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USSR chocolates. Chocolates and sweets of the USSR times

The assortment of chocolate in the USSR was truly huge. From all the variety, one could choose products for every taste and material wealth; not a single holiday, and not only for children, could do without this delicacy. During the Soviet era, Christmas trees were decorated with chocolates New Year... The cherished bar of chocolate in Soviet times was put in any gift. Do you all know about this sweet product? For example, do you know the name of the Alenka chocolate manufacturer in the USSR, and how did chocolate production appear in Russia?

Now it seems to us that chocolate has always been. Well, it is impossible to imagine that there was once no chocolate candy in this world. Meanwhile, the first chocolate bar appeared only in 1899 in Switzerland. In Russia, confectionery production until the beginning of the 19th century was, for the most part, artisanal. Foreigners also actively mastered the Russian confectionery market. The history of the appearance of chocolate in Russia began in 1850, when Ferdinand von Einem, who came from Württemberg, Germany, to Moscow, opened a small workshop on the Arbat for the production of chocolate products, including sweets.

In 1867, Einem and his companion Geis built a new factory on the Sofiyskaya Embankment. According to information from the history of chocolate in Russia, this factory was one of the first to be equipped with a steam engine, which allowed the company to quickly become one of the largest manufacturers. confectionery in the country.

After the revolution of 1917, all confectionery factories passed into the hands of the state - in November 1918, the Council of People's Commissars issued a decree on the nationalization of the confectionery industry. Naturally, the change of owners entailed a change of names. The Abrikosovs' factory was named after worker Pyotr Akimovich Babaev, chairman of the Sokolniki regional executive committee of Moscow. The Einem firm became known as Krasny Oktyabr, and the former Lenov merchants' factory was renamed Rot Front. True, the ideas of Marx and Lenin, the revolutionary spirit and new names could in no way affect the technology of confectionery production. Both under the old and under the new government, sugar was needed to make sweets, and cocoa beans were needed to make chocolate. And there were serious problems with that. For a long time, the "sugar" regions of the country were under the rule of whites, and the currency and gold, for which one could buy overseas raw materials, were used to buy bread. Only by the mid-20s, confectionery production was more or less revived. The NEP helped this, the entrepreneurial spirit and the growth of the well-being of urban residents made it possible to quickly increase the production of caramel, sweets, cookies, and cakes. The planned economy, which replaced the NEP, left its mark on the confectionery industry. Since 1928, the production of sweets has been strictly regulated, each factory has been transferred to its own, separate type of product. In Moscow, for example, caramel was produced by the Babayev factory. The manufacturer of chocolate in the USSR was the Krasny Oktyabr factory, and the biscuits - the Bolshevik.

During the war years, many confectionery factories were evacuated from the European part of the country to the rear. The confectioners continued to work, producing, among other things, strategically important products. The set of "emergency supplies" necessarily included a bar of chocolate, which saved the lives of more than one pilot or sailor.

After the war, for reparations from Germany, the USSR received equipment from German confectionery enterprises, which made it possible to establish the production of chocolate products in a short time. The production of chocolate has grown every year. For example, in 1946 at the Babaev chocolate manufacturer in the USSR, 500 tons of cocoa beans were processed, in 1950 - 2000 tons, and by the end of the 60s - 9000 tons annually. Foreign policy indirectly contributed to this impressive growth in production. For many years the Soviet Union supported various regimes in many countries of the world, including African ones. The main thing for these regimes was to swear allegiance to communist ideals, and then help in the form of weapons, technology, equipment was provided. This support was practically free of charge, the only way the Africans could somehow pay off the USSR was raw materials and agricultural products. Therefore, the confectionery factories were continuously supplied with raw materials from the distant African expanses.

In those years, there was no competition between chocolate producers in the Soviet Union, in its traditional sense. Confectioners could compete for prizes and titles, for example "best in the industry", for awards at exhibitions, for the love, after all, of consumers, but not for their wallets. Problems with the sale of sweets and other sweet products could have been with very careless and "tasteless" manufacturers. But also a deficit, according to at least in large cities, it was not. Of course, from time to time the names of sweets in the USSR, like "Squirrel", "Bear in the North" or "Karakum" disappeared from the shelves, and " bird's milk"In general, rarely appeared on them, but usually Muscovites, Kievites or Kharkovites could buy, if not in every store, their favorite delicacies. The exception was the pre-holiday days. Each pre-New Year children's performance in the theater or matinee ended with the distribution of sweet sets, which is why the most popular varieties of sweets disappeared from store shelves at that time. Before March 8, it was difficult to find candies in boxes, which, together with a bunch of flowers, made up a "universal" gift that did not require serious thoughts from men for the holiday.

