# Caramac

**Canonical URL:** https://sweeties.net/wiki/caramac/
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## Summary

Caramac was a caramel flavoured bar created by Mackintosh's and launched in 1959. Nestlé withdrew it in 2023, then brought it back for a limited time in 2024.

## Description

Caramac was a light brown, caramel flavoured bar in a red and yellow wrapper, created by Mackintosh's and made by Nestlé. It was launched in the United Kingdom in 1959.
What was in it?
Caramac was not chocolate in the usual sense. It was made with sweetened condensed milk, butter, sugar and flavourings, similar ingredients to vanilla fudge, and it tasted rather like fudge, or like blond chocolate, a variant of white chocolate. Instead of cocoa butter, it used palm and shea fats.
The name competition
The name was chosen in a competition held at the Mackintosh's factory in Norwich, and won by Barbara Herne. It combines the words caramel and Mackintosh. The bar was made in Norwich until the factory closed in 1996, when production moved to Fawdon on Tyneside.
Spin offs
A limited edition Caramac KitKat was launched in 2005 and brought back in 2007 by popular demand. A buttons version followed in 2015, and a similar caramel coating is used on McVitie's Gold biscuit bar.
Withdrawn, then back
In November 2023 Nestlé announced that it was withdrawing Caramac from its range because of low sales. The news upset its loyal fans, and in July 2024 the bar returned for a limited release.
From Mackintosh's to Nestlé
Mackintosh's of Halifax, the maker of Mackintosh's toffee and Quality Street, merged with Rowntree's in 1969, and the combined company was bought by Nestlé in 1988. That is how a Halifax invention ended up as a Nestlé bar: see when Nestlé bought Rowntree.
Not quite chocolate
Because Caramac used palm and shea fats rather than cocoa butter, it sat in its own category somewhere between chocolate, fudge and caramel. If you avoid palm oil, that is worth knowing: see palm oil in sweets. For more sweets that have come and gone, see sweets you can no longer buy.

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