A Brief History of the Cadbury Egg

The Cadbury Creme Egg, a milk chocolate egg filled with a creamy white-and-yellow fondant that is meant to mimic a real chicken egg, is a polarizing Easter candy. Some might say it’s cloyingly sweet. This seasonal treat has become a signifier of spring, in part because eggs traditionally symbolize renewal and rebirth.

Regardless of how you feel about this confection, you can’t deny its prominence from coast to coast come Easter time. The story of how the Cadbury Creme Egg came to be so popular starts back in the 19th century, in a small store in Birmingham, England. A man wanted to make better drinking chocolate, and ended up starting something that would be much bigger.

In 1824 John Cadbury opened up a shop in Birmingham, England, where he sold a variety of drinks including tea, coffee, and drinking chocolate. Cadbury gained some success with his shop and opened up a chocolate and cocoa factory in 1831 with his brother in order to produce more drinking chocolate.

In 1847 Joseph Fry, a competitor of Cadbury’s, began experimenting with making moldable chocolate bars. This sparked Cadbury’s experimentation in moldable chocolate, and in 1875 Cadbury created the first chocolate egg filled with sugary treats.

By 1919 Cadbury and Fry had merged their companies, and in 1923 they created the very first chocolate eggs filled with cream.

The Cadbury Creme Eggs we know and love (or hate) today, however, weren’t invented until 1963 under the name “Fry’s Creme Eggs.” The name changed to “Cadbury Creme Eggs” in 1971. In 1985, Cadbury launched a successful ad campaign, “How do you eat yours?” and the eggs have only achieved more fame as a result.

The Cadbury Creme Eggs are produced by many companies around the world — Hershey having the market rights in the United States. It is rumored that they taste different from country to country, and that the candy eggs are sweeter in England because they use cream to make their milk chocolate, versus powdered milk in the U.S.

Have you tried Cadbury eggs outside the United States? Are they different? And what do you think of that all-too-real-looking white and yolk?