What kind of Soviet-era chocolate and sweets were in the USSR, as they were called (with photo)

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

Krasny Oktyabr is a former confectionery factory called 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 under new, socialist conditions, producing mainly chocolate and sweets. What sweets were most popular in the USSR? Of course, "Clubfoot Bear" (appeared in 1925), "Southern Night" (1927), " Creamy fudge"(1928), iris" Kis-kis "(1928)," Stratosphere "(1936)," Souffle "(1936), etc.

In 1935, A. Ptushko's film "New Gulliver" was released, which was a tremendous success among children. After that, Gulliver sweets appeared on the shelves of Soviet stores - waffles covered with real chocolate icing... These were expensive sweets, so when they became popular, their cheap counterpart appeared - the Zhuravlik sweets, where the same waffle was covered with soy chocolate. The price is more affordable - 20 kopecks apiece.

What was the name of the chocolate produced by this manufacturer in the USSR? Among the chocolate products of "Krasny Oktyabr", the "oldest" brand was the "Golden Label" (1926). But chocolate "Gvardeisky" appeared during the war years.

Here you can see photos of Soviet chocolate from various factories:

Cola chocolate in the USSR and other chocolate products

In the twenties of the last century, "Red October" produced exclusively chocolate, and one brand - "Cola" - was intended for pilots. And after the war, the production of sweets was again resumed.

Such sweets during the Soviet era as "Bear in the North", "Bear footed", "Red poppy", "Tuzik", "Come on, take away!", "Karakum", "Bird's milk" and, of course, " Belochka ”were the dolce vita of a Soviet man, the quintessence of chocolate happiness of gourmands, quasi-uni-fantasy of confectionery craftsmanship, sweet symbols of the era ...“ The taste of our childhood ”- these words begin almost every second TV or newspaper report about chocolate products or the work of confectionery factories. This phrase, from its frequent use, has long turned into a worn-out stamp.

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

Look at a photo of chocolate in the USSR and other chocolate products of the Soviet era:

What is the name of the manufacturer of chocolate "Alenka" in the USSR

This section of the article is devoted to the name of the Alenka chocolate company in the USSR, and what other products were produced at this factory.

Since the second half of the 60s, the most recognizable product of Krasny Oktyabr in the USSR has become the Alenka chocolate (1 ruble 10 kopecks for a large bar and 20 kopecks for a small 15-gram bar). And it arose under Brezhnev, although the idea was born when N. Khrushchev was the leader 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 the kids. This idea was put into practice at the Krasny Oktyabr confectionery factory for two years, until finally it saw the light milk chocolate"Alenka". The label showed a little girl wearing a headscarf. This portrait of Alenka chocolate makers in the USSR was found on the cover of Zdorov'e magazine in 1962: there was photographed 8-month-old Lenochka Gerinas (the photo was taken by her father Alexander). In 1964, Red October decided that the new Alenka chocolate needed an original wrapper with a corporate portrait. At first, the Alenka chocolate company in the USSR produced this delicacy with different images. There was an idea to use Vasnetsov's "Alenushka" for decoration, but the artist's work "bypassed" the portrait of Elena Gerinas.

Among other products of this chocolate manufacturer in the USSR, besides Alenka, there were Pushkin's Tales, Flotskiy, Slava and many others.

Look at the photo of sweets from the Soviet era produced by the Krasny Oktyabr factory:

These are "Cancer necks", "Little Red Riding Hood", "Kara-kum", "Truffles", "Deer", "Souffle", "Tretyakov Gallery", "Temptation", "Fairy Tale", "Come on, take it away", "Snowball", "Peace", "Little Humpbacked Horse", "Zest", "Evening", "Chernomorochka", "Ladybug", iris "Golden Key", etc.

Chocolate producer in the USSR - Babaevskaya factory

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 merchants Abrikosovs, but after nationalization in 1918, the prominent Bolshevik Pyotr Babaev became its leader. 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 monpensier, toffee and caramel. And immediately after the war, it began to produce chocolate products, and very soon it was chocolate that became the main brand of this factory. Among its most popular products in the USSR were such names of chocolate as "Inspiration" (elite chocolate), "Babaevsky", "Special", "Gvardeisky", "Lux".

Here you can see a photo of the Soviet era chocolate produced by the Babaevskaya factory:

Chocolate and other sweets of the USSR times (with photo)

Among the sweets were listed such as "Squirrel", "Bear in the North", "Shuttle", "Zolotaya Niva", "Orange flavor", "Pilot", "Vesna", "Burevestnik", "Morskie", "Romashka", "Truffles", etc.;, in boxes - "Squirrel", "Visit", "Evening aroma", "Sweet dreams", etc.

Rot Front produced the following brands of sweets: Moskva, Kremlin, Rot Front (bars), Krasnaya Riding Hood, Chocolate-covered grill, Zolotaya Niva, Karavan, Autumn Waltz, "Lemon" (caramel), "Peanuts in chocolate", "Raisins in chocolate", etc.

The Bolshevik factory was popular for its cookies: oatmeal and "Jubilee".

