Sweets: from candy to cookies

The main producers of sweets in the USSR were the Krasny Oktyabr, Rot Front, Babaevskaya and Bolshevik factories, which were located in the capital of the Soviet Union - Moscow. It was they who set the tone for the rest of the factories, both in quality and in the design of sweet products.

"Red October" is the former confectionery factory "Einem" (it was named after its founder, the German Ferdinand von Einem). After the October Revolution of 1917, the factory was nationalized and renamed. And she continued her "sweet" history already in the new, socialist conditions, releasing mainly chocolate and sweets. Among the latter were: "Bear-toed" (appeared in 1925), "Southern Night" (1927), "Creamy Fudge" (1928), iris "Kis-kiss" (1928), "Stratosphere" (1936), "Soufflé "(1936) and others.

In 1935, A. Ptushko's film "The New Gulliver" saw the light of day, which was a huge success with children. After that, Gulliver sweets appeared on the shelves of Soviet stores - wafers covered with real chocolate icing. These were expensive candies, so when they became popular, their cheap counterpart appeared - Crane candies, where the same wafer was covered with soy chocolate. The price is more affordable - 20 kopecks apiece.

Among the chocolate products of Krasny Oktyabr, the "Golden Label" (1926) was the "oldest" brand. But chocolate "Guards" appeared during the war years. In those years, "Red October" produced exclusively chocolate, and one brand - "Cola" - was intended for pilots. And after the war, the production of sweets was resumed.

From the second half of the 60s, the most recognizable product of Krasny Oktyabr was Alenka chocolate (1 ruble 10 kopecks for a large bar and 20 kopecks for a small, 15-gram one). And it arose under Brezhnev, although the idea was born when N. Khrushchev was the head of the country. At the Plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU in February 1964, an appeal was made to Soviet confectioners to come up with cheap chocolate for kids. This idea was put into practice at the Krasny Oktyabr confectionery factory for two years, until, finally, Alenka milk chocolate saw the light of day. The label showed a little girl in a headscarf. This portrait was found on the cover of the Health magazine in 1962: 8-month-old Lenochka Gerinas was photographed there (the photo was taken by her father Alexander).

Among other products of this factory were chocolate - "Pushkin's Tales", "Flotsky", "Glory" and others; sweets - Cancer Necks, Little Red Riding Hood, Kara-Kum, Truffles, Deer, Soufflé, Tretyakov Gallery, Temptation, Fairy Tale, Come on, take it away , "Snowball", "Mir", "Humpbacked Horse", "Zest", "Evening", "Chernomorochka", "Cow", iris "Golden Key", etc.

The main competitor of "Red October" was considered the confectionery factory named after P. Babaev ("Babaevskaya"). Before the revolution, it was an enterprise of the Abrikosov merchants, but after nationalization in 1918, the prominent Bolshevik Pyotr Babaev became its head. True, he did not manage for long - only two years (he died at the age of 37 from tuberculosis), but his name was immortalized in the new name of the factory.

Before the war, she specialized in the production of montpensier, toffee and caramel. And immediately after the war, it began to produce chocolate products, and very soon chocolate became the main brand of this factory. Among her most popular brands of chocolate were Inspiration (elite chocolate), Babaevsky, Special, Guards, and Lux.

Among the sweets were such as "Squirrel", "Mishka in the North", "Shuttle", "Golden Field", "Orange Flavor", "Pilot", "Spring", "Petrel", "Marine", "Chamomile", “Truffles”, etc.;, in boxes - “Squirrel”, “Visit”, “Evening Aroma”, “Sweet Dreams”, etc.

"Rot Front" produced the following brands of sweets: "Moscow", "Kremlin", "Rot Front" (bars), "Little Red Riding Hood", "Grillage in Chocolate", "Golden Field", "Caravan", "Autumn Waltz", Lemon (caramel), Peanuts in chocolate, Raisins in chocolate, etc.

The Bolshevik factory was popular for its oatmeal and Yubileiny cookies. However, we will talk about cookies a little lower.

In Leningrad, there was a confectionery factory named after N. K. Krupskaya, which was opened in 1938. For a long time, its trademark (or brand in today's way) was the Mishka in the North sweets, which appeared on the shelves of Soviet stores even before the war - in 1939. This factory produced both chocolate and sweets, among which the Firebird sweets (praline and cream) were very popular.

In general, sweets in the USSR were divided into cheap and expensive. The first included various kinds of caramel, the second - chocolate products. The vast majority of Soviet children most often indulged in "caramels", and various kinds of chocolate "sweets" passed through their hands a little less often due to their relative high cost. Naturally, chocolate sweets have always been valued in the children's environment much higher than caramel ones. And, if possible, they were consumed with enviable regularity, for which almost every child knew how to “beg” money from their parents specifically for chocolate “sweets”.

Personally, I bought sweets at the Bakery, which was located at the beginning of Kazakova Street - on the corner with Chkalov Street. It was an old bakery, which in the early 70s celebrated "fifty kopecks" - 50 years of its existence. In addition to sweets, I bought there my favorite kos-halva for 19 kopecks (100 grams) and mint gingerbread in the form of figures of animals and houses. Today, we no longer produce anything like this, and a cafe has been made from an old bakery.

But let's get back to Soviet sweets, about which there was even a saying: "You will eat a lot of sweets, your butt will stick together." The most affordable sweets, as already mentioned, were caramels, candies and toffees. The very first Soviet caramels appeared back in the 20s - for example, Ilyich caramel with a portrait of V. I. Lenin on the wrapper. At the same time, other caramels were also popular: "Peasant", "North", "Barberry" and even "Stenka Razin", which were produced by the Babaevskaya factory.

In our years (60-70s), the most popular caramels were "Goose feet", "Cancerous necks" (both with coffee fillings), sour "Snowball", milk toffee "Cow". True, the latter was expensive for constant use - 2 rubles 50 kopecks per kilogram, since it was made from whole condensed milk and butter.

Much more affordable were the Duchess caramel, the same Barberry, Petushki on a stick (5 kopecks apiece), as well as Kis-kis and Golden Key toffees, which were also cheap - 5-7 kopecks for 100 grams. Unlike caramel "Montpensier" in a metal box - those were in short supply. Like another caramel - "Vzletnaya", which almost never went on sale and was distributed to passengers making air travel in order to relieve their nausea.

Among the expensive sweets are "Kara-Kum" and "Squirrel" (chocolate, with grated nuts inside), "Bird's milk" ( gentle soufflé in chocolate), Roasting, Koltsov's Songs, To the Stars. The latter could be sold both by weight and in boxes - 25 rubles per box.

What other sweets were there: "Arctic", "Toys" (caramel), "Caravan", "Strawberry with cream", "Little Red Riding Hood", "Come on, take it away", "Nochka", "Snowball" (caramel), "Terem-Teremok", "Southern Liquor" (caramel), "Zoological", "School", "Golden Field", "Milk Bar", "Pineapple".

There was a lot of chocolate, but the most famous was, of course, "Alenka" (1 ruble 10 kopecks for a large bar and 20 kopecks for a small one - 15 grams).

In addition to "Alenka", in the USSR there were other names of chocolate: "Road" (1 ruble 10 kopecks), "Merry guys" (25 kopecks), "Glory" (porous), "Firebird", "Theatrical", " Circus", "Lux", "Pushkin's Tales", etc.

Let's look at the Internet again.

Masha Ivanova: “In the USSR, chocolate tasted of scarcity. More often it was bought not to eat, but to give. In the USSR, only pilots and polar explorers could gobble up a chocolate delicacy without a twinge of conscience. They were given a high-calorie product "according to the charter." Well, the schoolchildren also got it. In Soviet times, before exams, children were given small tiles each - to "recharge their brains."

Often the sweets were very tasty, but the decoration was limping. The greater was the contrast. Indeed, such a luxury was wrapped in a miserable candy wrapper! .. Confectionery GOSTs strictly followed the recipe. Soviet chocolate was in no way inferior in quality to the same Swiss one. And it was cheaper only because most of the cocoa supplier countries were among the allies of the USSR. Any interruptions in the supply of the necessary confectionery components were reflected in production.

Candy boxes were never thrown away in the Soviet Union! - they passed from hand to hand, like a victory banner. Under the brand name of the box, sweets were bought by weight and neatly laid out in the package. And if you managed to buy a new one, unopened, they opened it very carefully, so that, God forbid, not to scratch it ... "

Lydia: “In the late 60s and early 70s, there were even discounted sweets and caramel, chocolate in stores. The caramel was melted, the chocolate was broken tiles (they should only be whole), and the candy probably had an expired shelf life (in Soviet times, storage periods were strictly monitored). When I was still at school in the 60s, my mother would give 1 ruble, send for granulated sugar, so I would buy sand for 90 kopecks and Caucasian sweets for 10 kopecks - they seemed so tasty (mother raised us alone, you won’t make a fuss). But when I started working, I tried all sorts of sweets, I still have a sweet tooth, and my favorite ones are the “Swallow” of the Krupskaya factory ... "

Elena: “In our time, in the 60s, candy stores were filled with all kinds of sweets and sweets. Now this is unimaginable. And everything was great quality! Loose bars of dark chocolate, figured. Any kozinaki and nuts in sugar. The cakes were delicious and there were plenty of pastries. And I remember the most interesting sweets were for adults - “Chocolate-covered bottles with cognac or liquor”. "Concert sweets" - a charm, "Grillage in chocolate", "Mocha", "Bears", "Sea pebbles", "Sweet peas", "Youth" are already caramels. They loved caramel "Moskovskaya" very much. Chocolate candies "Spike", "Capital", "Salute", "Soufflé" - different squares. Then marmalade fudge, marmalade "Baltika", chocolates "Southern Night", porous chocolate "Konek-Gorbunok", "Russian Patterns", chocolates "Charodeyka", sweets "Raspberry", "Tangerine", "Red Flower", " Zoological", "Truffle", lollipops (leaf), monpasier. And in the "Children's World" parents bought me ... a chocolate phone. And how many figured chocolates in foil! There were medals made of chocolate, and simple small chocolates for 20 kopecks ... "

Larisa: “How often I remember those moments when, on the eve of the New Year, my mother and I went to the best confectionery in Kharkov “Vedmedic” and, standing in line at several counters at once, we, happy, carried chocolates home! And what a pleasure it was to string them by the tails on a string to decorate the Christmas tree later. These were sacred candies, I did not touch them until the moment of decoration. I remember the beautiful labels of sweets “Marusya Boguslavka”, “Merry little men”, “Come on, take it away!”, “Ice-cream tubes” ... It was the end of the 60s - the beginning of the 70s. I folded wrappers between the pages of books and they kept the unique aroma of the holiday for a long time. Where are they now, these books? And why did my children never collect candy wrappers? Something is wrong with our children…”

