10 Interesting Facts About The Hydrox Cookies

Sunshine Biscuits launched the first creme-filled chocolate sandwich cookie in 1908. Hoping to evoke a sense of purity and goodness they called it Hydrox, a portmanteau of hydrogen and oxygen, the two elements that make up water. 

The truth was a bit more complicated, however. Intended to imply hydrogen and oxygen—the two chemicals that make up water—the result has a more clinical, less roll-off-the-tongue convention to it, and instead evokes hydrogen peroxide, a chemical you probably don’t want to drink.

No matter how good the invention of the sandwich cookies were, the name was just too chemical and inappropriate for the cookies that were delicious as well as kosher, which became the sole reason of its discontinuation in 1999.Unlike lard-infused Oreos, Hydrox were kosher. 

“This is a dark time in cookie history,” one Hydrox partisan, Gary Nadeau, wrote, according to the Wall Street Journal. “And for those of you who say, ‘Get over it, it’s only a cookie,‘ you have not lived until you have tasted a Hydrox.“

Nadeau was probably pleased, when in 2015, Hydrox made a comeback. Ellia Kassoff, a Jewish kid who grew up on the kosher cookies, had gained some knowledge on how to gain access to a trademark that was sitting unused, and as a result, he was able to pick up Hydrox for his own company, Leaf Brands—itself a dormant brand that Kassoff had revived.

Check out these 10 interesting facts about the millennials’ new sandwich cookie of choice; Hydrox

1) Hydrox Cookies Were First Launched In 1908

It originally debuted in 1908 and was manufactured by Sunshine Biscuits for over ninety years.

2) Hydrox Came Before The Oreos

 Nabisco’s Oreos are inspired from the Original sandwich cookie Hydrox, Oreo was released in 1912.

3) Hydrox Completely Vanished In The Year 1999

Hydrox was discontinued in the year 1999, after facing tough competition from biscuit giant Nabisco.

4) Hydrox Came Back In 2008 To Celebrate Its 100th Anniversary

They made a brief comeback in 2008, to mark Hydrox’s 100th anniversary

5) Hydrox Have Always Been Kosher

Unlike lard-infused Oreos, Hydrox were Kosher. Now both the cookies are Kosher

6) Hydrox Cookies Are Made From Real Sugar

While other manufacturers were using high fructose corn syrup as an alternative to the conventional sweeteners, Hydrox were made from real sugar. 

7) They Were Once Relaunched As Droxies By Keebler

Keebler realized other sandwich cookies and their non-chemical name was a problem and quickly attempted to rename the cookies Droxies, a sort of softening of the name to discourage people from thinking of chemicals.

8) Kelloggs Was Responsible For Hydrox’s 100th Anniversary Comeback

In 2001, Kellogg’s had bought the Keebler brand, putting Hydrox under yet another corporate owner, and by 2003, it had stopped selling Hydrox altogether sans a brief reprieve in 2008 after enough consumers complained that it briefly changed its mind.

9) Back On The Shelves Again For The Millenials

Hydrox Cookies Were Reintroduced Again In 2015 By Leaf Brands LLC, And Is Doing Good Relatively.

10) Tastes Just Like Home Baked Cookies

And Most Of All, They Taste Like Homemade Cookies, Because They Are Made Without Any Genetically Modified Organisms(GMOs).