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

Like chocolate in the USSR, sweets were divided into cheap and expensive. The former included various kinds of caramels, the latter - chocolate products. The overwhelming majority of the Soviet children most often indulged in "caramels", and various kinds of chocolate "snacks" passed through her hands a little less often due to their relative high cost. Naturally, chocolate sweets have always been appreciated in the children's environment much higher than caramel ones. In those distant years (60s-70s), the most popular caramels were "Crow's Feet", "Crayfish Tails" (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 Duchess caramel, the same Barberry, Petushki on a stick (5 kopecks apiece), as well as Kis-kis and Golden Key toffee, which were also cheap - 5–7 kopecks for 100 grams. Unlike caramel "Montpensier" in a metal box - those were in short supply. Like other caramel - "Vzletnaya", which almost did not go on sale and was distributed to passengers flying by air in order to relieve their attacks of nausea.

Among the expensive sweets - "Kara-kum" and "Belochka" (chocolate, with grated nut inside), "Bird's milk" ( tender soufflé in chocolate), "Grillage", "Songs of Koltsov", "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 away", "Night", "Snowball" (caramel), Terem-Teremok, Southern Liqueur (caramel), Zoological, School, Zolotaya Niva, Milk Bar, Pineapple.

As you can see in the photo, chocolate candies in the USSR "with white filling", perhaps, could be distinguished into a separate class:

There were more expensive sweets - Pilot (the candy wrapper is so interesting, a piece of paper with a blue and white strip, in the middle - foil), Citron (the filling is white and yellow, with lemon flavor, the candy wrapper was wrapped only on one side), Swallow. Waffle is cheaper - "Our Mark", "Clubfoot Bear", "Tuzik", "Spartak", "Pineapple", "Fakel". "Torch" was sold in bulk, without wrappers. He held on to the last. When the country ran out of chocolate, they began to make "Torch" from soy chocolate.

During the perestroika years, the confectionery industry, like the entire economy, experienced problems. But on the whole, the confectioners survived the collapse of the Union and the transition from plan to market rather painlessly. Someone thanks the old traditions for this, laid down in Soviet times, someone believes that the growth in the production of sweet products was facilitated by foreign capital that came to the domestic market. Probably both are right. But most importantly, sweets, cookies and chocolate are always delicious.

Today I had a dream - I found a bag with sweets in the locker, and not just any, but with bears in the north. I can say that it was a dream with 100% certainty, because in the end I ate them. She sat down straight at the table and screwed up the whole find without a trace. Well, where else can a woman have such a thing ?! I woke up with a sweet taste in my mouth. What do not say - sleep is a dream, but nice. In the morning I decided to remember what kind of sweets were held in high esteem before, what we appreciated more, and what we took for granted. And what kind of factories were producing all this for us children. So…

The main producers of sweets in the USSR were the factories "Red October", "Rot Front", "Babaevskaya" and "Bolshevik", 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 design of sweet products.

"Red October"- This 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 under new, socialist conditions, producing mainly chocolate and sweets. Among the latter there were: "Clubfoot Bear" (appeared in 1925), "Southern Night" (1927), "Creamy Fudge" (1928), iris "Kis-kis" (1928), "Stratosphere" (1936), "Souffle "(1936) and others.

In 1935, A. Ptushko's film "New Gulliver" was released, which was a tremendous success among children. After that, Gulliver sweets - waffles covered with real chocolate glaze - appeared on the shelves of Soviet stores. These were expensive sweets, so when they became popular, their cheap counterpart appeared - the Zhuravlik sweets, where the same waffle was covered with soy chocolate. The price is more affordable - 20 kopecks apiece.

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

Since the second half of the 60s, the most recognizable product of Krasny Oktyabr has become Alenka chocolate (1 ruble 10 kopecks for a large bar and 20 kopecks for a small 15-gram bar). And it arose under Brezhnev, although the idea was born when N. Khrushchev was the leader 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 the kids. This idea was put into practice at the Krasny Oktyabr confectionery factory for two years, until, finally, the Alenka milk chocolate saw the light of day. The label showed a little girl wearing a headscarf. This portrait was found on the cover of Zdorovye 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 listed chocolate - "Tales of Pushkin", "Flotskiy", "Slava" and others; sweets - "Crayfish tails", "Little Red Riding Hood", "Kara-kum", "Truffles", "Deer", "Souffle", "Tretyakov Gallery", "Temptation", "Fairy Tale", "Well, take it away" , "Snowball", "Mir", "Little Humpbacked Horse", "Zest", "Evening", "Chernomorochka", "Ladybug", iris "Golden Key", etc.

At the Babaevsky factory

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

Factory "Rot Front" produced sweets of the following brands: "Moscow", "Kremlin", "Rot Front" (bars), "Little Red Riding Hood", "Grill in chocolate", "Zolotaya Niva", "Karavan", "Autumn Waltz", "Lemon" ( caramel), "Peanuts in chocolate", "Raisins in chocolate", etc.