Hope: “No one remembers the little briquettes-cubes of pressed cocoa with sugar? Sold in the 60s. They had to be dissolved in boiling water and drunk like cocoa. But we gnawed on these cubes and I don’t remember anything tastier, despite the presence of other sweets. And from childhood - the chocolate was soy "Children's". There is a girl on the cover. And inside is an insert with clothes for her. It was necessary to cut out both the doll and the clothes. Nobody remembers??? My kids don't believe me...

nt61: Pressed cocoa? Oh, I remember this sweetie. Pressed cocoa with sugar, there was still milk (dry, of course). And all this joy cost about 7-8 kopecks. And there was coffee in the same version for 10 (11) kopecks ... Raspberry sweets. If we are talking about sweets, very soft and fragrant (raspberry, lemon) in the form of cones, then these were the simplest sweets at that time, but they were also very tasty. Moreover, I loved to eat them, or rather to gnaw on them already “outdated”. Everything, saliva went ... "

echidna56 (Orenburg): “After the lessons, everything was delicious - from a round bun for three kopecks to kurabye cookies bought in a pool - if you rehearse or hang around on a mug, they threw off whoever had how much and bought, depending on the amount, two or three cookies per nose ... We, the sweet tooth, were attracted by “tent number 7” - a kiosk from the Orenburg restaurant with the freshest cakes - there are 22 kopecks, choose what you want ... If less - sand cake or buns. Special memories are associated with juices - they were sold in the school cafeteria for 8–9 kopecks a glass, thick, 1000% natural juices with pulp - plum, peach, pear, apple ...

I also remembered home-made truffles - from the packs of baby food already mentioned here. The recipe is hopelessly lost...

On a bad day, one could also rejoice at the Artek waffles. Yes, what is there - it happened, and they ate chocolate from "ovnilin" - a sweet bar was called. It was best to go to the store with my grandfather - he always bought normal food - at least a cake with raisins was not displayed in the grocery store, corn sticks were rare and in a fight - one pack in hand (!), ice cream - at worst, in best times - chocolate bar - 1.80, and each. From “karakumok” and “roosters”, we, having stuck a match in them, made popsicle (only dwarf) - we didn’t have it in the city, but it was in the book about Aibolit! ..

We also had our own branded cookies in the city - "Orenburg" - bent with horseshoes. My other grandfather bought it in kilograms and sent it to Astrakhan, to the Kirov fish factory in parcels - to his parents. Very tasty - you can gnaw, you can dip in tea with milk ... "

Coca Ch.: “I ate sweets“ Capital ”as a child once in a single copy; more often came across sweets "Sputnik" - a form like "Truffle", but a little more, also with liquor. Candies of this form were also "Aleko", "Space Seagull", "Zolota Niva", "Truffle". The latter were the most expensive, costing about 7 rubles before the rise in price. 20 kop. "Truffles" were often the only chocolates that lay freely in the deli, because, firstly, they were very expensive, secondly, they were hard (you could only nibble them), and thirdly, they were sprinkled with cocoa, i.e. were bitter. In the early 1970s, Zolota Niva sweets appeared, they cost a little less, about 6 rubles, and were softer and sprinkled with waffle crumbs. "Aleko" and "Space Seagull", by the way, disappeared around the middle of the 70s.

The middle niche was occupied, as they would say now, by “elite” sweets such as “Red Poppy” and “Karakum” (they had something so crunchy inside). The price is about 3.40 - 3.60 rubles.

I also remember such sweets as "White Acacia" - they were kept in stock for a long time, when there were no others. They cost, it seems, 2 rubles. 80 kop.

The lowest level was occupied by candies "Lemon" and "Autumn", with a white filling. Price 1 rub. 80 kop.

Sweets "with white filling", perhaps, could be singled out in a separate class. There were more expensive sweets - “Pilot” (the wrapper is so interesting, a piece of paper with a blue and white stripe, in the middle - foil), “Citron” (the filling is white and yellow, with lemon flavor, the wrapper wrapped only on one side), “Swallow”.

Wafer sweets are a separate issue. As already mentioned, there was "Gulliver". The very idea is original - after all, Gulliver was great in the country of the Lilliputians. The Gulliver candy was just as big. I also remember the Yalynka candy of the same format.

Smaller waffles - "Our brand", "Clumsy bear", "Tuzik", "Spartak", "Pineapple", "Torch".

"Torch", by the way, was sold loose, without candy wrappers. He held out until the very end. When the country ran out of chocolate, they began to make "Torch" from soy chocolate.

"Pivdenna nich" ("Southern night"). Some sort of marmalade filling. Probably the only candies that are exactly the same today as they were 45 years ago.

Caramel. I didn’t particularly remember - I didn’t like them, although, I remember, I somehow sat down on Vzletnaya. Separately, I would like to mention caramel "Cherry". It was a very expensive caramel, something like 5 rubles per kilo. It was wrapped in a very beautiful valuable wrapper of the "tselofashka" black color with red cherries. For some reason, I had to see only candy wrappers. The sweets were so expensive that the parents apparently preferred to buy chocolates for this money.

Butterscotch - "Moo-mu" (square, like bouillon cubes "maggi"), "milk". Nothing special, except for plobs pulled out of the teeth.

"Long sucking" - there were "barberry" and "mint". "Barberry" disappeared in the early 70s, only "mint" ones remained. These are the sweets that could be found in the most remote village, in the most seedy silpo, where no other sweets simply ever lived. They were wrapped in such waxed paper. Along the length they had small holes (like macaroni, but much smaller in diameter), through which one could try to suck tea from a mug.

"Cocks on a stick" in the store cost 5 kopecks. There were different "roosters" - "asterisks", "bunnies", actually "roosters" and some other little animals of an incomprehensible shape. At the same time, grannies were walking around the city, who were selling such boooo-big cockerels, whole, one might say, roosters, painted with bright colors (probably harmful), self-made, from burnt sugar. Those cost 20 cents.

In the late 70s, sweets "Lubimiye" appeared in Kyiv - they were slightly enlarged, not the same as "Gulliver", but somewhere in half. They cost, I think, 3.60, they were very tasty.

Back in the late 70s, “sweet tiles” appeared. As I now understand - from soy. Now, too, sometimes you come across such a “sweet bar”, but under the proud name of “chocolate”.

But all sorts of different “chocolate-covered cherries”, etc., were probably made only in Moldova. From there, it happened, they brought "bombone" in boxes.

Well, there were also Assorted. There was also Bird's Milk. It is not clear where they were sold, I did not see them in stores, but they gave them for birthdays.

In Kyiv, on the street. Lenin (above the Central Department Store, not reaching the Opera House, on the right side, opposite the Museum of Nature) there was a store "Solodoshchi Ukrainy". There were always huge queues. There, each confectionery factory had its own department. There was almost never a queue in one or two departments. That's where I hung out when I had the chance. But this is already the end of the 70s - the beginning of the 80s ... "

Lokomotiv (Engels): “It is difficult to list all the delicious things that were then. Now the choice is great, but I don’t dare to call it delicious! .. I think that everyone remembers chocolate medals for 9 kopecks, monpasier in jars and by weight, Alenka chocolate (not to be confused with the current Alenka, she didn’t even stand next to Soviet!). It's hard not to remember Soviet sausages, what we eat now is not sausage. I don’t even want to talk about the current sausages made from fluffed pork skin. And Soviet champagne, which really was champagne using the Abrau Durso technology, and not soda, as it is now. Well enough, otherwise I'll burst into tears! :) "

Polina: “The first sweet miracle from my childhood - gummy bear cubs, were sold in the Lakomka store next door (both the store and the cubs disappeared without a trace a long time ago). Not the ones that are now sold in bags, of course. Each teddy bear was eight centimeters long, with beady eyes and a bow around the neck. Dark marmalade in sugar sprinkling. I always felt sorry for eating, I already sniffed and licked before biting, starting with the ears ...

And in the bread shop they sold such biscuit cookies in boxes, they were called “The Magic Wand”. These sticks lay in two rows, lined with paper. The box is pink, with a running girl. Of course, it never occurred to me to read who produces it. It seemed that everything always was and always will be. An no...

And for 20 kopecks from school breakfasts, we bought “Takeoff” candies. Small, ribbed, sour, and it turned out quite a lot of them for this amount.

And for some reason, I remember (in the same bread) small rye bars with raisins for diabetics. Wow, and there were goodies, especially since they were baked right there, downstairs, like all kinds of buns with nuts, puffs and other pastries. Can you compare with today? And not because the taste of childhood is always special, but because they did it honestly. The store smelled a mile away, better than any advertisement, and if you slowed down at the basement window, you could see how these buns were laid out on baking trays ... "

ergo67 (Ukraine): "Getting closer New Year, and from that, memories of children's New Year's joys and sensations are not uncommon. One of the traditional attributes of the New Year in my childhood (related to sweets) was hung on the Christmas tree (in large quantities) amazing-tasting sweets “Frosty Tubes” (long ones like pencils, but snow-white), now there are all sorts of “chills”, but that's not it at all. For some reason, few people remember these sweets, but in the 70s in the Donbass there was plenty of them in every grocery store, and by the mid-80s they disappeared, alas ... "

PROBA: Ice cream in chocolate "Leningradskoye", caramel "Goose paws", "Cancer necks", "Pastila", marshmallows in chocolate, sweets "Come on, take it away", nutmeg "Stepnaya Rose" (a masterpiece of the Novocherkassk Research Institute), corn crispy sticks. And cocoa "Gold" and "Silver Label" will never be compared with No. esquik ... "

Glafira Z.: “But I remember that we had a crush in the school buffet for a puff with jam for 7 kopecks))), two buns in one hand! The high school students always ate everything first, and we kids didn’t get much…”

As far as I remember, in the buffet of my beloved school No. 325, shortcakes for 7 kopecks and a bun "Kaloriynaya" with raisins for 8 kopecks were especially popular. I also remember the big slogan stretched out in the buffet: “School breakfasts are great! They will help you quickly - to become strong, courageous, dexterous, as they are useful and very tasty!

rvr70 (Moscow): "Teatralnaya" and "Vzletnaya" caramels (with the Aeroflot emblem on the wrapper), cranberries in sugar - 2 rubles. 50 kop. for 1 kg. Oatmeal cookies - they are no more, as before, in a square long package, inside they are laid in parchment ... Cold "Southern", such a yellowish one - but you can’t remember everything at once !!!

