You really weren't properly brought up if you don't know how much more land your father owns than everyone else in the room but are too polite to ever mention it.
A few years ago (so my memory is a little rusty) we did some business in India. We shipped the goods to an address something like "The lane behind the Pickling factory, Mumbai." On the odd-one-side, even-the-other...our cul-de-sac runs 1-14 anti-clockwise, so 1 is next to 2, etc. Only, to make it interesting, it's not a complete circle (there's one side that opens out onto some parkland) so the numbering runs 1-7 loads of no houses 8-14. As far as house number 13 goes, we don't have one...so 12 is next to 14. The alternative would be to number it 12A...as in 221B Baker Street.
I discovered recently that trifle is another one. If you have a jelly layer, you're working class. Jam is middle class. I'm so working class I can't even imagine a trifle with jam.
Who the bloody hell puts jam in a trifle? If that's what it takes to be considered middle class, count me out. Edit - for clarity, by "jam" I mean fruit conserves (what Americans call "jelly"), and by "jelly" I mean fruit juice set with gelatine (what Americans call "jello").
Right? And apparently middle class people don't have toilet brushes. I don't even want to know how they clean their toilets.
I remember my mother making Crab Apple Jelly. The difference between this jelly and jam was that it was strained through a jelly bag, so there were zero chunky bits of fruit in the end product, just a clear (unless you squeezed the bag) jam-like substance. And very nice it was too. Especially the year the fruit fermented somewhere in the process. Alcoholic Crab Apple Jelly when you're too young to drink! Incidentally, this was set using the naturally-occurring pectin from the fruit itself.
Hang on a second; are we talking about middle class or upper class? Because there really is a difference. The vast majority of middle class people clean their own toilets, you know? I appreciate that to the working man the middle classes might at times appear to be posh but only if you don't know people who come from serious money. There are a certain kind of nouveau riche upper middle class people who are suffering from Hyacinth Bouquet syndrome; really snobbish tossers who are trying to elbow their way into the upper class and who thinking scrubbing their toilet is beneath them because their husband makes three hundred grand a year dontchaknow. But that's not most middle class people, in fact it's someone trying to convince the world they are upper class when they are definitely not. Suffice to say; I am definitely very middle class. I grew up in a big semi-detached house in a leafy bit of Kent and went to a grammar school but I also grew up with toilet brushes.
Wait. You guys put Jello in a trifle? Is that what I'm reading, here? (I thought you were getting into a jelly (strained) vs jam (chunks in) discussion and I was wondering how the hell anyone would notice. But JELLO? Is that real?) I mean, I'm middle class, for sure. Class isn't such a big deal here, but somebody else does clean my toilets. I can accept there will be differences. But JELLO in a trifle? No. I refuse.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trifle Trifle in English cuisine is a dessert made with fruit, a thin layer of sponge fingers or sponge cake soaked in sherry or another fortified wine, and custard. It can be topped with whipped cream. The fruit and sponge layers may be suspended in fruit-flavoured jelly, and these ingredients are usually arranged to produce three or four layers. The contents of a trifle are highly variable; many varieties exist, some foregoing fruit entirely and instead using other ingredients such as chocolate, coffee or vanilla. The name trifle was used for a dessert like a fruit fool in the sixteenth century; by the eighteenth century, Hannah Glasse records a recognisably modern trifle, with the inclusion of a gelatin jelly. Whereas... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jello_(disambiguation) Jell-O is a brand name for a gelatin dessert and also an occasional American term for gelatin desserts in general. Invented 1897
Yeah, but... what's "jelly" in the UK? In Canada, jelly is like jam without seeds, and maybe with a tiny bit more pectin. Is that what "jelly" is in the UK, or is UK jelly more like NA Jello?
Jelly - in trifle - is the same as NA (gelatin-setting) Jello. The Crab Apple Jelly I mentioned a few posts ago is like "jam without seeds" - it's strained through a cloth bag to remove all of the solid chunks of fruit. Tiptree Crab Apple Jelly (340g) ETA: And, like @Tenderiser , I don't think I could take jam in a trifle.
