The 3-Ingredient Cool Whip Candy That Tastes Like A 3 Musketeers Dupe
We admit, the concept of making your own candy bars — not to mention trying to imitate a tried-and-true favorite — sounds downright intimidating. But if your favorite candy is a 3 Musketeers bar, creating a dupe that looks and tastes like it is actually incredibly simple, even for novice confectioners. All it requires is a mere three ingredients.
When you mix melted milk chocolate with a tub of Cool Whip and freeze the mixture, you can make an uncanny impostor for that silky, mousse-like candy nougat that 3 Musketeers is known for. And, once you cut the firmed mixture into bite-sized pieces and glaze them with more melted chocolate — combined with a little melted vegetable shortening — you have homemade candy bars. (The only thing easier might just be making a Cool Whip and cream cheese frosting.)
This recipe should yield about 30 bite-sized pieces, but you can easily double the ingredients to make a bigger batch. The prep work for these DIY candy bars takes very little active time, and the mixture just needs to sit in the freezer twice for 30-minute stints, and then in the fridge once the chocolate glaze is applied.
Original 3 Musketeers bars were much smaller
You can make these candy bars as large or small as you'd like, but slicing them into bite-sized pieces is actually truer to the original 3 Musketeers than the modern, larger version. Back in its birth year of 1932, three tiny chocolate-covered bars came in each package, and each bar had a different flavor of nougat inside: vanilla, strawberry, or chocolate. The idea was to share the candy with two other friends, thus emulating "The Three Musketeers."
You can actually create vanilla and strawberry flavors of this treat to mimic the original candy. For vanilla-flavored nougat, mix the Cool Whip with a package of vanilla instant pudding mix, powdered sugar, and vanilla extract, and follow the same chilling and slicing guidelines before coating it with chocolate. For a strawberry flavor, follow these same steps, but replace the vanilla extract with strawberry extract, and add a little red food coloring for a pretty pink color.
Even though 3 Musketeers eventually phased out its vanilla and strawberry versions, the candy has certainly withstood the test of time. According to a market data report from Gitnux conducted in 2024, 3 Musketeers is the fifth most popular candy bar in America. Sure, purchasing the original is easy enough, but making a copycat version on your own is just plain fun, not to mention the personal touches you can add.
Candy bars with a personal spin
While chocolate nougat is the standard flavor, occasionally 3 Musketeers releases variations like mint and raspberry. You can experiment yourself, too, and flavor both the nougat and chocolate coating. Instead of tempering milk chocolate chips for the outer coating, use butterscotch, caramel, white chocolate, or peanut butter chips. If you prefer the milk chocolate, you can mix in extracts like peppermint, coffee, orange, cherry, or any other flavor that tastes good with chocolate.
When you pour the coating over the filling, you can immediately sprinkle the sticky topping with chopped, toasted nuts, shredded coconut, dehydrated fruit like strawberries or bananas, colored sprinkles, or crushed pretzels for a salty kick. These are perfect for holidays and parties, because you can adjust the flavors and colors easily depending on what you're celebrating (think crushed candy canes at Christmas, or fruity cereal for a kid's birthday party).
On the opposite end of the spectrum, you can even make these candies sugar-free, since zero-sugar Cool Whip is readily available, as are sugar-free baking chips from several brands. However you whip them up, be sure to store the candies in the refrigerator in an airtight container (if you even have leftovers, that is). They'll taste their best if you eat them within five days.