To say some chocolates are distinctively middle class?

[lionobserving]

MIL asked us if we thought our ferrero rocher tower was "aspirational" and said she knows ferrero rochers to be the aspirational chocolates of the working class.

This baffled me. My family has always sort of transcended class - my mum was upper middle, my day was very working class. But he was a doctor and she a nurse. We were probably lower middle growing up if I had to put a tag on it, but our mixed extended family meant that we weren't aware of what was "posh" or MC / WC. We certainly wouldn't have known which chocs has the markings of which class.

Therefore MNers - lightheartedly - tell me which chocolates you view as typically middle class? We discussed it as a family and we couldn't come up with a single one!

Yeah, the class 'system' is just status from money really, with a few coded social graces thrown in depending on your tribe. Not many (any?) countries are free of that, its very human nature.
Oz is supposed to be lacking in class system, but when I lived there, plenty of people looked down on others just not in a 'were you at eton' way.
Though they didn't like something more the more expensive it was, so that was different (pretty common in the uk I think) so a shirt could be amazing and worn on a special night out even if it cost $20 not $200. Whereas I think it's more common in the UK to be the opposite.

I've only met posh people through work, but honestly they seem happy with dairy milk or whatever.

My very middle class friend however will only eat locally made chocolate from small businesses. Preferably in bizarre flavours. That's what she posts on Instagram anyway.

@NalPolishRemover

Leonidas?

These are my Christmas treat to myself. I go in the shop and choose my own selection. It's the best pick and mix ever!

@CounsellorTroi

Whatever happened to Suchard? Never seem to see it now.

I’m quite partial to a Greek brand called Ion, they do slabs full of whole hazelnuts, but don’t think it’s posh as it’s sold in supermarkets in Greece.

Suchard! I used to love that when I was a strictly working class child, I clearly had notions above my station! I wonder what happened to it? It was far better than Lindt.

Never heard of Prestat, I take it that it’s good? I only buy Lindor when it’s on special so maybe that. And does anyone else try to stuff as many of the Lindt chocolates as possible into the pick and mix In Sainsbury’s…asking for a friend I reckon they’re MC.

@SD1978

I can't believe no one has mentioned a vientetta.......surely that was always the epitome of class and poshness.......

Excuse me, I went to three shops in search of a Viennetta today!

It used to be a Sunday treat at Granny’s house. Now, it’s nostalgia.

Where was it on the posh scale when Granny served it in the eighties? And where is it now if I eat it nostalgically rather than ironically?

@CasperGutman

Came on to say this. These threads are so bizarre/ironic. People posting about expensive chocolates and not understanding how aspirational that is 😬

I think Suchard was swallowed up by Mondelez. I agree that it used to be a cut above when I was young, definitely a more expensive treat chocolate.

Whatever happened to Suchard? Never seem to see it now.

You can definitely still get Suchard Express in Germany (or you could pre-pandemic, I haven't been there since). It's a chocolate powder to put into warm or cold milk.

www.thehandbook.com/10-luxury-chocolate-shops-to-visit-if-youre-a-chocoholic/

@PlanktonsComputerWife

Poncy Irish chocolate like Lily O'Brien's dessert collection, or those weird honeycomb chocolate buttons.

Importing Whittaker's.

I got a box of these. They were too creative.orange spice, bit "peely" not sweet. too many dark chocolates and not enough milk choc etc prefer leonidas box where they are mostly praline praline 😋

My in laws are very posh. Very upper middle class. Land owners and educated at top boarding schools. At Christmas they have tubs of quality street.
My lower middle class family have green and blacks, m&s and Lindt.

@LaBellina

Has Côte d'Or been mentioned yet?

This. Lovely stuff.

Bendicks Bittermints, my annual Christmas present to myself.

Chocolate companies are known to be 'philanthropic' in the finest English tradition of keeping the WC down.

I don't understand this comment, @Sleepaway. Fry's, Cadbury's, Rowntree's and possibly several other companies were founded by Quaker families who tried to be good employers by providing decent working conditions and building model housing for their workers. I can see how you might think that's paternalistic, but the alternative was living in a slum and working for an out and out capitalist.

Their other motivation, as I understand it, was promoting cocoa as a beverage in the hope of keeping people off the booze. Yes, again, telling the working class what was good for them, but there's no denying that women and children were likely to be better off in a household where the breadwinner didn't head straight to the pub on payday.

Nothing you can buy at the supermarket!
Neuhaus is the best.

I'm sorry, but this the Mumsnet class obsession has reached new levels of ridiculous.

IME, if you're invested enough to try and determine the social class of confectionery, you're clearly trying to be something you're not.

The only ones I can think of are those Marc de champagne truffles in the lovely little box.

I don’t understand how they or any other chocolates would be aspirational though

Pierre Marcolini are lovely. Belgian customer used to bring them for our office. You can get them in Harrods 😁

Back in the 1970s when I went shopping on my own in Leeds city centre as a teenager, I'd always walk through Schofield's department store. They must have had a chocolate counter. I saw these once and bought one as a great treat for myself. Haven't had one for many years and no idea what they're like now. I always think of it as that elephant-shaped truffle thing, but Google tells me it's a Côte d'Or Bouchée.

Charbonel
Prestat
Elizabeth Shaw mints

@WorraLiberty I knew it was who who wrote that comment before I even noticed your name! 😂

*you

I don't particularly like chocolate except on Jaffa Cakes. Lower working class and proud.

Truly upper class posh people just grab a Mars bar when they fancy one.

People who are obsessed with showing the world how painfully MC buy all of above suggestions.

Baffled, btw, by the many deletions on this thread! I assume they stem from the class reference in the OP, not the chocolate, although clearly people do feel very strongly about chocolate.

Back in the 1960s/early 1970s my (working class, far from affluent) grandmother would sometimes take me with her to the grocer's shop (a small supermarket had only just arrived in her small, rather genteel town and was viewed with some suspicion by older people, I think) to place her order, which would then be delivered later in the week. Behind the glass screen at the counter they had a display of chocolates, which fascinated me. I remember particularly gazing at the violet creams, which seemed very exotic. On the rare occasion I got one I did enjoy it, although it was an odd mix of chocolate and perfume/soap/pot pourri assocations. I assume the idea was that if you were well off or feeling flush that week you picked out a few to go in a suitably sized box.

The new town where we were living had no such place. Safeway for us!