50 Fun Facts About Oreo

In which year was the Oreo introduced?

Nabisco has owned it ever since, and Mondelez International has owned Nabisco since 2012.

Which earlier cookie was the Oreo an imitation of?

It outsold the original so thoroughly that most people now assume the imitation came the other way round.

The chocolate sandwich cookie the Oreo imitated first went on sale in which year?

1908: Loose-Wiles, later Sunshine Biscuits, launched its chocolate sandwich cookie that year, and it stayed on shelves for decades as the cookie people wrongly assumed was the copy.

What three-step ritual did Oreo's advertising popularise for eating the cookie?

Twist, Lick, Dunk: pull the wafers apart, lick the creme, then dunk in milk; Oreo built decades of advertising and even a 2012 mobile game around the ritual.

One theory says the name is Greek for 'mountain', because the cookie was meant to be what?

Dome-shaped: Greek oros means mountain, and the earliest Oreos were mound-like; other theories cite the French 'or' for the gold-coloured tin, or Oreodaphne, a laurel genus matching the early design's border.

In which New York City neighbourhood was the first Oreo made?

Chelsea: Nabisco's huge bakery complex between 15th and 16th Streets on Manhattan's West Side baked the first Oreos; the building later became Chelsea Market.

The first Oreo was sold on 6 March 1912 to a grocer in which city?

Hoboken, New Jersey: a grocer there placed the first order on March 6, 1912, buying the cookies by the pound from the National Biscuit Company.

What was the cookie renamed in 1921?

Oreo Sandwich replaced the original Oreo Biscuit name in 1921; it became the Oreo Creme Sandwich in 1948 and the Oreo Chocolate Sandwich Cookie in 1974.

Who designed the embossed pattern introduced on the Oreo's face in 1952?

William A. Turnier, a Nabisco engineer, drew the 1952 face with its ring of four-leaf clovers and central Nabisco logo, replacing a 1924 design.

Which flavour of filling was tried in 1920 and dropped four years later?

A lemon creme filling, sold from 1920 to 1924, was the first alternative; afterwards the plain white filling was the only option for decades.

Which Nabisco food scientist developed the modern filling?

Sam Porcello, nicknamed Mr. Oreo, developed the modern creme at Nabisco, held five patents tied to the cookie and created the dark and white chocolate-covered versions.

Which ingredient did Nabisco remove from the Oreo creme filling in the early 1990s over health concerns?

Lard gave way to partially hydrogenated vegetable oil in the early 1990s, removing the animal fat from the creme amid rising concern about saturated fat.

What certification did the Oreo gain in the late 1990s after its creme recipe changed?

Kosher certification: after the creme's old shortening was replaced, Nabisco spent years converting its bakeries and won Orthodox Union approval in the late 1990s, opening a market the original recipe had shut.

In which year did Nabisco remove trans fat from the cookie?

January 2006 was when non-hydrogenated vegetable oil went in as one of the main ingredients instead.

What was unusual about the rainbow Pride cookie Oreo advertised in June 2012?

It did not actually exist: the rainbow-creme Oreo was only a Facebook image posted for Pride Month in the centenary Daily Twist campaign, and Kraft stood by it despite boycott threats.

What did Oreo tweet when the lights went out at Super Bowl XLVII?

'You can still dunk in the dark' went out within minutes of the Superdome blackout in February 2013, drew around 15,000 retweets and became the textbook case of real-time marketing.

Which pop star's 2021 Oreo collaboration came in pink wafers with green creme?

Lady Gaga's Chromatica Oreos, named after her 2020 album, paired pink wafers with green creme and launched in January 2021.

In which year was Double Stuf introduced?

Double Stuf arrived in 1974 with roughly twice the creme of a standard Oreo, the same year the cookie was renamed the Oreo Chocolate Sandwich Cookie.

What was the golden cookie with chocolate filling called until 2007?

Golden wafers with chocolate filling are the original cookie turned inside out, which is exactly how it was sold.

Oreo Minis were re-released in 2000 as a promotional tie-in with which vehicle?

Their 1990s packaging had been a shrunken copy of the full-size cardboard tray and box.

How much thinner than the original is an Oreo Thin?

Each one comes to 40 calories, and the range runs to mint, lemon and tiramisu fillings.

Engineers at which university coined the term 'Oreology' in a 2022 study of twisting Oreos apart?

MIT engineers coined 'Oreology' for their 2022 Physics of Fluids paper, which found the creme nearly always stays on one wafer however the cookie is twisted.

How many Oreos had been sold worldwide by the cookie's centenary in 2012?

Over 450 billion Oreos had been sold by the 2012 centenary; Kraft marked the birthday with a 100-day 'Daily Twist' advertising campaign.

How many main ingredients are in a classic Oreo?

The recipe has barely changed in a century, even as the fats in it were swapped twice.

Which company first brought Oreos to the Indian market, in 2011?

Cadbury India launched the Oreo in India in March 2011, a year after Kraft's takeover of Cadbury brought the two companies together.

After losing the Oreo licence, Japan's Yamazaki launched a rival called what?

