uncommon before these commercials ran? If so, they have really taken off in the last 25 years. At my company last month there was a bake-off and at least three entries were peanut butter and chocolate pies.
I decided to look into it. I went to the Reese's homepage and see that they've reprised the commerical I remember to promote the new Caramel Reese's cup. This time race-car drivers Kevin Harvick and Tony Kanaan bump into each other. Harvick is walking down the street eating a Reeses cup, and Kanaan is moseying along with a jar of caramel. They collide, and magic ensues. This means I'm not the only one to remember the old ad, but doesn't really answer my question.
Wikipedia says that the Reese's Peanut Butter cup was created in 1928 by an employee of Milton Hershey. 1928! I can tell you I was not around in 1928 to see television commercials - the ads I remember ran in the late 70's. Since the candies had been around for about 50 years by the time those commercials ran, I wonder why the creators decided they needed to emphasize the point that this combination was a good idea, and furthermore act like this was some kind of "new" idea.
I'm hungry.
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