By the way, oatmeal cookies was very popular in the USSR. But the most promoted brand was the Yubileinoye cookie, which was born even before the revolution - in 1913, when the 300th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty was celebrated. It is in honor of this anniversary that the confectioner Adolf Siu at his factory “A. Sioux and Co. has released Jubilee cookies. And five years later, already under the Bolsheviks, this factory was nationalized and renamed Bolshevik. However, "Jubilee" continued to be produced according to the same recipe: Wheat flour, corn starch, powdered sugar, margarine, milk and eggs.

Bobas: “For many years I have been trying to recall the name of the yummy that I adored in childhood: there were such waffles, abundantly sprinkled with nuts and just as abundantly poured with chocolate. Production - exactly Bulgaria. They were sold packed in 1 piece, but the thing was 100 grams, it seems. On the pack is a striking combination of a bright blue background and a scarlet rose. I remember something that they were called "Marika", but I'm not sure ...

Another "yummy" from childhood: loose dates. 80 kopecks per kilo. For some reason, I bought them for myself only when I wandered into the music room. On the way - a vegetable shop, in it - a sticky cube of these overseas sweets. For 5 kopecks it turned out 8 dates, for 3 kopecks - 5. She came to the music shop, rinsed them in the washbasin, wrapped them in a “gold” from a chocolate bar specially reserved for these cases. By the end of the lesson, they softened, this was my reward for not too favorite music lessons. For some reason, the idea of ​​​​running to the store and buying them just never arose. It was a children's ritual: a house - dates - a musician.

Privoljski (Engels): “I remember briquettes with jelly. They gnawed it with pleasure, pleasant to the taste, not very sweet, with the aroma of berries. But it didn’t make sense to cook real jelly out of it, it turned out to be a tasteless, dirty-colored swill ... "

Mutabor777: I love sweets! And I remember all the sweets of my childhood ... I remember those five-kopeck "cockerels-on-a-stick" and "Kis-kis" toffees that were torn off along with fillings. There were also such long lollipops that looked like a pencil ... Caramel pads with filling, soy bars ... And chocolate, of course! This is "Gulliver", and "Golden Pheasant", and "Sister Chanterelle". Chocolates "Alenka", "Seagull", bar "Hi", chocolate bar, round large "Planet" ... Well, and many more: "Kara-Kum", "Sunny Bunny", "Tick-Tock", "Funny little men "... But the most delicious for me is the candy" Come on, take it away "(two hares were drawn on the wrapper, taking carrots from each other). I ate these sweets in my earliest childhood in the mid-70s, then I didn’t see them anymore ... Maybe that’s why I consider them the most delicious ... "

Latysheva Elena: “Come on, take it away sweets,” I remember well - only on the wrapper there were by no means hares, but a girl holding a candy high, which was encroached upon by a dog jumping at her feet. And I saw and ate Flamingo bars only in Vilnius - they were of Lithuanian production. We also forgot about “poppy seeds” - plates of pressed poppy seeds, molded with either honey or sugar syrup.

Svetlana: “I lived in a small mining town, and in our house there was a Palyanitsa store, where there was a confectionery department. When I was studying on the second shift, leaving the house, I would definitely go to the store and buy the “Golden Key” or “Kis-Kis” kopecks for 10–15, all this fit in the pocket of a school apron and was enough for several school breaks. Dad often went to Kyiv for work and brought “Kyiv” cake to all the neighbors, I don’t know how he managed to go shopping there, but he always carried out orders. And when I flew on business trips to Moscow, I always brought a bunch of sweets, my mother hid them, before the holidays, my brother and I found them and often pulled them out one at a time, and when the holidays came ... then there weren’t enough sweets, for this we often got hit)))) Often they argued with my brother who would go to donate bottles, because 5 bottles is a ruble, and for a ruble you could go for a walk - both to the movies and to an ice cream parlor. In May, summer cafes began to work in the city, and the whole class went there after school, the Summer cake cost 15 kopecks, and ice cream without syrup cost 20 kopecks, with syrup 22 kopecks. The beauty!!!"

Maria4e: “Even my brother in childhood correctly noticed my mother’s principle: “If you want sweets to be stored for a long time, take them that are not tasty.” Ah, how true! I still remember Soviet gifts, thanks to which Melky and I completed the five-year plan for eating sweets in a couple of days. The size of the plastic bag, of course, did not correlate with the amount of goodies inside. Mom's bosses almost always stuffed the bag with caramel and three tangerines ... In good year"Artek" was still rushing from above.

Tasty and tasteless sweets were divided in different proportions - happiness, if one to five. That is, for five caramels, there was still a chance to meet a chocolate one. Caramels were not held in high esteem, although they were eaten immediately without much lamentation over them ...

Sweets "Duchess", "Barberry", "Rachki", "Goose paws" - all of them were the first to go to battle in the name of early childhood caries. And they could only be eaten with sticky paper.

In the second echelon, there were candies, conditionally christened "white-dark-filling" - "Swallow", "Chamomile", "Petrel", "Sea". As a rule, my brother and I used them as an internal currency to pay for all sorts of small orders. Yes, yes, even then the currency lawlessness was familiar to me. The course of the "Petrel" was unstable - sometimes in a single copy he could send his brother on a night trip for a glass of kvass, and sometimes it dropped to the memorable "Barberry" and could not even force the curtains to be drawn at night.

The gold reserves were always Little Red Riding Hood, Bear in the North, Red Poppy, Epic, Gulliver, Karakum and Pineapple. However, the latter have always harbored some prescription unpredictability. I've tasted Pineapples so sour that they instantly turned into caramels in my brother and I's home stock market. I also had to pay extra for Petty to take them.

From the "good" in a gift, several things could also come across: for example, chocolates "Pushkin's Tales", even with a white touch of antiquity, went flying. Daddy could eat them not only tea and coffee, but also rice porridge, white bread, and, in fact, even gingerbread ... "

Ludmila: “Oh, sweet notes of childhood ... Everyone has just an abyss of sweet memories. I want to remember curly marmalade. Such big bears, bunnies, Dunnos in sugar... Nothing special in taste, but bite a little bit, then suck delicious gummies in your mouth... They dragged out the pleasure. Another gray (sunflower) halva ... Small squares of milk chocolates 11 kopecks each: "Pushkin's Tales", "Krylov's Fables" ... "

Irina: “My grandmother's sister often came to visit us from Moscow and brought me various gifts. I won't forget vanilla sweets - yummy, no words! I didn’t see these sweets anywhere else, and in Ukraine, at least here in Sumy, they weren’t sold.”

Tatyana: “I want to clarify a little. All cakes cost 22 kopecks, simple chocolates such as Lastochki - 3.50, and Kara-Kum, Squirrel - 5.50, and Alenka chocolate was the cheapest - 80 kopecks per 100-gram bar, because it was milk . There was also the same - "Seagull". I look with tenderness at the candy wrappers of those long-standing sweets, all the girls (including me) collected candy wrappers, some in a box of sugar, some - from under sweets. Everything was laid out according to the format and quality of the wrapper, it was a pleasure to sit somewhere with girlfriends, go through your treasures, exchange takes and show off new products. I remember when they gave us money to school for lunch, we saved money and, going into a pastry shop, bought one piece of candy (5-6 kopecks) just for the sake of a new candy wrapper! .. "

Lala Zimova: “In the years of my childhood, there was a certain set of sweets, cakes, ice cream, cookies that we all loved, remembering which we experience a slight sense of nostalgia, because they are no longer produced. I remember that such pillows with cocoa, with jam inside, were popular and they cost ridiculous money, either 75 or 80 kopecks per kilogram ...

Some sweets were not so easy on the shelves of Kyiv stores, they had to be caught and still stand in line. But many well-known and beloved brands of Soviet sweets, such as Golden Field, Cancer Necks, Barberry, Duchess, Golden Key, Karakum, Belochka, Mishka Kosolapy, Pineapple ”, “Milk bar”, “School”, sweets in “Assorted” boxes and multi-colored candies in large metal boxes “Monpasier” were available to everyone who wanted to enjoy and cost ridiculous money in our times. I would also like to mention the world of chocolates and everyone's favorite "Alenka", "Seagull", dark chocolate "Guards". From Moscow, they often brought the famous caramel in chocolate, Snezhok sweets, Medovaya caramel, raisins and nuts in chocolate in bright packaging bags, marshmallows and a wide variety of chocolates - Extra, Nut, Teatralny, Inspiration famous confectionery factories "RotFront", "Red October" and "Babaevskaya".

Many children also loved sweets such as "Korovka" with boiled condensed milk inside, but they were in short supply, and these cherished little boxes could only be found in the grocery store in the morning, and, of course, they were quickly taken apart. By the way, these candies have successfully survived to our children, as well as the famous and no less scarce and beloved candies "Ptichye Moloko" and "Grillage".

Marshmallows occupied a separate place among the favorite treats of Soviet children! Marshmallow white, pink and chocolate. In Kyiv, of course, you could search for marshmallows in chocolate during the day with fire, but white and pink were in short supply, and marshmallows in chocolate were usually brought from Moscow. Lemon slices were also in short supply, they were rarely found in Soviet stores, they were obtained by pull, as well as Strela chocolates. The world of cookies was also varied. I remember the most delicious cookies "Mosaic", it was of two colors - light and chocolate and was sold in a box. Everyone's favorite wafers "Artek" and, of course, sweet and crispy "Straws", everyone's favorite "Chocolate Sausage" ...

But in the New Year's gift, the most delicious was a chocolate bunny for 1 ruble !!! And the same chocolate Santa Claus! They appeared together, both the hare and Santa Claus, about two weeks before the New Year. I have always been happy with them. But you must admit that in our Soviet childhood we did not lack sweets, of which there were a great many! .. "

Olga: “In the New Year's gift, I was looking for forbidden tangerines, dragees in chocolate and white icing. My brother and I studied the contents of the gift and honestly divided it in half. Wrappers were kept for more than one year.