Factory "Bolshevik" was popular for its cookies: oatmeal and "Jubilee". However, we will talk about cookies below.

In general, sweets in the USSR were divided into cheap and expensive. The former included various kinds of caramels, the latter - chocolate products. The overwhelming majority of the Soviet children most often indulged in "caramels", and various kinds of chocolate "snacks" passed through her hands a little less often due to their relative high cost.

Naturally, chocolate sweets have always been appreciated in the children's environment much higher than caramel ones. And whenever possible they were consumed with enviable regularity, for which almost every child knew how to "beg" money from their parents for chocolate "snacks".

The most accessible of the candies, as already mentioned, were caramels, lollipops and toffee. The very first Soviet caramels appeared in the 1920s - for example, the Ilyich caramel with a portrait of V. I. Lenin on the wrapper. At the same time, other caramels were popular: "Krestyanskaya", "Sever", "Barberry" and even "Stenka Razin", which were produced by the Babaevskaya factory.

"Stenka Razin" sweets produced by the "Moscow" factory

In the 60s and 70s, the most popular caramels were "Crow's Feet", "Crayfish Tails" (both with coffee fillings), sour "Snezhok", milk toffee "Korovka". 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 Duchess caramel, the same Barberry, Petushki on a stick (5 kopecks apiece), as well as Kis-kis and Golden Key toffee, which were also cheap - 5-7 kopecks for 100 grams. Unlike caramel "Montpensier" in a metal box - those were in short supply. Like other caramel - "Vzletnaya", which almost did not go on sale and was distributed to passengers who made air flights in order to relieve their attacks of nausea.

Among the expensive sweets are "Kara-kum" and "Belochka" (chocolate, with grated nuts inside), "Bird's milk" (delicate soufflé in chocolate), "Grillage", "Songs of Koltsov", "To the stars". The latter could be sold both by weight and in boxes - 25 rubles per box.

What other candies were there: "Arctic", "Toys" (caramel), "Caravan", "Strawberry with cream", "Little Red Riding Hood", "Come on, take away", "Night", "Snowball" (caramel), "Terem-teremok", "Southern liqueur" (caramel), "Zoological", "School", "Zolotaya Niva", "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).

But what we managed to find from other people's sweet memories on the Internet:

Masha Ivanova: “In the USSR, chocolate had a taste of a deficit. More often it was bought not in order to eat, but in order to give. In the USSR, only pilots and polar explorers could devour 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, children were given a small tile before exams to "recharge their brains."

The sweets were often very tasty, but the decoration was limp. The contrast was all the more important. After all, such a luxury was wrapped in a pitiful candy wrapper! .. The 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-supplying countries were among the allies of the USSR. Any interruptions in the supply of the necessary confectionery components were reflected in production.

In the Soviet Union, candy boxes were never thrown away! - they passed from hand to hand, like a victory banner. We bought sweets by weight under the brand of the box and neatly put them in the packaging. And if it was possible to buy a new one, unopened, it was opened extremely carefully so that, God forbid, it would not be scratched ... "

Friendship children's chocolate. 1946. Photo: www.kudvic.ru

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“ Vedmedik ”and, after standing in line to several counters at once, we, happy, carried home chocolates! 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", "Well, take it away!", "Frozen tubes" ... It was the late 60s - early 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 ... "

Sweets Take it away! Photo: www.kudvic.ru

Pauline:“The first sweet miracle from my childhood - gummy bears, were sold in the“ Lakomka ”store next door (both the store and the bears disappeared long ago without a trace). Not the ones that are sold in bags now, of course. Each teddy bear was about eight centimeters long, with beady eyes and a bow on the neck. Dark marmalade covered with sugar. I was always sorry to eat, I already smelled and licked before biting, starting with the ears ...

And in the bread this was sold biscuit in boxes, it was called "The magic wand". These sticks lay in two rows, laid out with paper. The box is pink, with a running girl. Of course, it never crossed my mind to read who was producing it. It seemed that everything has always been and always will be. But no ...

And for 20 kopecks from school breakfasts, we bought "Takeoff" candies. Small, ribbed, sour, and there were quite a lot of them for this amount.

And for some reason I still remember (in the same bread) small rye bars with raisins for diabetics. Wow, and there was delicious food, especially since they were baked right there, downstairs, like all kinds of buns with nuts, puffs and other baked goods. Can you compare with the current ones? And not because the taste of childhood is always special, but because they did it conscientiously. The store smelled a mile away, any better advertising, and if you slow down at the basement window, you could see how these buns are spread on baking trays ... "

Svetlana:“I lived in a small mining town, and we had a Palyanitsa store in our house, where there was a confectionery department. When I was in the second shift, leaving home, I always went to the store and bought a Golden Key or Kis-Keys for 10-15 kopecks, all this fit in the pocket of a school apron and was enough for several school breaks.