Noir was launched by Yamazaki Biscuit in September 2016 after its decades-long Nabisco licence ended, using the same lines that had made Japanese Oreos.

What colour is the creme filling in the Oreo Halloween special edition?

Orange for Halloween; Christmas gets red or green, and springtime blue or yellow with flowers and butterflies stamped on one side.

Which streetwear brand's red-wafer Oreo collaboration in 2020 fetched huge resale prices?

Supreme's red, logo-stamped Oreos went on sale in February 2020 at $8 for a pack of three and were soon listed on eBay for thousands of dollars.

When was Mega Stuf released?

Mega Stuf arrived in 2013 with even more creme than Double Stuf, offered in both chocolate and golden wafers.

In which year did a gluten-free version arrive?

January 2021 brought the gluten-free version, launched in both the traditional and Double Stuf formats.

Oreo Minis were first introduced in which year?

Oreo Minis, bite-sized versions of the original, first appeared in 1991 and vanished in the late 1990s before a relaunch in 2000.

The flavour of the first Mystery Oreo, sold in 2017, was revealed to be what?

Fruity Pebbles: Nabisco's 2017 Mystery Oreo contest invited fans to guess the creme flavour, and the answer, revealed in December 2017, was the fruity cereal taste.

Oreo's 2013 Super Bowl ad staged a whispered 'cookie or creme' fight in which setting?

A library: the 'Whisper Fight' ad had patrons silently brawling over whether the cookie or the creme is better, all while keeping their voices down.

What were the first Oreos sold in?

Metal tins with glass tops: Oreos were sold loose by the pound from the display tins, so the see-through lid mattered as much as the packaging.

What decorative element ringed the original cookie face?

The laurel wreath is the basis of one theory that the name comes from Oreodaphne, a genus of the laurel family.

Which street was ceremonially named after the cookie in 2002?

A block of Ninth Avenue outside Nabisco's former Manhattan bakery was ceremonially renamed Oreo Way in 2002 for the cookie's 90th birthday.

How many Oreo cookies were being produced annually by 2017?

More than 40 billion Oreos a year were coming off the lines by 2017, baked in 18 countries including India, Indonesia, Bahrain and China.

Which gummy candy lent its flavour to a notorious 2016 limited-edition Oreo?

Swedish Fish Oreos, with red fish-flavoured creme, appeared in August 2016 as a Kroger exclusive and were widely panned as one of the strangest Oreo flavours.

Which company has owned the Oreo brand since 2012?

Mondelez International, the snacks company formed when Kraft Foods split in October 2012, kept Nabisco and its Oreo brand; Kraft had bought Nabisco in 2000.

What did the Golden Oreo use in place of the chocolate biscuit?

Vanilla-flavoured wafers replaced the chocolate ones when the Golden Oreo arrived in 2004, keeping the same white creme in between.

Oreo O's breakfast cereal was launched in 1997 by which cereal maker?

Post launched Oreo O's in 1997 under a licensing deal with Nabisco; a 2001 'Extreme Creme Taste' version added creme-flavoured marshmallow pieces.

After being discontinued in 2007, Oreo O's cereal survived in only which country?

A corporate split left Post and Kraft unable to co-brand the cereal, so it vanished elsewhere. Post finally revived it in the US in June 2017.

In 2024 Oreo and which soft-drink brand swapped flavours in a 'Besties' collaboration?

Coca-Cola and Oreo released a Coke-flavoured Oreo and an Oreo-flavoured Coca-Cola Zero Sugar in September 2024, marketed as the 'Besties' collaboration.

The Most Stuf, launched in January 2019, had roughly how many times a standard Oreo's creme?

It began as a limited edition, stacking even more filling than Mega Stuf. Oreo's crème-flavour team of six is so secretive the company will not reveal the group's name.

Oreo Cakesters, introduced in 2007, are Oreo's version of which soft snack?

Whoopie pie: Oreo Cakesters sandwich soft chocolate cakes around vanilla creme; launched in 2007, they returned in 2022 alongside a Nutter Butter version.

Where did Nabisco build a 2020 bunker to protect the Oreo recipe from an asteroid?

Svalbard, Norway: the Global Oreo Vault riffed on the Global Seed Vault nearby, storing Mylar-wrapped cookies and powdered milk; asteroid 2018 VP1 missed Earth in November 2020.

A 2015 decision to move some Oreo production to which country sparked a US boycott?

Mexico: Mondelez moved Oreo lines from its Chicago bakery to a new plant in Salinas, Mexico, prompting boycott calls that the AFL-CIO backed in 2016.

The first British-made Oreos came from a Cadbury factory in which city, announced in 2011?

Sheffield: Kraft announced in 2011 that Cadbury's Trebor Bassett plant in the city would bake the first British-made Oreos, which had previously been imported from Spain.

Which supermarket chain first brought Oreos to Britain?

Sainsbury's was for several years the only UK chain to stock them, until Kraft's nationwide launch in May 2008.

In which month and year did the Oreo McFlurry become a permanent UK McDonald's menu item?

It had been a rotating special during the chain's Great Tastes of America promotions, and was already on sale in the US and elsewhere.