Natalia: “I remember in 1980 I got on the Christmas tree in the Kremlin, There was a “Chill” in the gift, but not a simple one, but a lemon one. God, it was delicious…”

movie girl: “Volga relatives brought Kuibyshev sweets, for them I was ready to go to the store at least 100 times or take out the garbage without a queue for a week ...”

steal: "Golden Niva" sweets. Now there are similar sweets, but the taste is still inaccessible ... "

Alexei: “There were very tasty Pioneer candies, such striped black and white, then “School”, they just melted in your mouth, a bright green candy wrapper with yellow stars, this is the early 80s, then they were no longer sold. Candies "Sea", factories "Kalev", soy bars "Privet" for 20 kopecks I could eat 5 pieces at once ... "

And I: “When I was five years old, I tried the Tuzik candy. The taste is breathtaking. It was almost impossible to get them, and there was always no money for such a luxury. And in adulthood, they were not impressed ... "

Ira: "The most delicious sweets of the 70s - "Squirrel" factory named after. N.K. Krupskaya and "Truffles". These were also the most expensive sweets (at least in the North-West of the USSR). They cost 7 rubles. 50 kop. per kilogram.

Antokha: “In principle, each region had its own characteristics, and in Ulyanovsk we also had a not frail “confectionery”. And all the sweet faces were awesome! My favorites are Squirrel, Kara-Kum, Little Red Riding Hood and Bears. Well, in boxes. And also tiles and bars ... "

As for "regional" sweets, I also have a childhood memory. As I already mentioned, every summer we went with the whole family to my father's homeland - to Uzbekistan. They lived in a large village in the Bukhara region (near the ancient city of Gijduvan). So there I tried the real Eastern halva, which was cooked by one local grandfather-confectioner (it was not in the state sale). Grandfather sold it at a price of 1 ruble for a large bowl (in liquid form) and I periodically ran to him, begging my father for money. The taste is unforgettable, especially when it is only cooked, hot (when it cooled down, it lost a little in taste).

tichkank999: “In Gorky we had our own, no less famous Moscow confectionery factory - Sormovskaya. I remember "Squirrel" with the addition of nuts, "Clumsy Bear" with a waffle inside, "Cockerel", "Little Red Riding Hood", "Golden Khokhloma". Mostly they came across to me in gifts for the New Year. This was a holiday!!!”

Sasha: “I remember my mother brought Pheasant chocolates from somewhere - I haven’t seen anything like it now ...”

Irina: “I agree with everyone, although I am ten years older than you. 70-80 kopecks, with my mother's salary of 92 rubles a month, was a very good amount then. Here in Leningrad "Solomka" was very popular and it was quite cheap. It's funny, but I buy the same "Straw" in my New York, and in the same packaging. Our compatriots are very enterprising! The most delicious memories I have are about soy bars, and soy bars, not chocolate ones. Apparently, there was not enough money for chocolate, but I adored them. They knitted their mouths and were not cloying. Even in Leningrad, on Nevsky, there was a cafe "Sever" or "Roskond", so they sold various pastries, cakes, sweets and all sorts of outlandish confectionery- one Kyiv cake was worth something! And also cakes “Trubochka” and baskets with buttercream roses… I haven’t eaten anything like this here yet…”

Anatoly: “The sweets of my childhood are Squirrel and Baltika, Truffle and Red Poppy produced by the Laima factory, as well as PASTILAAAAA and ZEFIR, you can’t buy these now, but Monpasier caramels in a tin can for 20 kopecks…”

Anna: “For some reason, I remember the Snowball caramels, although I didn’t particularly like them, but my parents often bought them. And chocolates "Lake Ritsa". Their filling was white and sour, and chocolate icing on top. So, my brother and sister and I ate the icing, and sculpted all sorts of figures from the filling ... I can’t imagine how I would take it if I caught my child doing such an activity now ... There was also a delicious calorie cookie, with the image of a cheerful bear on the package . Now I would love to try it all! But this, of course, is no longer found ... "

Elena: “On the eve of the New Year, to the ballet “Swan Lake”, to the enduring “Irony ...”, an action that I especially loved took place: all New Year's gifts were shaken out on the velvet surface of the sofa! A happy moment of possession of mountains of various sweets, tangerines from the unknown "Morocco", chocolate bars and medals! Do you remember medals in gold pieces? Iris "Kis-Kis"? Tiny chocolates "Pushkin's Tales"? Bars "Sports"? All these charms were then hung on a prickly Christmas tree smelling of forest silence and were quietly eaten in the evening, so that when the tree was undressed, only inedible glass glitter remained on it. Well, okay, until another holiday! As for sweets, on weekdays we ate Dunka's Joy or bought a bag of Golden Key toffees, but we couldn't count on anything else. What overseas wonders the sweets sent to my neighbor from the Baltic seemed to me! .. "

Irina-2: “In New Year's gifts, we always had medals - large and small with a New Year theme. And the most delicious sweets for me were "Autumn Waltz" and "Evening Ringing" factory "Rot Front" - 10 rubles per kg. And back in the seventies, Inspiration chocolate bars appeared - with ten small chocolate bars packed in foil. They still exist with the addition "classic". The taste hasn't changed! So you can be transported back - to the USSR ... "

sharpening: “For me, the most delicious were the “Theatrical” lollipops in red candy wrappers with golden patterns. And also caramel "Cheburashka" and "Cancerous necks".

Sergey: “Bear in the North”, “Tuzik”, “Enchantress”, “Merry Men”, “Pillows” in sugar and cocoa ... And “Gulliver”, “Kara-Kum”, “Red Poppy”, “Chamomile” are also now…"

Victor: “Even if the names are still the same, the taste of sweets has changed beyond recognition ...”

Gennady: "Bird's milk" and the truth is now not the same as it was in the USSR. And "Squirrel" is also not like that, and "Chamomile". But marmalade and roasted meats are similar to Soviet ones. Oh, and there were also “pillows”, and “Tuzik”, and “Tick-tock” ... "

annamarta: “I remember the boom that was around Bird's Milk cakes in the early 80s, when there were only 2 shops in Moscow that produced these cakes - and one of them was not far from our house. The smells around the area were so appetizing that it was breathtaking! .. "

By the way, sweets like "Bird's milk" (with air filling marshmallows) were first produced in Poland in 1936 according to approximately the same recipe as marshmallows, only without the addition of eggs. The "Bird's Milk" was made by the Warsaw confectionery factory E. Wedel. And in the USSR, these sweets began to be produced in 1968 at the Moscow factory "Red October" in small batches. They got their name thanks to the legend about the miraculous milk of birds of paradise, which can give a person heroic strength, good health and eternal youth. These sweets were produced in many cities of the USSR, and the most delicious ones were made in Moscow and Tomsk. They were so popular that, based on them, the cake of the same name was later born. However, it is necessary to tell about cakes and pastries separately.

Let's talk a little about the favorite sweets of Soviet childhood, in particular, let's remember cakes.

Those whose childhood and youth fell on Soviet times sometimes remember those days with pleasure. Especially the sweet tooth, and especially when it comes to Soviet pastries. Today we will try to recall the most popular positions in the assortment of Soviet cafeterias and confectioneries.
Delicious assortment

A distinctive feature of the Soviet Union has always been a rather meager range of products, which had a fairly high quality. The same can be attributed to Soviet cakes.

It was cakes that were synonymous with happiness for many children, regardless of age!

Few could walk past the candy store. And then there were mittens in cream, textbooks smeared with chocolate, the Meringue cake broken into pieces in a new briefcase ...

The current numerous confectionery and coffee houses delight the eye with the abundance and beauty of culinary products, but they will never compare with nondescript Soviet pastries made from simple, but high-quality and natural ingredients. No one thought at that time about food coloring and preservatives. Depending on the dough from which the cakes were baked, they were divided into biscuit, air, custard, amateur (crumble), almond-nut, shortbread, sugar tubes, puff.

Unlike today's production, the raw material for making cakes was premium wheat flour, granulated sugar and powder, starch, molasses, butter, whole and condensed milk, eggs, fruits, fruit fillings, agar, chocolate, cocoa powder, nuts, lemon acid, salt, food colorings, vanillin, essences, cognac, wine. Let's remember those childhood joys of our school buffet or favorite pastry shop.

"Napoleon"

The Napoleon cake was considered a special chic in the culinary and pastry environment. It looked like a fat puff equilateral triangle covered with a very tasty cream.

The price is 22 kopecks.

Cake "Eclair"

Eclair with butter cream and chocolate icing is one of the favorite and delicious cakes of the Soviet era.

The sets of cakes, which were sold in beautiful cardboard boxes, always had an eclair. This cake was made from choux pastry, and cream or custard was used as a filling.

The eclair cost 22 kopecks.

little basket

A sand basket sold everywhere and was no less loved by Soviet boys and girls than an eclair. Most often, the baskets were decorated with cream mushrooms. The mushroom caps were made from dough. These hats were eaten first.

The price is 22 kopecks.

Cake "Tubules with butter cream"

Delicious and very simple cake. For the generation born in the USSR in the 1960s - 1980s. - puff tubes with melt-in-your-mouth protein cream were a real delicacy.

The price is 22 kopecks.

Cake Potato

Cake "Potato" is one of the iconic dishes of Soviet cuisine. The legendary potato is a favorite delicacy of Soviet children. She was loved and loved as well as eclairs, baskets and tubes.

It was served in restaurants, in student canteens, and at the home table. Potatoes are still the taste of childhood for many today ... Which, in general, is not surprising. A not very laborious dish made it possible to utilize cake trimmings, dry biscuits, crackers with benefit and taste.

The name "potato" was given to this cake because it was finished with white cream in the form of sprouts on a potato tuber.

Cake "Potato" was not baked. And it was made from biscuit crumbs, cake scraps, etc., which were mixed with creamy, sweet cream (as an option - condensed milk). Plus - the addition of raisins, nuts - whoever is in what much.

But it should be noted that the real Potato cake was always made from biscuit crumbs, and inside it was light in color, that is, without adding cocoa.

The price is from 16 to 18 kopecks.

white meringue

Snow-white cake consisting of two halves. Pieces of white crispy meringue were held together with jam or buttercream. The dream of all Soviet girls.

lemon cakes

One of the favorite sweet treats was lemon cakes with delicate sourness. The undeniable advantage of this sweet treat was the use of the simplest and most affordable products that could be found in any Soviet grocery store.

The price is 22 kopecks.

Sand ring with nuts

An excellent afternoon snack for a Soviet schoolchild or student is a sand ring with nuts. To get that same taste, Soviet chefs used only peanuts! The undulating shortbread topped with nuts could be eaten with both tea and milk.