Dad often traveled to Kiev for work and brought “Kievsky” cake to all the neighbors, I don’t know how he managed to go shopping there, but he always did his orders. And when I flew on business trips to Moscow, I always brought a bunch of sweets, my mother hid them, until the holidays, my brother and I found and often pulled out one at a time, and when the holidays came ... then there were not enough sweets, for this we often got))))

Often, my brother and I argued about who would go to hand over the bottles, because 5 bottles is a ruble, and for a ruble it was possible to walk around - to the cinema and to an ice cream parlor. In May, summer cafes began to work in the city, and our whole class went there after school, the Letnee cake cost 15 kopecks, and ice cream without syrup cost 20 kopecks, with syrup 22 kopecks. The beauty!!!"

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

I look forward to your memories)

Montpensier in a round tin can with a bizarre pattern on the lid, cockerels on sticks, coloring their tongue, and, of course, the queen of all butterscotch - Milk Cows.

As far as I remember, the most accessible and cheapest in those days was the so-called dragee. Multi-colored round sweets of several types. For 1 ruble 10 kopecks, one could buy a whole kilogram of multi-colored dragees called "peas". The alternatives were plain 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, pills were sold, which could be classified as weapons of mass destruction by the Hague Convention, since in order to dissolve them in the mouth , you had to have salivation from the Alien, jaw from the Critter and patience from the Little Buddha)

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

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

"Sea pebbles"
The so-called pillows were an alternative to dragees for cheapness and goodies. There was a variety of jams under the caramel shell. Tasty, 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 became 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", it became problematic to find them for food.

"Cool" pads
The ruble eighty 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 taste. I liked more the ones where under the caramel shell there was delicious jam... "Strawberries with Cream" or "Plum", for example. But some "Cancer necks", "Baltika" or "Snowball" did not cause any emotions in me. And I also remember the Cherry caramel, which cost some exorbitant money (either 4 or 5 rubles per kilo), but it was delicious.

Plum caramel wrapper
Although my favorite variety in this segment has always been (and probably is) caramels called "Lemon". True, they almost played a fatal role in my life. I have a big sweet tooth since childhood, and I became addicted, going to bed, to take out a couple of sweets with me, throwing them under the pillow and savoring their taste, to fall asleep. And then, apparently, fell asleep too early and the candy fell into the wrong throat. In general, I began to choke, and if my parents were late for a minute or two, who literally shook my legs upside down, pulled this very unfortunate "lemon" out of me, then I would not write these lines now :-) And nevertheless " lemons "I love to this day, although I gnaw them violently - like all caramels :-) Apparently a defensive reaction :-)

Those "Lemons"
Well, my favorite among this type of sweets were lollipops, or, more correctly, “lollipop caramel”. This one is cheap but practical and tasty product, I still use it with great pleasure. In Soviet times, the number 1 was "Takeoff", which were not only distributed on board Aeroflot airliners, but were also freely available for sale. These candies cost somewhere around 2.30-2.50. And my love for them was due to several circumstances. Firstly, on the wrapper there was a picture of a Tu-154, and from a young age I was drawn to aviation. Secondly, my grandmother's friend, who constantly regaled me with them, told me that these are real aviation sweets and all pilots love them :-)))) And thirdly, they were really tasty. With sourness. I love those. More than just sweet candies like Duchess.

Modern version children's bestseller
However, takeoffs were not always in the store, but almost everywhere you could buy "Mint" in a blue wrapper. There was also "barberry" almost everywhere. But unlike modern ones, with sourness, that "barberry" was almost always sweet.

Remember these candy wrappers? :-)

I loved the Start caramel very much. Remember lollipops in the form of washers (well, or large tablets). It was very tasty.
And, of course, a wonderful monpensier in a round tin can.

Monpasier's box ...
They were tiny, of different colors, shapes and tastes. The only trouble is that most often they stick together and it was necessary to tear off a separate "monpasieshka" with the use of brute physical force. But tasteful :-)) Such a tin cost somewhere around 20 and was used very actively in the subsidiary farm.

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

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

Rarely has there been such beauty
And we will finish today's story with the memory of "toffee" - or fondant mass boiled from condensed milk or molasses. He came up with the name at the beginning of the 20th century. French pastry chef Morna, who works in St. Petersburg, who for some reason decided that the final product was very similar to iris petals. Why he decided so - it is difficult to understand this.

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

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

Well, it was like that
Well, the queen of toffee was of course "Milk Cows" - soft candies with condensed milk inside.
And I also remember that toffee was sold in large pieces by weight. However, they did not enjoy much love ...

Do you remember the candies "Little Red Riding Hood", "Bear in the North", "Alenka", "Kara-Kum? Who came up with these names and bright candy wrappers? And what kind of candies were there before? Let's address this question to the Museum of Russian Chocolate.

