The three-ounce rounds of peppermint ice cream are dipped in a dark chocolate coating (coating = some vegetable oil is added so the chocolate will adhere to the ice cream). The ice cream is a lot less intense than the York Peppermint Pattie. This will please people who like just a bit o’ mint.

The ice cram bar doesn’t have the candy’s depth of chocolate coating flavor, either. But it certainly is refreshing, and we can’t complain: It’s tough to find any type of peppermint ice cream. Our favorite flavors, chocolate chip mint and cookie mint, seem to have disappeared from stores in our area.

CURIOSER & CURIOSER

Although the box declares that the bars are made from Peppermint Light Ice Cream (see photo above), the small print underneath it says, “This is not a light food.” It goes on to explain that the light ice cream has 75% less fat than “a range of full fat ice creams.”

Hmm. So the ice cream is lower in fat, but not the bar as a whole? The whole bar has 170 calories but the box explains that the light ice cream portion is 80 calories. So the thin chocolate coating has more calories than the much larger lump of ice cream?

If this information is meant to help consumers understand what they’re getting, we think that a second explanation is needed to clarify the first explanation.
 
 
PATTIE VS. PATTY

Second, the ice cream box never mentions the word “patty” or “pattie.” Wouldn’t calling them “York Peppermint Ice Cream Patties” better leverage the York Peppermint Pattie brand?

And what about “pattie?”

Whether it’s candy, meat or veggies, you may have noticed patty and pattie used in different places. The plural for both is patties.

Dictionary.com doesn’t recognize the word “pattie.” Merriam-Webster.com at least brings you to “patty.” The word, by the way, derives from the French pâté, for paste (i.e., a mix of finely-ground ingredients; pasta also means paste and in French, pâté refers to a meat loaf as well as the more rare ground goose or duck liver pâté). “Patty” seems to have entered the English language around 1710.

Patty, pattie or bar, the six pieces disappeared faster than we would like to admit.
 
 
YORK PEPPERMINT PATTIE HISTORY

According to a company history in Wikipedia, the York Peppermint Pattie was first produced by Henry C. Kessler, owner of the York Cone Company, in 1940. The company was named for its location: York, Pennsylvania.

In the annals of corporate acquisitions, in 1972 the York Cone Company was acquired by Peter Paul. In 1978, Peter Paul merged with Cadbury Schweppes. In 1988 the Hershey Foods Corporation acquired the U.S. operations of Cadbury Schweppes.

The York Peppermint Pattie we know is different from Henry Kessler’s: the mint centers are only semi hard. In February 2009, Hershey closed the Reading, Pennsylvania plant that made York Peppermint Patties, 5th Avenue and Zagnut candy bars, and Jolly Rancher hard candies. Production was moved to a new factory the company built in Monterey, Mexico.