Korzhik-ringlet - 8 kopecks.

Jack of all trades

Keeping up with businesses Catering and Soviet citizens. Airy eclairs, delicious cakes, potato cakes ... Our mothers and grandmothers could not cook anything! The hostesses preferred to make delicious masterpieces on their own. Recipes were taken from the collection "Cooking". This book was in almost every home. How to make a cake, bake pies, decorate cakes. This book had answers to almost all questions.

Young chefs

Mothers had daughters in the wings. Remember the famous "Birthday Days", which were celebrated by the whole class once a month. Especially for these school tea parties, the girls brought sweets made with their own hands from home.

There were also home economics lessons. The girls also baked cakes on them. At the end of such lessons, we boys came to visit them for tea!

New breath

Much has changed today. Preservatives, improvers, stabilizers, flavorings ... and there are no longer those biscuit cakes and pastries, puff tubes and baskets with cream, simple shortbreads, juicier, cakes "Oreshek", custard ring with curd cream and much more is missing ... But people's interest in the Soviet culinary "heritage" does not disappear. And we return to the old recipes again and again.

Favorite goodies

So among the favorite goodies of our school gatherings was “sweet sausage”. It was easy and quick to prepare. Various types of sweet biscuits were used for cooking. There were many recipes for this dish. And here's one of them for you. The one from the cooking class.

Ingredients (for 8-10 servings):

Cookies "Jubilee" (or other) - 750-800 g;

Condensed milk - 1 can (400 g);

Butter - 200 g;

Cocoa powder - 3 tbsp. spoons;

Cognac - 3 tbsp. spoons.

Cooking:

Remove butter and condensed milk from the refrigerator in advance and leave for several hours at room temperature. Break cookies with your hands into small pieces, mix with condensed milk, then add butter, cocoa and cognac and mix thoroughly. Put a sheet of baking paper or foil on the table and put the prepared mass on the edge in the form of an oblong slide. Wrap it up in the form of a long cylinder, flatten it with your hands along the entire length and twist cellophane or foil from the edges (like candy).

Refrigerate for a few hours before serving and cut into round pieces. If desired, half a glass of chopped nuts and 100 grams of chopped prunes can be added to the cookie mass.

Montpensier in the round tin can with a bizarre pattern on the lid, cockerels on sticks that color the tongue, and, of course, the queen of all toffees - "Dairy Cows".

As far as I remember, the most accessible and cheap in those days was the so-called dragee. Multi-colored round sweets of several types. For 1 ruble 10 kopecks, you could buy a whole kilogram of multi-colored dragees called “peas”. An alternative was one-color strawberry or cherry. It was delicious, but it was necessary to take into account the freshness of the product, because ... At one time, in the late 80s, in the glorious city of Chita, dragees were sold, which could be classified by the Hague Convention as weapons of mass destruction, since in order to dissolve them in the mouth , you had to have salivation from the Alien, jaws from the Critter and patience from the Little Buddha)

polka dots
A slightly more expensive variety of "peas" was a large dragee with a softer shell and with sugar on it. I personally remember why lemon. When they were fresh - a very tasty thing. They cost more - somewhere in the region of 1 ruble 30 kopecks - 1 ruble 40 kopecks.

Dragee "lemons"
Well, the most expensive and desirable were either dragees with peanuts - the domestic version of M & M s, or the so-called "sea pebbles" - raisins in glaze. I loved the latter very much :-) They cost about 1 ruble 70 kopecks per kilo.

"Sea pebbles"
An alternative to dragees for cheapness and goodness were the so-called pads. There was various jams under the caramel shell. Delicious, by the way. And they were inexpensive - somewhere around 1 ruble 30 kopecks. After the adoption of the “semi-dry law”, they instantly disappeared from store shelves, and moved into the category of an acute shortage. The reason for the post - cheapness and quality allowed them to become a bestseller of raw materials for the production of moonshine. And since everyone started to “drive” them, it became problematic to find them for food.

"Cool" pads
Ruble eighty - this was the lowest limit, the purchase of a kilogram of numerous caramels, which, perhaps, were the most common type of sweets in the USSR. Not all of them were to my liking. I loved the ones with delicious jam under the caramel shell. "Strawberry with cream" or "Plum", for example. But some “Cancer necks”, “Baltika” or “Snowball” did not cause any emotions in me. And I also remember Cherry caramel, which cost some prohibitive money (either 4 or 5 rubles per kilo), but it was delicious.

Plum caramel wrap
Although my favorite variety in this segment has always been (and perhaps there is) caramels called Lemons. True, they almost played a fatal role in my life. Since childhood, I have been a big sweet tooth, and I have become addicted, going to bed, to pull out a couple of sweets with me, throwing them under the pillow and savoring their taste, falling asleep. And here, apparently, he fell asleep too early and the candy got into the wrong throat. In general, I began to suffocate and be late for a minute or two, my parents, who literally shaking my legs upside down, pulled out of me this most unfortunate "lemon", then I would not write these lines now :-) And yet " lemons "I still love to this day, although I gnaw them furiously - like all caramels :-) Apparently a defensive reaction :-)

Those Lemons
Well, my favorite among this type of sweets were lollipops, or, more correctly, “candy caramel”. This cheap, but practical and tasty product, I still use with great pleasure. AT Soviet times No. 1 were "Takeoff", which were not only distributed on board Aeroflot liners, but were also on free sale. Such lollipops cost somewhere around 2.30-2.50. And my love for them was determined by several circumstances. Firstly, the Tu-154 was depicted on the wrapper, and from an early age I was drawn to aviation. Secondly, a friend of my grandmother, who constantly regaled me with them, told me that these are real aviation sweets and all pilots love them :-)))) Well, and thirdly, they really were delicious. With sour. I love those. More than just sweet candy like Duchess.

Modern version of children's bestseller
However, take-offs were not always in the store, but almost everywhere you could buy Mints in a blue wrapper. Still practically everywhere there was a "barberry". But unlike modern ones, with sourness, that “barberry” was almost always sweet.

Remember these fanfictions? :-)

I really liked caramel "Start". Remember lollipops in the form of pucks (well, or large tablets). It was very tasty.
And of course, a wonderful montpensier in a round tin can.

Box from monpasier ...
They were miniature, of different colors, shapes and tastes. The only trouble is that most often they stuck together and it was necessary to tear off a separate “monpasy” with the use of brute physical force. But vkuuusno :-)) Such a tin cost about 20 rubles and was used very actively in the subsidiary farm.

The candies themselves
And we were all probably drawn to buy poisonous cockerels on sticks for 15-20 kopecks, which were sold by gypsies in the markets. Parents, of course, did not buy them for us, saying that they were made in unsanitary conditions. But forbidden fruit is known to be sweet, right? :-))) And there were also sweet sticks - beautiful, but strange in taste

Cockerel from gypsies ©
And a couple of times from Poland, Hungary and the GDR they brought me real handmade candy caramel, which, in addition to taste, also looked great. It was fun!

Rarely has such beauty
And we will complete today's story with a memory of "toffees" - or fondant mass boiled from condensed milk or molasses. The name came up with them at the beginning of the 20th century by the French confectioner Morna, who works in St. Petersburg, who for some reason decided that the final product is very similar to iris petals. Why he chose to do so is difficult to understand.

Kitty Kitty
All toffees could be divided into several subspecies. The most common was the so-called viscous iris, which never was. Representatives of this subspecies were the brands "Kis-Kis" and "Tuzik". The former were usually steel and an attempt to chew was worth broken teeth and torn fillings, while the latter were too soft and disintegrated on the teeth immediately.

They are the most
More pleasant was the "Golden Key", which can be attributed to the cast semi-hard iris.

Well, that was
Well, the queen of toffee was, of course, "Dairy Cows" - soft sweets with condensed milk inside.
I also remember that toffees were sold in large pieces by weight. However, they did not enjoy special love ...

Recently, while walking around one of the cities, I stumbled upon a museum of Soviet sweets and, of course, could not pass by. Sweets in childhood loved, I think, everyone. Here they have collected a large collection that will not leave many indifferent.
Let's remember what we enjoyed in childhood.

2. I confess that I did not recognize many sweets and chocolates. Perhaps they are much older than me, or these confectionery products were rare, or maybe I just forgot already, because so many years have passed.
But Alyonka chocolate, I remember, has always been there.

3. Olenka chocolate was produced in Ukraine.

4. There were many confectionery factories in Ukraine.

5. Someone was collecting wrappers from Childish chocolate.

6. There was also a place for unsightly toys at the present time.

7. The chocolates in the boxes were very nicely decorated. Please note that in a box of sweets there were 400 grams and even more, and not 150-200 as it is now.

8. Colorful candy boxes were used to store small things.

9. Sports theme.

10. Beauty-Moscow. The label suggests that it was a butter cookie. Prices were then printed on labels, in all stores and in different cities they were the same.

11. Candy postcard. From Evgenia Dmitrievna to Elena Ivanovna.

12. I see such a girl for the first time.

13. Assorted chocolate for 37 rubles. Really before 1961?

14. It is also interesting that the storage periods were much shorter than now.

15. More candy.

16. Marmalade "Orange and lemon slices" I remember very well.

17. More candies in jars. Jars were also used on the farm.

18. Dragee was very loved.

19. Creamy fudge and cakes.

20.

22. Wrappers are presented on a separate showcase.

23. When there were no inserts yet, the children collected candy wrappers. Not all, but there were some.

24. "Pineapple" sweets remember.

25.

26. The store-museum "Soviet Sweets" is located in Vladimir, a few steps from Bolshaya Moskovskaya Street. The entrance is free.

27. Now you can buy products of many companies here. It is noteworthy that the assortment mainly includes brands that were still in Soviet times.

28.

29. And yet, "Bird's Milk" then was completely different.

30. You can buy a cake or sweets and sit down to drink tea right there at the table. That's exactly what I did.

31. We have not yet come to the victory of communist labor, but it was nice to remember some moments from childhood.

Tell me what you learned? What do you remember? What were your favorite candies?

Surely many will still be interested in remembering

Ingvar from St. Petersburg recalls: Those whose childhood was spent in the Soviet Union certainly remembered some certain foods with their irretrievably lost taste. For example, for many it is hot bread. Remember - they send you for bread, you go into the store, and before reaching the trays with bakery products you understand that today you can not take a piece of paper to feel the softness of bread or rolls. Ah, the smell of freshly baked bread, which you can't find in stores these days! And by the time you get back home, you have already eaten a good part of the warm loaf, because it is impossible to resist!

