I've written before about how I think butter has changed in recent years, and not for the better. The shift to feeding cows more palm oil products (probably alongside other feed and nutrition changes) has resulted - in my opinion - in butter that is greasier and harder at room temperature. Butter is not the only food product that has become worse as companies look for ways to save money, however. The list is long and growing.

In 2017, Nutella's parent company admitted that it changed the formula for the iconic spread, using less cocoa and more skimmed milk powder. According to fans, Oreo cookies have become softer and the filling sweeter. A quick Google search offers up dozens more examples of people complaining that a once beloved food now tastes wrong or has a different texture. The latest casualty in the seemingly inexorable march to the bottom is Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and other Reese's products, according to Brad Reese, the grandson of the original inventor of the iconic peanut butter cup.

Peanut butter cup turkey cookies from Bake at 350 by Bridget Edwards

In a LinkedIn post last month, Reese says that Hershey's has replaced key ingredients with lesser quality substitutes: the milk chocolate is now a compound coating, and the peanut butter filling also got tweaked. He says these changes have diminished the brand. "Reese's became iconic because my grandfather built it on real ingredients and real integrity," Reese wrote in a later LinkedIn post.

Hershey's provided a statement to CBS News that said the company sometimes makes "product recipe adjustments," but defended Peanut Butter Cups, saying they "are made the same way they always have been." The company also said that the "product recipe adjustments that allow us to make new shapes, sizes and innovations that Reese's fans have come to love and ask for, while always protecting the essence of what makes Reese's unique and special." However, Brad Reese isn't buying Hershey's argument, saying that people often tell him that Reese's products don't taste as good as they used to. He suggests that Hershey's heed the company's founder, Milton Hershey, who said "Give them quality, that's the best advertising."