Crumbs! McVitie's alters its chocolate digestives...and fans are not impressed McVitie's claims new recipe contains three per cent more chocolate Only one per cent more chocolate content and tasters preferred old recipe IT has been the biscuit of choice for generations of tea-dunkers. But chocolate digestive fans may soon be switching their allegiances after McVitie's changed the recipe - and reportedly made it worse. The reformulated biscuits were quietly introduced into supermarkets in December, with manufacturers only officially launching them last week. Customers preferred the taste of biscuits made with the old recipe (left) to the more chocolatey snack (right) Taste testers say the new version is less crunchy, and the topping is more even - even though there is slightly more chocolate than the old one. And in a blind trial, two thirds of those tasting the new recipe said they preferred the original. The snack company said it "tweaked" the ingredients of the brand after receiving feedback from customers. Television ads launched last week to publicise the changes use the slogans "wholemeal at their heart" and "now with more chocolate." United Biscuits, which owns McVitie's, said the new biscuit had around three per cent more chocolate, and the coating was more even. However, consumer group Which? found that just one per cent more was added. Each biscuit contains 86 calories, compared to 85, and slightly more sugar, fat and saturated fat, although experts said the difference was "negligible." And when 30 shoppers tried both versions, 19 preferred the old recipe. McVitie's introduced the new more chocolatey recipe to supermarket shelves back in December last year A spokesman for Which? said: "Our 30-strong blind taste test panel preferred the old biscuit, with many mentioning its crunchier texture." McVitie's started making chocolate digestives in 1925 at its factory in Harlesden, North London - and last year sold 81 million packs in the UK. A spokesman for the firm said: "McVitie's Chocolate Digestives are the Nation's favourite biscuit. "The British public love our biscuits so we have not reformulated the biscuit itself in any way or changed the "eat" of the product. "We have just added on more chocolate, hence the "now with more chocolate" statement on pack to communicate this. The feedback we've had is that people like it. Last year, McVitie's faced a consumer backlash after it slashed the amount of saturated fat in digestive biscuits by 80 per cent. Critics said the change ruined the taste, made them more oily and left them too brittle to dunk in a cup of tea. Digestives have been enjoyed by Britons for more than a century, with Huntley & Palmers first advertising them in 1876. The name comes from the digestive properties they were thought to have because of the amount of baking soda in the recipe. In 1892, Edinburgh bakers McVitie & Price made their version of the biscuit to a recipe created by young new employee Alexander Grant. It was their first major biscuit and demand was strong, prompting the building of two new factories. In 1925, the company started making the chocolate version, which American writer Bill Bryson called "a British masterpiece." According to Nielsen data, McVitie's Chocolate Digestives are the number 1 biscuit brand, worth £82.8m retail sales value.