In short, let's remember what we couldn't be pulled off by the ears in childhood. Let's start with drinks...

The same juice

As far as I remember, there were several types of juice in jars of the Odessa plant. The price also depended on the specific type. The empty can of 0.25 in Glassware itself cost, in my opinion, 10 kopecks, respectively, the price of your favorite juice varied from 17 to 25 kopecks. I immediately recall birch, tomato (favorite juice), plain apple, clarified apple, apple with pulp, grape-apple, grape, carrot, carrot-apple, quince, plum, pear, pear-apple and orange. If I missed something and someone else remembers - tell me :-)

I did not find authentic photos of juice cans, so that's it.

Also, in these same jars, popularly called mayonnaise, they also sold Nezhenka applesauce, which, by the way, I still adore. I found a similar taste at FrutoNyanya - good products.
But unlike today, then it was impossible to open a glass container with a flick of the wrist and enjoy juice or applesauce. Good "tube" jars were tightly closed with a tin lid (and no thread) and the only way to get to the coveted goodies was using a can opener/can opener. The only way:-). In addition to the "light" versions with packaging of juices in 250 gram jars, there was also a "hard" version - with three-liter jars, sometimes called cylinders. True, the assortment of juices in such jars was significantly lower, and the glass products themselves were almost never handed over to Steklotaru, since such dishes were in high demand in Soviet families - most jams, pickles and other preservation were rolled into dishes of just such a volume: - )


Balloons :-)

However, the mayonnaise and “balloon” version was not the only way to taste fruit pomace, commonly called juice. It is, so to speak, a home system. And there was also an exit ...
Almost every large store had a department where the suffering traveler could enjoy the pleasant moisture for bottling. Remember there were such huge cones that for some reason attracted our attention. At the end of the cone, narrowed downwards, there was a faucet through which juice could be obtained. The saleswoman opened a three-liter jar of juice, poured it into a cone and from there sold it, so to speak, in a glass :-) Sometimes - in a more simplified version, several simple decanters were used instead of cones, lonely covered with a long-used napkin (insect filter in the simplest version).

Juice Corner :-)

Usually there were 3-4 cones in the store, or the same number of decanters. Accordingly, the most common varieties of fruit juices were birch (the main thing is not fresh :-))), apple, sometimes grape. And of course, the main bestseller of those years is tomato. And the presence of this "drink of the gods" meant 3 more devices that would lead to a state of reactive psychosis of any foreigner who had observed them at least once in his life. The first is a faceted glass filled to the brim with coarse-grained salt. The second glass in which there was a liquid of a slightly scarlet color that has not been changed for a long time, in which one could logically assume ordinary water with residues tomato juice, well, and the third device - a twisted aluminum tablespoon, which was thoroughly fastened to the counter, but was usually in a glass with a light scarlet liquid. The ritual was as follows: the buyer took a glass (also usually faceted) from the insides of innocent tomatoes, scooped up salt with a spoon, stirred it with the same spoon, and then dipped it into a glass with a light scarlet liquid, apparently passing it disinfection. :-) A glass of the most common apple and tomato juice usually cost 10 kopecks. The cheapest birch was 8 kopecks.


One of the many variations :-)

In addition to juice, we could enjoy 2 more types of delicious liquid.
First of all, it is, of course, bread kvass. Huge bright yellow barrels stood in many places of the city, and the citizens, tired of the summer heat, sipped with pleasure the original Russian drink. Naturally, there were "horror stories" in use, that corpses and other horrors were constantly found in the barrel, but no one believed in them. Kvass could be taken on the spot or a mug with a volume of 0.5, or a small glass - 0.25. For the latter, you had to pay 3 kopecks, respectively, the big one cost 6. But parents and grandparents sent us with three-liter jars, or enameled cans - there should be a lot of kvass. And just drink, and okroshka. Kvass was respected.


Excessive demand in the summer :-)

We, children, appreciated more what adults called "pop". That is, all sorts of lemonades.
There were 2 ways to get lemonade in our happy childhood. The simplest and most commonly used is through the soda dispensers that stood on almost every corner.
If you think sensibly now, then some Gennady Onishchenko should have been horrified, because a glass of general use (again, faceted - where without it :-))) was truly popular. And the weak trickle of water, with the help of which he, so to speak, washed himself, caused only laughter. Plus, such glasses were often used as necessary utensils for those who like to “figure out for three”. So the amount of infection per square millimeter on this glass container should have exceeded all conceivable and unthinkable limits. However, somehow the majority treated this indifferently - and nothing, everyone seemed to survive somehow :-)))

Soda machines

In my childhood, there were no longer red soda machines that we can see in the same "Operation Y", and gray-blue beckoned us. Most often, the variation was simple - simple soda - 1 kopeck, water with syrup (usually pear) - 3 kopecks. A small light hack: since simple soda was always flowing at first, for 6 kopecks you could make yourself almost a full glass of syrup, which we often used.

Popular coin :-)

Well, the most squeak, of course - it was sweet bottled water. In our time there was no Coca-Cola with Mirinda, but you know, dear ones, the variety of fruit waters was not weak. How strong can be estimated in such a collection: http://vk.com/id138478338?z=albums138478338

Bottle "Pinocchio"

I figured here that since childhood I tried to try as many lemonades as possible. In addition to Pinocchio, Bell, Cream Soda, Tarragon, Duchesse, Kryushon, I remember Isindi, " Wild berry", "Pear", "Sitro", "Orange", "Tangerine" and somewhere else about 10-15 varieties. "Sayans" and "Baikal" stood apart. They were more expensive (the cheapest lemonade could be bought for 12 kopecks) and tastier By the way, I buy “drinks from Chernogolovka” here all the time - and the taste is similar :-).

Label from that "Baikal"

Taking Baltic lemonade was a special chic. Every summer I spent with my grandmother in Ukraine, and the train passed through the Baltic states. We always bought lemonade in Daugavpils - it was of excellent quality there (like all Baltic goods in those years). By the way, train rides during the "parade of sovereignties" resembled Russian roulette on a rollercoaster :-)) So in 1993, the following customs offices had to be crossed in a day (Russia - entry, Belarus entry and exit, Latvia - entry and exit, Lithuania - entry and exit, Ukraine - entry). Invigorated, so to speak, such a trip :-) Although this is a completely different story.


Somewhat unexpectedly - Lithuanian ... "Sayans" :-)

And finally, a few words should be said about Pepsi-Cola. It was a slightly different drink than Pepsi, but was bottled in factories created under license from Pepsico. In 1974, the leadership of the Soviet Union agreed with the president of this giant to build several factories in exchange for distribution rights for Stolichnaya vodka in the United States.

That Pepsi Cola

Pepsi took full advantage, and most Soviet children considered Pepsi-Cola to be a welcome drink. Despite the fact that it cost as much as 45 kopecks, while in a small bottle 0.33 (most lemonades were poured into beer "cheburashkas"). Ordinary lemonade could be bought at a price of 12 to 35 kopecks.


1983

For some reason, I especially remember the branded pavilions, including those in Pushkin :-)

ice cream cakes

In any grocery store of the country of that time, you could find several types of cakes. These are "eclair" (well, or in another way custard), "sand", a basket with cream and a tube with cream. All of them cost 22 kopecks. By the way, did you know that the name "eclair" was invented in the 19th century by the famous French culinary specialist Marie-Antoine Karem. So in French they call lightning, and cakes got this name for the speed of production and a brilliant appearance :-)


These are the eclairs :-)

In addition to the above, in stores it was sometimes possible to buy a honey cake and sour cream for the same money. The ubiquitous "Potato" cost a little less - from 16 to 18 kopecks. The same amount (16 kopecks) was the price of a cake with raisins. It was cheaper to take only a shortbread "ringlet" - 8 kopecks, a muffin for 10, a bun with cream - for 10, and a bagel with poppy seeds for 6 kopecks. And here is the rum woman, in which, to be honest, I only liked delicious icing, cost 25 kopecks - no less :-)


Potato :-)

It is clear that the taste largely depended on the territory of production. For example, in Leningrad both "eclairs" and "baskets" were tastier than in Ukraine, but "potatoes" and bagels with poppy seeds, on the contrary :-) I don't even know what the trick is :-) That is, it was necessary to determine which city had its bestsellers and buy them :-)


Attraction "don't let the cream fall on the ground" :)))

I remember there was also such a shortbread cake "Karpaty", which every time the guests brought, and which I categorically did not like :-) But I adored the "Leningrad set". Remember, such mini-goodies in a beautiful box, which we only had in Leningrad (Captain Obviousness once again was happy for me). However, they can still be bought, although this is somewhat different. How much it cost then in the USSR - I don’t remember, but it’s certainly not cheap - they didn’t spoil me with this very set :-)


This is what the "Leningrad set" looked like

The holiday was when the cake was bought. I still love waffle-chocolate, which is now called "Baltic". It was inexpensive, relatively (1 ruble 10 kopecks, as far as I remember) and was delicious ..... But other similar cakes - “Polar” and “Surprise” somehow didn’t really use it. Didn't like it.


Particularly pleased with the influx of chocolate :-)

There was also such a thing as a creamy log. Hello to all diets - a terrible amount of calories, probably - but tasty :-) Something like a big creamy sausage, with nuts, and on top there is such a powerful cream :-) In general, a tough thing - but I destroyed them like Papa Carlo at work over the perfect Pinocchio :-)


Something like this..:-)

But with large cakes, tension. Really. I remember right off the bat, only "Fairy Tale" for 1 ruble 90, "Prague" - a sort of version of the now famous Sacher, and the absolute bestseller of childhood - "Kyiv". In Ukraine, I ate enough of it, although it was not cheap - about 4 rubles, but in Leningrad it was impossible to get it in principle.


Authentic "Prague" of those times

They say that some ordered directly from Kyiv - it is dry inside - so it was possible to negotiate with the conductor - she brought it on the train. The price was from 15 to 20 rubles per cake. Such a not weak profit :-) If you remember any other ones - tell/show. BUT only purchased! That splendid variety home baking, we will not touch you - because this is not a conversation for one post :-)))


This is what I call the Kyiv oligarch! :-)

The biggest delicacy of children in our time was, of course, " milk product enriched with air ”(full name according to GOST) or simply ice cream :-) IMHO, we had the most delicious ice cream in the Soviet Union in Leningrad. But there are variations :-)


Do not give more than 2 in your hands !!! :-)

The most chic was to go to an ice cream parlor, like the still fairly recently functioning "Frrog" on Nevsky. Ice cream balls, certainly in memorable metal bowls, and for some reason with aluminum spoons. It (ice cream) could be poured with syrup, or sprinkled with chocolate and / or nuts. It was possible to have both, and the third at the same time. The price for one hundred grams was from 19 to 23 kopecks.