Using candy wrappers from Russian chocolate, it is easy to study the tastes of citizens and the history of the country: Peter the First, the dwarfs, easter bunnies, Lenin, chubby girls and Gagarin, who is unrecognizable.
The Moscow Museum of the History of Russian Chocolate contains thousands of such wrappers, as well as pink velvet bonbonnieres, notes of chocolate waltz, books with pre-revolutionary recipes and fine china.

We went to the museum to understand the history of Russian chocolate, but it was temporarily closed, and one of its founders, Maria Golovkina, had to meet in the field - at the Zlata Rozman factory, where Maria, free from lectures and museum excursions time prepares chocolate according to Belgian technology, but in compliance with strict Soviet GOST standards.

Further - her story.
Chocolate came to Russia under Peter the Great. It was liquid, very expensive, and at first it was drunk only at Peter's assemblies. Quite quickly, the palaces began to be equipped with special rooms for making chocolate, the position of a coffee shop was even invented - the person responsible for chocolate, tea and coffee at the royal court.
Then chocolate gradually went beyond the palace boundaries, and already at the end of the 18th century street hawkers were selling it. After a while, coffee shops began to open all over Russia, where people drank hot chocolate and discussed the news. In addition to postcards depicting these old coffee houses, we do not have any other information yet, they are collected by grains. It is not yet possible to find recipes from that period, we have later recipes - at the end of the 19th century, when tiles and sweets were already being produced throughout the country.
In 1914, there were 170 chocolate confectionery factories in St. Petersburg, 213 in Moscow, and more than 600 throughout Russia. The main achievement of the confectionery factories was getting the title “supplier of the court of His Imperial Majesty” and the ability to paint a two-headed eagle on their products.
The nomination was awarded twice a year - before Easter and before Christmas. They gave it for merit and for quality, and if it fell, then the nomination was taken away; it was not inherited. Basically, the suppliers of the imperial court were confectioners who lived in Russia, with the exception of one Frenchman - Antoine Rumpelmeier, who invented the Mont Blanc cake and fed the Russian aristocrats in Nice with chocolate, for which he received the honorary title. The most popular Moscow factories - "Partnership Einem" and "Factory and trade partnership of A. I. Abrikosov's sons" - fiercely competed with each other. Aprikosov, for example, lured male shoppers into stores, hiring only brunettes in some stores, and only blondes in others. Einem did not lag behind.

Chocolate has always been an elite product; not everyone could afford it - and not every day. If you compare the packaging, you can immediately see what kind of chocolate was made where. St. Petersburg was an intelligent city, and Moscow was a merchant. And the Moscow packaging looks much more expensive than the St. Petersburg one. In general, in those days, packaging more often cost more than the candy itself.
The sweets were packed in pink velvet boxes with a satin bottom, in elegant plywood boxes with Art Deco patterns: probably, gentlemen gave such sweets to ladies. Before the revolution, wonderful artists were engaged in confectionery graphics; it is known that Ivan Bilibin, Alexander Benois, Viktor Vasnetsov were involved in drawing wrappers. The most important pre-revolutionary factory artist is Emmanuel Andreev. It was he who painted "The Clubfoot Bear" and many other famous wrappers.
Several large Moscow factories managed to survive after the revolution: Einem Partnership, AI Abrikosov's Sons Factory and Trade Partnership, A. Siu and Co factory, where the Yubileinoye cookie was invented for the 300th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty , extremely popular in Soviet times. In St. Petersburg, the Georges Bormand factory survived - a participant in seven European exhibitions. By the way, it was Bormann who was the first to come up with open-source production, placing a chocolate-making machine in the middle of the sales area. He was also famous for being the first in St. Petersburg to install a cocoa vending machine. But he quickly closed it, because people threw 30 kopecks at once instead of 15 in the hope of getting two portions at the same time, they beat on the machine; in general, it did not work out.
Many other remarkable factories have not survived: Bliegken & Robinson, Dinga Confectionery Steam Factory, Yani Confectionery Steam Factory, M. Konradi. Mostly they were owned by foreigners, the persecution of which began already in 1914 with the outbreak of the First World War. Many abandoned their factories before the revolution and left. And someone was shot like the Greek pastry chefs Yani.

"Squirrel" was made for the first time at the factory of Georges Bormann, which was later renamed into the factory named after Samoilova. In the 1990s, when the copyright for images and names appeared, Krasny Oktyabr won the images and names from almost all factories, but they did not manage to get the Belochka - the Belochka went to the Krupskaya factory, as well as factory named after Samoilova, St. Petersburg.

After the revolution, the factories were nationalized and renamed. At first, however, they were given only numbers in general, and the names appeared a little later. A. Siu and Co became a Bolshevik, Sergey Lenov's factory is Rot Front, Einem Partnership - Red October, A. Abrikosov's Sons Factory and Trade Partnership - Babaev Factory, Georges Bormand "- factory named after Samoilova.

