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Horlicks, a drink Brits go to bed with and Indians wake up with
- BoorishBears 10y agoIn Ghana it's linked to sleep
- hprotagonist 10y agoNot the same drink at all, but : As a child i read the James Herriot memoirs (all things bright and beautiful, etc..), in which he waxes rhapsodic about the restorative powers and deliciousness of Bovril. I had no idea what it was, so I was free to invent my own idea of what it might taste like, or be, or consist of. When i discovered he was so happy about diluted beef stock, i was more than a little let down.
- helipad 10y agoWent to a football match as a lad and wasn't sure what Bovril was, but ordered one anyway. Imagine my reaction when what I thought was hot chocolate, was instead hot beef extract.
- hprotagonist 10y agoYeah. I had a real hard time conceiving of it as something that doesn't involve malt powder.
- jahnu 10y agoBilly Connolly had a great bit about Bovril, football and violence. https://youtu.be/-JjVg0Sbsh4 https://youtu.be/-JjVg0Sbsh4
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- midgetjones 10y agoPeople are still trying to sell that idea, only now they've packaged it as 'bone broth'. Snark aside, though, I could drink salty, savoury hot drinks all day long.
- rpazyaquian 10y agoIt's a preferable alternative to sugar, sure, but the salt content could be a concern. Wouldn't be a bad option if the other option is soda.
- dorfsmay 10y agoNow that science is backing benefits from fasting, and that bone soup are recommended for long fasts (> 48 hours), they should advertise towards that market!
- drcross 10y agoAs an aside, I strongly recommend Bovril as a "post" hangover and fasting aid. Add jalapeno and pepper or spicy sauce to it and it has a lot of filling properties and the salt restores what has been lost during drinking. Your milage may vary.
- smacktoward 10y agoNot even a drink, but: reading The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe as a child led me down a similar path with regard to Turkish Delight.
- smcl 10y agoThat's such a common one! It's even worse that there's a chocolate bar in the UK called "Turkish Delight" which is nothing like the proper "Lokum". It's not very pleasant :)
- OJFord 10y agoTurkish delight (not Cadbury's chocolate bar) is delicious. The chocolate bar is just crap mass-produced Turkish delight wrapped in chocolate. I agree it's not very pleasant, but I don't know what else one could expect.
- smacktoward 10y agoIt's not that real-world Turkish delight is bad, per se, so much as that Lewis makes it sound so life-changingly incredible that the real-world version is bound to disappoint by comparison.
- manarth 10y agoOn the one hand, it was mind-numbingly delicious because of the White Witch's magic making it incredibly addictive, rather than simply the virtue of being Turkish delight. But why the choice of Turkish delight? A combination of status-signalling and unavailability [1] (post-WW2 sugar-rationing was still in effect when the book was written). [1] http://www.tor.com/2016/08/08/why-was-turkish-delight-the-ultimate-temptation-in-c-s-lewis-narnia/ http://www.tor.com/2016/08/08/why-was-turkish-delight-the-ul...
- walshemj 10y agoDon't forget that CS Lewis was writing for a UK audience that still had rationing for sweets when published. Turkish Delight was /Is a common UK Christmas time treat.
- DanBC 10y agoThe bovril name is interesting. It's a mix of Bos (ox) and a super intelligent alien race from science fiction stories. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bovril https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bovril Beef tea isn't to everyone's taste. I wonder how they'd react if given the chevril variant? Also, Bovril is one of the only products to have the Pope in its marketing.
- fuckemem 10y ago"One of the only" ... sneaky!
- jbdistaken 10y agosorry to use this forum, but i don't know how to send a message to you directly. two days ago a discussion appeared [0] that quoted your JJ thomson quote from a previous comment [1], but the poster didn't know where the original quote comes from. I'm also curious about the source of the wonderful quote. Would you mind responding to the comment [2] with the attribution if you have time? Thanks! [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12803770 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12803770 [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14021885 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14021885 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14022158 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14022158
- magic_beans 10y agoHome-made beef stock is actually INCREDIBLY nutritious, especially if it is made with the bones. There's a huge trend of bone broth suppliers cropping up in New York. If it's some kind of mass produced stock though, it's probably not better than salt water.
- rodgerd 10y ago> When i discovered he was so happy about diluted beef stock, i was more than a little let down. It's basically marmite for drinking.
- teknologist 10y agoYeah I know I'm being pedantic here but Marmite is yeast extract while Bovril is beef.
- rodgerd 10y agoIt's an important point for vegetarians! But the taste is very similar.
- gideonparanoid 10y agoIn the UK, from my experience, the drink is usually associated with more elderly people (my grandparents & older uncle are the only people who drink it), interesting to see it here aimed more for children.