It's not like they replace all the jelly with jam; they just have a thin layer of jam between the sponge fingers and the custard. Imagine the same amount of jam as in a Victoria sponge. This works by the way because the sponge fingers are being soaked in something fruity anyway, so the real difference is in texture but it actually doesn't make as much difference as you think. Imagine eating trifle where the jelly has melted; that's pretty much what we're talking about. And then with a thin layer of jam between that and the custard.
I grew up in a working class area in Essex. Middle and upper were pretty much the same thing, so I'm probably a bit biased against the middle class. Middle and upper class people in Essex do tend to be that very nouveau riche Hyacinth Bouquet types you described. Oi, we invented trifle. We'll decide what should go in it, thank you very much. And while we're at it, stop selling ready-made tea in bottles.
I'm not seeing this equivalence. Middle class is when you're trying to become Upper class. Upper class is when you don't have to try. Upper class is "old money", titles and getting your boy into Eton because you went there. Middle class is "new money" (nouveau riche), buying a Scottish lairdship on eBay to impress your chums with your new-found title, and putting your boy down for Eton before he's born because the waiting list for common folk is that long. Incidentally, nouveau riche has been around for a while. Henry VIII helped his finances by selling the hereditary title of baronet. Not quite the same scale of selling the family silver as nationalising the monasteries, but it was always going to mean that, ultimately, everybody in the country who could afford it would be a "Sir"!
middle class isn't trying to become upper class (unless your a social climber). In general lower class either don't work and are on benefits or work in blue collar jobs (factory workers, shop assistants, manual labourers) etc - are generally less well educated and 'common' middle class work in white collar jobs (teachers, office workers, lawyers, doctors and so on ie professional jobs )and so on and are better educated Upper class generally don't work because they have family money, may well have titles and links to nobility, and probably were educated at private school (celebrities are a grey area since they are often as rich as the upper class without having the education or blood connections)
I'm not saying that ALL middle class are trying to be upper class - although that does seem to be @mashers ' experience - I was simply responding to his point that middle and upper are synonymous, and illustrating where the "climbers" display their aspirations and failures. I'd agree, in general with your definitions - except that Upper class frequently do work, and usually in a well-paid job - that's how they stay Upper Class! - so that they don't just burn daddy's money. As an aside, I'd see Tywin Lanister as a good example of upper class - his commitment is to maintaining what is effectively a thousand-year reich, a family that remains strong and influential into the mists of the future.
Some good chat here. See, I've been researching - reading that book [again] on the 'lavatory' - called 'The English.' It doesn't matter what class you think you are, or what job you do - it's the range of assumptions made by the listener the moment you open your mouth [that define you]. And my contribution to 'excuse me/pardon me' is the most terrible practice of... ...people who say 'Saawwwy?' or 'sorry,' properly, when you ask a question, or make a statement even. There should be special prisons for those people.
Nobody has trifle with jam. Jam on rice pudding [?], mmm, yeuk. Also I don't trust your credentials, I need more evidence for you to be working class. I suppose if this 'job' of yours is a Merseyside call centre you might deserve limited accreditation, otherwise you're staying in the lower middle class, for now. I am very sorry. [Americans always get confused about jam] This is great btw:
I certainly didn't mean to imply that I think they are synonymous. I am aware they are different classes. I really meant that where I was from the distinction isn't there. There were really just two classes.
I'm definitely a social climber. Very working class background - my father was a postie and my mum left school at 14 - but yeah, I'm definitely middle class now. I recently told a colleague I grew up in Lewisham and he said (I paraphrase), "You don't sound like scum." Would still put jelly in a trifle, though.
The old definition was 'your father's job,' so I take back what I said, [you are working class] hero. Some good postmen around. Charles Bukowski was a postman, and he was...quite horrible actually - American writer. I think Eltham was one of the scariest places I've ever been...
I lived in Eltham for several years. Was okay if you avoided the EDL pubs. Though I will always remember being on a bus that stopped on Eltham High Street where a woman was performing a certain act on a gentleman, who zipped up his flies, jumped on the bus, and waved as she yelled, "Call me!" after him. Class.