The nationalized factories worked according to the old recipe, moreover, it became open. They published books in which recipes for famous sweets were detailed, and almost every city had its own chocolate factory that could make this candy as much as needed. At first, almost all factories in parentheses added the former name of the manufacturer (for example, "the former Einem partnership") on the wrapper, so that buyers would not get lost. But the uniqueness was gone: it was possible to copy the name, and the recipe, and the wrapper.
In the first years of the USSR, the quality and color of the packaging were noticeably lost. Things got better after the war, a lot of decent packaging began to appear, then Leonid Chelnokov, a student of Emmanuil Andreev, worked as the main artist at Krasny Oktyabr. Chelnokov worked at the factory all his life, and when in the late 1990s he offered to issue copyright, in the end he had to sue for many years, and the authorship was never defended, although he drew thousands of wrappers and boxes and even the Red October logo ...
At that time, it was generally difficult with copyrights, the grown-up Elena Gerinas, a girl from Alenka, was also suing, and also in vain: the image from the chocolate turned out to be "collective". But it is important to understand that, in spite of everything, excellent chocolate was still produced in the USSR: this was helped by the GOST system and high-quality cocoa beans. And here are the labels of some of the popular chocolates and their history.

The most popular of the pre-revolutionary sweets, which successfully continued to be produced in the USSR, is the Clubfoot Bear, produced in 1913 at the Einem factory. The wrapper of "Einem" remained almost unchanged, only after the revolution the six-pointed stars disappeared from the wrapper. The rest has been preserved - both the recipe and the name. After the 1990s, when the name "Mishka Clubfoot" was assigned to "Red October", other factories tried to produce their own version, one of the most amazing - candy "Brother from the North Came".

"Cancer necks" were produced before the revolution, and they were then produced by different factories. This is caramel with chocolate filling... Before the revolution, crayfish necks (that is, crayfish tails) were a delicacy, and confectioners thus tried to console and distract people from their high cost.

"Alenka" was invented in 1964, when a party approached factories with a request to make chocolate no worse than Swiss, because milk chocolate was invented in Switzerland. "Alenka" was produced by both Moscow and regional factories, everyone had the right to do so. True, the images on the wrappers varied.

"Cockerel - a golden comb" was produced by the Sioux factory. This is how candy wrappers look a hundred years apart.

On the eve of Yuri Gagarin's flight into space, Krasny Oktyabr was given the task to draw a package for sweets. So that in the morning, if Gagarin did land, everyone was treated to sweets from the box with his portrait. The main artist of Krasny Oktyabr, Chelnokov, watched TV all evening the night before, and then painted for half the night. And the next morning everyone was treated to sweets, as planned.

After the nationalization, the wrappers were hardly changed at first. We have packages from the pre-revolutionary "Russian Army" candy and packages from the Soviet candy "Red Army" - they practically do not differ. In the 1930s, pre-revolutionary letters were still found on the already Soviet candy wrapper.

Johann Leopold Ding produced his famous chocolate eggs with a surprise inside. They say that such Easter eggs Sioux and Abrikosov did, too, but we did not find any evidence. We have 12 Ding eggs in the museum, they are all different sizes and sealed. The thirteenth was broken; it contained a porcelain figurine of a royal nobleman. Ding was forced to emigrate when the persecution of the Germans began.

Chocolates and sweets were often accompanied by educational inserts. For example, Einem had a series of twelve numbered inserts for sweets with architectural monuments, called "The World's Largest Buildings."

Many factories produced boxes of chocolates with board games. Here is one of them - with the game "Fire of 1812".

And the "Einem Partnership", for example, ordered Karl Feldman, the author of the romance "Coachman, Don't Drive the Horses," to write "Chocolate Waltz", "Waltz-Montpensier", "Tango Cocoa" and "Cupcake-Gallop" buying a certain type of candy. These are the notes of "Chocolate Waltz".

Vladimir Lenin, Felix Dzerzhinsky, Leon Trotsky - their portraits appeared on the wrappers for some time. It was supposed to release candies with a portrait of Joseph Stalin on the cover, the packaging had already been drawn for the 17th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks). But the matter did not go further than the plan.

There is a legend that Little Red Riding Hood appeared by accident. Allegedly in 1955, Nikolai Vinogradov, the senior master of the Krasny Oktyabr chocolate shop, was instructed to produce a large batch of Clubfoot Bear as soon as possible. For "Mishka" needed almonds, and in such quantities it was not at hand. Instead of almonds, I had to use peanuts. But the test batch of sweets was accepted with enthusiasm.

Many factories had to re-invent their names in the 1990s, after large Moscow and St. Petersburg factories left behind popular brands. So, instead of "Little Red Riding Hood" they began to release "And I'm going to my grandmother" and "Tales of Charles Perrault." And instead of "Clubfoot Bear" - "A brother came from the north."