I especially remember these.

And be sure to take milkshake for 11 kopecks (mmmmm .... the taste of childhood), or a float cocktail (in orange juice a scoop of ice cream) for 18. This is not just chic - but chic cubed :-)
There were usually 3 variations of ice cream - creamy, creme brulee, chocolate. Less often - fruit.


The device from which the heart sank :-)))

Again, do not forget about the various jellies and soufflés that could be purchased at these same ice cream parlors. I remember in Ukraine, the local "Frog" was called the "Pinocchio" cafe, and the ice cream there, by the way, was so-so, but the jelly was such that a pioneer tie, a set of badges and a program for a football match could be sold for it at the same time :-))))


How could you get past this? :-)

And for some reason, I still have a strong impression of an unearthly taste (and high cost) ice cream, which I managed to try in the closed bar of the Oktyabrskaya Hotel. I don’t remember why I was so struck by this ice cream, but it was divine.


Something like that, only 30 times better :-)

As an option for buying bulk ice cream, I remember cases when in the spring of 1985, every Saturday and Sunday, they brought ice cream from Voentorg to the House of Officers in Sertolovo, where I lived then, from Voentorg, which was packaged in the same balls, but not in creamers, but in crispy waffle cups. Moreover, these cups were so tasty that they were remembered in memory, and not the ice cream itself.


Something similar...

Another alternative to bulk milk treats was the so-called "soft ice cream". I don’t really like him now, I didn’t really love him then either (again, I saw from which dirty bucket they pour milk mixture into the machine). But there was one exception. Somehow, having arrived in handsome Kyiv, already at Zhuliany airport, I received apricot soft ice cream for exemplary behavior. And I liked it SO much that my parents had to please me 3 more times - on Khreshchatyk, on Andreevsky Descent and in Darnitsa :-)

Freezer for the production of soft ice cream in Ukraine

And until now, Kyiv is often associated with me not only with a huge number of the most beautiful girls per square kilometer, with the greenery and beauty of streets and squares, with the majesty of the mighty Dnieper, but also with the taste of that same children's soft apricot ice cream.

Now that we have walked through the loose ice cream, it's time to remember the packaged. For me, there is no doubt that the most delicious, the best, the most interesting was ours, at that time Leningrad. But there were a few exceptions. When, for example, in the mid-80s, I first visited the city on 7 hills (but not Rome :-))), I really liked the ice cream called Borodino from Fili. By the way - they generally had delicious ice cream and eat it. It was, however, a little expensive - 26 kopecks. But it was worth it :-) Or, on the annual trip to and from Ukraine, I definitely tried to get ice cream on a stick in chocolate at the railway station in Vilnius. Like everything Baltic - it was of high quality and tasty.

Something like this :-)

If there was a difference in taste, then in terms of price categories and the range of packaged ice cream in general, the system was approximately the same across the country in those years.
The cheapest was the so-called fruit and berry ice cream - such as lemon, cranberry or raspberry. It was sold in a paper cup with a wooden stick in addition (which was often not enough) and it cost 7 and 9 kopecks. For 7 kopecks, to be honest, it was quite disgusting. True, while relaxing in Sevastopol, I somehow found that lemon is quite suitable for me. But for 9 - it was very good.

fruit and berry

Now this is often called sherbet. A paper circle was molded on top of the ice cream indicating the manufacturer, price, GOST and a stall selling ice cream from a distance was visible from these same circles, which usually covered the entire side wall.


Ice cream stand from the early 80s

Then there was dairy for 10 kopecks. It seems like "Morozko" was called. Also in a paper cup, on which cherries were sometimes drawn, and I thought that the ice cream was fruit there - but no :-)

So...

Currant cost 11 kopecks, and ice cream and creme brulee cost 15 kopecks. These were the most expensive types of ice cream in a paper cup.


..or so :-)

The perfect bestseller of our time was ice cream in a waffle cup. I remember that the delivery in Ukraine was at noon, and we all "grazed" near the ice cream stand, waiting for what they would bring this time. If they brought a product from a local creamery, then it was unhealthy - it was not very tasty. But if they delivered Lviv .... oooh .... it was cool! :-)


Cream.

I was guaranteed one portion a day - my grandfather, a big sweet lover, was just returning home for lunch, and he always gave money so that I could buy ice cream for myself and him. But in the presence of Lviv, we all opened our hiding places and fished out treasured coins in order to get additional portions :-) It was possible to replenish the hiding place if there was some kind of wedding in the yard in the near future. According to a good Ukrainian tradition, the main friend walked 3 times around the cars with the newlyweds and guests and sprinkled them (cars) with grain and coins. The younger friend "sowed" more sweets - but I disdained to collect them, but coins - that's it.


Portion of ice cream! :-)

Moreover, if the wedding was rich, then 2 categories of the population rejoiced most of all - children, who could collect not coppers for 1-3 kopecks, but nickel for 15-20 kopecks, and alcoholics, who could get almost up to a box of vodka or "red" :-)))


This is how ice cream was advertised in our years ... Just kidding. In the USA and much earlier :-)

By the way, it was called ice cream not because of falling out dental fillings, but by the name of the French town of Plombier-les-Bains (Vosges department), which was famous under Napoleon III for its excellent ice cream recipe made from the freshest cream and butter.


Homeland of ice cream :-)

But we digress a little. Let's get back to our yummy rams :-) In addition to ice cream in a waffle cup, you could buy chocolate and creme brulee for 19 kopecks.
Eskimo is next. There were several types of this Eskimo. The simplest is milk on a stick, rather tasteless, but cheap. The package was 50 grams and cost 11 kopecks.

Remember? :-)

If not tastier, then more interesting was popsicle in yellow icing. For an amateur taste - but certainly brighter. It cost 16-18 kopecks. And the most delicious was in chocolate icing. It was often called "Leningradskoe", cost 22 kopecks and was really good. It melted quickly, but the chocolate did not break :-)


Similar to what we ate :-)

From the rest, I remember well the briquette, where there was milk ice cream between 2 waffles. Such a briquette cost 13 kopecks. There, on the packaging, geese-swans were drawn.


Britketik

But I vaguely remember the sugar tube. It cost 15 kopecks, it could only be bought in Leningrad and it was in short supply.
I don’t remember “Gourmet”, “Chestnut”, “Golden Bomb” at all. Either it didn't, or I just didn't get it.
It seems like a small selection of ice cream, and it certainly cannot be compared with the current one. But you know, we somehow had enough :-) And in the second half of the 80s, I moved to sunny Chita for a while, and for me this short assortment line seemed to be absolutely wonderful. Do you know why? Because there was almost no ice cream in the city. Sold only in 2 cafes (and expensive). And by weight - it was something with something :-)))

And they demanded it! :-)

Imagine a cellophane bag, only one and a half kilograms (no more and no less) filled with frozen and frozen SOMETHING, which was proudly called "Dairy Ice Cream" in the price tag :-))) Moreover, the taste was archaic - inedible powdered milk was covered with sugar and butter and voila ..... Brrrrr.
I remember that one of the brightest holidays was when they were able to give me a box of ice cream from Moscow near NG and DR. A real one - not a Chita surrogate :-) It was a feast :-)))


Dry ice

Concluding the topic of ice cream, I cannot but recall how this very product was stored. Now it’s easy - put a generator, and that’s it :-) And then they used huge blocks of dry ice, which didn’t keep the cold very much in the heat, and most importantly, it was a great achievement to get ice cream that was not rumpled and not deformed.

Chewing gum and stuff for chewing

I don’t know what this is connected with, but in the mid-80s, the presence of chewing gum significantly influenced the status in the children’s environment :-)
There was really no variety. Chewing gum of 4 modifications was basic and universally distributed: orange, strawberry, mint and coffee flavor. Crimson could also be found much less frequently.


This is approximately

It consisted of a kidney and 5 plates wrapped in wax paper or foil (like today's wrigleys juicy fruit). Such chewing gum lost its taste after 5 minutes (Orange was felt a little more in the mouth), and with long chewing it fell apart.


Such....

It had nothing to do with modern chewing gum, and let's be honest, it was disgusting. Often, in order to “throw fingers” and show off, the kid put a piece of colored pencil lead into the chewing gum and tried to convince the others that since the “chew” is, say, purple, it is definitely imported.


Sort of ....

But since the stylus stained not only chewing gum, but also the tongue, such a “pontorez” was quickly exposed :-)


Or like this :-)

The product was not cheap - as much as 50 kopecks, and despite its inelasticity and rapid destruction, they tried to stretch such chewing gum for several days.
In addition to the above, I remember the pioneer of all Soviet chewing gum - "Well, you wait" for 15 kopecks. I remember chewing this one, but I don't remember the taste at all.


Wait for it

Baltic chewing gum deserves special mention. In Soviet times, everything there was of the best quality. And especially the products of the Estonian factory "Kalev". In Estonia, some varieties of chewing gum were made not with plates, but with pads, and they were very much appreciated only for their shape and always ordered if someone went to the Estonian SSR :-))) For some reason we were convinced that the Kalev pads were impregnated with Coca -cola" and they have a special taste :-) However, the quality was really much higher.


Kalev pillows were in such a package :-)

I vacationed in Western Ukraine in the summer, and lived in the family of a military man and talked with peers from military families whose parents had previously served in Hungary, the GDR and Poland, and therefore I could often see other types of chewing gum. Round Gdrov chewing gums designed in the form soccer ball, or like colored balloons in a transparent pack, which for some reason we called “cowboy balloons”.

cowboy balls :-)

They were brighter and tastier than ours. Well, the first chewing gums with inserts enjoyed special love. Turkish bestsellers like Turbo, Laser, Donald, Final, Love is... appeared later, and at the very beginning I only remember Czech Pedro and Polish Lölek and Bolek.

Inserts for chewing gum "Final"

I really loved the cartoon with their participation, and when they brought me a whole block of these chewing gums from Warsaw, I was very pleased.