The Kara-Kum sweets were invented in 1950 at Krasny Oktyabr. The waffle crumb in the filling was responsible for the association with desert sand. At first, there were just sands on the wrapper, then in 1954 three cars and a rider appeared in the desert, after years they were replaced by camels.

Good day!
After listening to the stories of her parents about their happy Soviet childhood and everything connected with it, I decided to create a topic about sweets.
In Soviet times, Christmas trees were decorated with chocolates for the New Year. The cherished bar of chocolate in Soviet times was put in any gift. The main producers of sweets in the USSR were the factories "Red October", "Rot Front", "Babaevskaya" and "Bolshevik".
Some sweets are still on sale now, but they are not the same as they were before, the taste is not the same ... the "taste of childhood" that you will never forget.
I suggest going back in time and remembering those sweets.

"Clubfoot bear"

Few people know that the Mishka Kosolapy chocolate sweets are a kind of Soviet confectionery symbol, not from the USSR, but from Tsarist Russia. Around the 80s of the 19th century, a candy was brought to Julius Geis, the head of the Einem Partnership, to sample: a thick layer of almond praline was enclosed between two wafer plates and glazed chocolate. The manufacturer liked the find of the confectioners, and immediately the name appeared - "Bear Footed". According to legend, a reproduction of the painting by Ivan Shishkin and Konstantin Savitsky "Morning in a Pine Forest" hung in Gays's office, as a result of which the name was first thought up, and later the design of the new delicacy.
The exact date of the appearance of the wrapper for "Clubfoot Bear" is 1913, in 2013 was the 100th anniversary of the wrapper of the legendary candy.

"Squirrel"

This candy can be called a symbol of the era that has gone into the history of the twentieth century. No one festive table, no one new year gift could not do without sweets "Belochka". The wrappers are made of thick paper, on a dark green background - a nimble squirrel, and inside - a candy of incredible yummy. With nuts.

"Bear in the north"

These candies with nut filling Confectioners of the factory named after N.K. Krupskaya began to produce on the eve of the Great Patriotic War, in 1939. The delicacy was so fond of the residents of the city on the Neva that even during the most difficult period of the life of Leningrad, despite all the difficulties of wartime and the state of siege, the factory did not stop producing these sweets, although it had to use substitutes for traditional confectionery raw materials. Since 1966, they have become a trademark of the Leningrad Factory.

"Well, take it away!"

The "Come on, take it away!" Candy, popular in Soviet times was released more than a hundred years ago at the Einem factory. At first, the wrapper depicted a ferocious-looking boy with a bat in one hand and a bitten Einem chocolate bar in the other. There was no doubt that the boy was ready for anything to finish the delicacy.

In 1952, the artist Leonid Chelnokov, creatively reworking and preserving the background of the wrapper, painted a girl in a blue pea dress with a candy in her hand, teasing a white dog. It was this image that was preserved in the memory of Soviet children.

Gulliver

It was a super candy, it was associated with great happiness, it was given by adults to children when they came to visit.

"Bird's milk"

In 1967, the Minister of the Food Industry of the USSR, during a working visit to Czechoslovakia, tasted Ptasie Mleczko (Bird's Milk, created by Jan Wedel, a Polish pastry chef). Returning to his homeland, the official gathered confectioners from large enterprises at the Rot-Front factory, showed a box of the imported Ptasie Mleczko and gave them the task to invent something similar to this foreign dessert. The best was the development of the specialists of the Primorsky Konditer factory from Vladivostok under the leadership of Anna Chulkova. She personally finalized the recipe and experimented with ingredients ... For the development of a unique recipe, Anna Chulkova was awarded the Order of Lenin.

The topic turns out to be large, so I will show you a photo of the most famous sweets of the Soviet period.

Golden comb cockerel

Red poppy

Stratosphere

Kara - Kum

Little Red Riding Hood

Do you also remember the dragee?
Multi-colored round sweets of several types. For 1 ruble 10 kopecks, you could buy a whole kilogram of multi-colored "peas"

More expensive variety with soft filling inside.

"Sea pebbles"

The so-called "Sea pebbles" - glazed raisins (1p70 kopecks per kilogram).

Caramel

Lemons

Crow's feet

Barberry

Cancer neck

And the cockerel? It could even be prepared at home. The candies were scary, but quite edible. You could also buy poisonous-red or green lollipops in the form of cockerels, horses, bears from the hands of gypsies at the bazaar. Mothers often refused to take these sweets from the unwashed hands of people of unknown origin. Neither pleading nor tears helped.

Montpensier in a round tin.

Most often they stuck together and it was necessary to tear off a separate "monpasies" with the use of brute physical force. But delicious. Such a tin cost somewhere around 1 ruble 20 kopecks, the jar was never thrown out and was used very actively on the farm.

Butterscotch
The most famous Kis-Keys and the Golden Key

Lemon and orange wedges

Of course, this is not all, I did not find the USSR and if someone has additions, I will only be glad.
All good and thank you for your attention.

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