Lelik and Bolek

Many had a happy childhood, but sometimes a little extreme. Let's not forget that in addition to purchased "chews" we chewed with pleasure the hardening juice of some trees, tar and even roofing material :-)))


:-))

Even today I want to remember such a delicious delicacy as straws and corn sticks. Moreover, I remember the division of cash by region. I could not find high-quality and tasty straws in Ukraine, but with sweet corn sticks I was in trouble in Leningrad.

Straw

And, by the way, if now there are a lot of those delicious straws, then with glazed corn sticks it’s tense. I remember there was such a square pack, on its side Dunno was also drawn on hot-air balloon. Such a pack cost 28 kopecks and the sticks were fantastically tasty. Sweet, juicy, but light. I was ready to absorb tons of them, and the only problem was to wash my sweet hands after them. And it was also inconvenient to read books - fingers are sweet, sticky - you can’t turn the page :-))) Honestly, I still miss these sticks.


Similar... but not the same.

Candy, etc.

Naturally, such a variety of forms and content as it is now among the heterogeneous sugar or chocolate products united under the name derived from the Latin word "made" in the mid-80s was not. And by the end of this era, sweets, for various reasons, were classified as a scarce product. But there is still something to remember. Shall we try? :-)) As always, I am happy to read your memories, and some other varieties of sweets that I forgot, missed or simply did not list.

Variety of wrappers for childhood :-)

As far as I remember, the most accessible and cheap in those days was the so-called dragee. Multi-colored round sweets of several types. For 1 ruble 10 kopecks, you could buy a whole kilogram of multi-colored dragees called “peas”. An alternative was one-color strawberry or cherry. It was delicious, but it was necessary to take into account the freshness of the product, because .... At one time, in the late 80s, in the glorious city of Chita, a dragee was sold, which could be attributed by the Hague Convention to weapons of mass destruction, since in order to dissolve them in your mouth, you had to have salivation from the Alien, jaws from the Nibbler and patience from the Little Buddha :-) I don’t know how many years before they hit the counter they spent in the bins of their homeland, but these sweets were really reinforced concrete. For the sake of experiment, we dropped them onto the asphalt from the balcony. Well, so - they shattered to smithereens only from the 4th floor and above :-)


polka dots

A slightly more expensive variety of "peas" was a large dragee with a softer shell and with sugar on it. I personally remember why lemon. When they were fresh - a very tasty thing. They cost more - somewhere in the region of 1 ruble 30 kopecks - 1 ruble 40 kopecks.

Dragee "lemons"

Well, the most expensive and desirable were either dragees with peanuts - the domestic version of M & M s, or the so-called "sea pebbles" - raisins in glaze. I loved the latter very much :-) They cost about 1 ruble 70 kopecks per kilo.

"Sea pebbles"

An alternative to dragees for cheapness and goodness were the so-called pads. There was various jams under the caramel shell. Delicious, by the way. And they were inexpensive - somewhere around 1 ruble 30 kopecks. After the adoption of the “semi-dry law”, they instantly disappeared from store shelves, and moved into the category of an acute shortage. The reason for the post - cheapness and quality allowed them to become a bestseller of raw materials for the production of moonshine. And since everyone started to “drive” (at least in Ukraine), it became problematic to find them for food.


"Cool" pads

Ruble eighty - this was the lowest limit, the purchase of a kilogram of numerous caramels, which, perhaps, were the most common type of sweets in the USSR. Not all of them were to my liking. I loved the ones with delicious jam under the caramel shell. "Strawberry with cream" or "Plum", for example. But some “Cancer necks”, “Baltika” or “Snowball” did not cause any emotions in me. And I also remember Cherry caramel, which cost some prohibitive money (either 4 or 5 rubles per kilo), but it was delicious.


Caramel wrap "Plum"

Although my favorite variety in this segment has always been (and perhaps there is) caramels called Lemons. True, they almost played a fatal role in my life. Since childhood, I have been a big sweet tooth, and I have become addicted, going to bed, to pull out a couple of sweets with me, throwing them under the pillow and savoring their taste, falling asleep. And here, apparently, he fell asleep too early and the candy got into the wrong throat. In general, I began to suffocate and be late for a minute or two, my parents, who literally shaking my legs upside down, pulled out of me this most unfortunate "lemon", then I would not write these lines now :-) And yet " lemons "I still love to this day, although I gnaw them furiously - like all caramels :-) Apparently a defensive reaction :-)

Those "Lemons" :-)

Well, my favorite among this type of sweets were lollipops, or, more correctly, “candy caramel”. This cheap, but practical and tasty product, I still use with great pleasure. In Soviet times, No. 1 was “Vzletnye”, which were not only distributed on board Aeroflot liners, but were also on free sale. Such lollipops cost somewhere around 2.30-2.50. And my love for them was determined by several circumstances. Firstly, the Tu-154 was depicted on the wrapper, and from an early age I was drawn to aviation. Secondly, a friend of my grandmother, who constantly regaled me with them, told me that these are real aviation sweets and all pilots love them :-)))) Well, and thirdly, they really were delicious. With sour. I love those. More than just sweet candy like Duchess.


A modern version of a children's bestseller :-)

However, take-offs were not always in the store, but almost everywhere you could buy Mints in a blue wrapper. Still practically everywhere there was a "barberry". But unlike modern ones, with sourness, that “barberry” was almost always sweet.


Remember these fanfictions? :-)

I really liked caramel "Start". Remember lollipops in the form of pucks (well, or large tablets). It was very tasty.
And of course, a wonderful montpensier in a round tin can.


Box from monpasier...

They were miniature, of different colors, shapes and tastes. The only trouble is that most often they stuck together and it was necessary to tear off a separate “monpasy” with the use of brute physical force. But vkuuusno :-)) Such a tin cost about 20 rubles and was used very actively in the subsidiary farm.


Candies themselves :-)

And we were all probably drawn to buy poisonous cockerels on sticks for 15-20 kopecks, which were sold by gypsies in the markets. Parents, of course, did not buy them for us, saying that they were made in unsanitary conditions. But forbidden fruit is known to be sweet, right? :-))) And there were also sweet sticks - beautiful, but strange in taste :-)


Cockerel from gypsies (c) :-)))

And a couple of times from Poland, Hungary and the GDR they brought me real handmade candy caramel, which, in addition to taste, also looked great. It was fun!


Rarely seen such beauty :-)

And we will complete today's story with a memory of "toffees" - or fondant mass boiled from condensed milk or molasses. The name came up with them at the beginning of the 20th century by the French confectioner Morna, who works in St. Petersburg, who for some reason decided that the final product is very similar to iris petals. Why he chose to do so is difficult to understand.


Kitty Kitty.

All toffees could be divided into several subspecies. The most common was the so-called viscous iris, which never was. Representatives of this subspecies were the brands "Kis-Kis" and "Tuzik". The former were usually steel and an attempt to chew was worth broken teeth and torn fillings, while the latter were too soft and disintegrated on the teeth immediately.


They are the best :-)

More pleasant was the "Golden Key", which can be attributed to the cast semi-hard iris.

Well, that was it :-)

Well, the queen of toffee was, of course, "Dairy Cows" - soft sweets with condensed milk inside.
I also remember that toffees were sold in large pieces by weight. However, they did not enjoy special love.

Hello dear!
Last time we started a story about sweets with you: I propose to continue :-)


Sweets for the most spoiled boys and girls (pay attention to the shape of the roof of the hut) :-)))

The lower bar for the price of chocolates also began with an amount of 1 ruble 80 kopecks. From 1.80 to 3.80 you could buy chocolate with "white" filling. I never loved them. All sorts of "Swallows", "Apples", "White Acacia", "Mask". The only exception, perhaps, was the Citron. The others in this category I didn't like. The same goes for Natalka-Poltavka, Stolichnye... Just as I didn't like the more expensive grillage.


Wrapper option "Swallows"

But sweets with dark filling adored :-)
"Kara-Kum", for example, although it was very expensive - 5 rubles per kg. Well, or "Squirrel".


Numerous variations of "Kara-Kum"

Sweets with jelly "Jelly", "Aronia chokeberry" or "Southern Night" were very pleasant too.
But the main delicacy of childhood and universal adoration are waffle-based sweets. They were small in shape, such as "Pineapple", "Our Mark", "Clumsy Bear", "Tuzik" medium - "Little Red Riding Hood" and large - "Gulliver" and "Bear in the North". The latter are my sweet and tender childhood memories. Especially how they let me pick up sweets in the store ... Mother let me into the warehouse, and knowing that I was a modest child, I wouldn’t take much. And I typed directly from the boxes. Such happiness was :-))) Sweets were not cheap - 4 rubles also cost somewhere.

One of the main joys of childhood :-)

Well, the most expensive, as far as I remember, were truffles. They were often sold in gift boxes and cost from 7 to 11 rubles. Therefore, I set up their home production - and still sometimes indulge :-))))
True, there was an option and simpler - "Golden Field" was called. There, together with cocoa, the truffle was sprinkled with waffle crumbs. Such sweets cost 6 rubles and were quite loved.

Sweets "Zolotaya Niva"

Since we are talking about candies in boxes, it is worth noting that they have always been a success. An ideal gift is a bottle of wine or Soviet champagne and a box of chocolates. They cost, depending on the brand, from 3 to 12 rubles. Particularly popular with us in Leningrad, used Assorted factory them. Krupskaya. I especially liked it with buttercream inside. And so they were in short supply.


More or less like this...

Another candy that I really liked comes from Ukraine. Either the Vinnitsa factory, or the famous Lviv "Svitoch" is considered the inventor of the "Strela" sweets. But I know for sure that for the first time they appeared at the Lutsk candy factory and getting a pack of arrows as a child was a great holiday for me :-)))) Very tasty sweets.


"Arrow"

By the way, I recently saw a glimpse of their Belarusian production - I must try - maybe delicious :-)
Speaking of "Assorted" from the factory named after N.K. Krupskaya, we cannot pass by bars with chocolate or creamy milk filling. The price was 55 kopecks, and it was far from the cheapest option.


SUBZH :-)

Chocolate medals cost the least - 10-15 kopecks. The smallest 20 gram chocolate cost 20 kopecks. Pushkin's Tales, for example.

"Pushkin's Tales"

The legendary "Alenka" (80 kopecks per 80 grams) had a lower price among the large chocolates. Everything else was noticeably more expensive. "Children's" and "Merry Fellows" - 1.20, "Troika" - 1.30. "Aurora" went for 1 ruble 50 kopecks, and "Special" - 2 rubles. The most expensive was the "Golden Label" - somewhere around 2.50.