- arethuza 10y agoI was definitely fed it by my parents when I was a kid in the 1970s - pretty sure the marketing targeted kids (or more likely targeted parents to feed it to their kids). Ovaltine used to have a radio kids club - though that was before my time... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ovaltineys https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ovaltineys "At games and sports we're more than keen, Mo merrier children could be seen, Because we all drink Ovaltine,"
- rayiner 10y agoWe used to drink Horlicks in Bangladesh, where it was - like in India - a breakfast drink. Of course, Horlicks has no special powers to do anything, certainly not any of the things it is marketed as doing. It's a potent example of the insidiousness of marketing: pretty much everywhere in the U.K. and the former British Empire people associate this product with qualities it simply does not possess. Not only that, they are drinking a high-calorie product because it is marketed as being good for you. Kids in the U.K. (and, as development happens across the subcontinent, increasingly kids in India and Bangladesh too) really don't need to be drinking milk fortified with wheat and barley - either for breakfast or before bed.
- OJFord 10y ago> they are drinking a high-calorie product because it is marketed as being good for you Are they, and is it? I tried it once and didn't like it, but I've always bucketed it with hot chocolate. I've certainly never had or heard it associated with improving health.
- doingmyting 10y agoThe slogan of Horlicks is "Taller, stronger, sharper". Grew up in the Caribbean and every mom swore by it so we drank it.
- smanatstpete 10y agoAbsolutely that is how it is marketed. When you visit a sick relative, it often tradition to bring something to them. Often, people will show up with Horlicks or Complan bottles. It is fortified with vitamins so people conflate Horlicks with it being healthy. However, it is mostly carbs and sugar. I know a lot of Indians who insist that their children drink it as part of their breakfast.
- M_Grey 10y agoBasically the same kind of thing gets marketed here as nutritional drinks, that basically end up being vitamin powders and glucose. While I'm not sold on the notion of something like Soylent as a dietary replacement, at least they're not just mixing sugar and chicory starch and calling it a day.
- cs02rm0 10y agoStrikes an odd chime when an article appears about marketing differences in a brand I'd managed to completely forget about despite having been one of those in the UK who'd enjoyed it before bed. I'm not sure I've heard it mentioned in 20 years. Seems to me they could do with more marketing, any marketing.
- slurry 10y agoThe occult writer Arthur Edward Waite - of Rider-Waite-Smith tarot fame - used to work for Horlick's, a fact for which he was much mocked by Aleister Crowley.
- d-crane 10y agoThat's interesting! As a former occult-type guy this was news to me. I can definitely see AC ribbing Waite over this endlessly.
- dluan 10y agoGreat article - the drink backstory is just a good segue into the discussion about globalization and how it's changing with China and India. > "In fact, many of the areas that will generate the most growth in future are currently unfamiliar in the West, according to management consultancy McKinsey." Given that more and more of the co's in YC's recent batches are exclusively India focused, I am definitely on board with the next big unicorn being born in India and China right now.
- fcbrooklyn 10y agoWhen I read the title, my first thought was "Indians wake up and drink a pint of beer?"
- OJFord 10y agoI was thinking port - which would be a jolly fortifying start to the day, if you'll forgive the pun!
- maverick_iceman 10y agoI assumed whiskey. That's like Indian national drink.
- dTal 10y agoI guessed hot chocolate. Not too bad! But the real answer is even more interesting. The title has changed now, to remove the "clickbait" I guess. Bit of a shame, I enjoyed the guessing game...
- sealjam 10y agoThere is an extremely similar drink in the UK (and probably elsewhere) called Ovaltine which is marketed as an energy drink. I always thought it was odd that two such similar drinks were marketed in such contrary ways. Horlicks to make your sleep and Ovaltine to give you energy. Perhaps that was the point at which I realised marketeers weren't always scientific in their advice :(
- JauntTrooper 10y agoInteresting, Ovaltine is marketed as an energy drink in the U.K.? Growing up in the US in the 1990s it was marketed as chocolate milk with vitamins (so therefore good for your kids).
- sealjam 10y agoHad to double check but seems so! (link to image of ovaltine jar) https://www.catchthedeal.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/2-x-Ovaltine-energy-drink-300x300.jpg https://www.catchthedeal.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/2...
- lumisota 10y agoThis appears to be an Australian version. UK: http://www.ovaltine.co.uk/media/22661/ovaltine-original-addmilk-product-small.png http://www.ovaltine.co.uk/media/22661/ovaltine-original-addm...
- sealjam 10y agoThere was similar marketing in the UK too. http://www.just-drinks.com/news/ovaltine-reinvents-itself-with-energy-tag_id77071.aspx http://www.just-drinks.com/news/ovaltine-reinvents-itself-wi...
- williamgb 10y agoInteresting! I cannot recall any such marketing materials for Ovaltine. The only reference I can find regarding this strategy is from 2000[0]. Both the drink and the brand, in my experience at least, have always been associated with comfort, family, pajamas and bedtime. I seem to recall "Ovalteeney" being a mild pejoritve to describe those of a quiet/calm nature. [0] http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/ovaltine-target-younger-drinkers-energy-ads/57013 http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/ovaltine-target-younge...
- torrent-of-ions 10y agoIt is pretty odd that a drink of concentrated simple carbohydrates/sugar would be taken before going to bed.
- draw_down 10y agoIn my experience ingesting calories before bed is never a wise idea, but especially so if milk is involved.
- pasquinelli 10y agoWhat happens, in your experience?
- dm3730 10y agoIt would cause a spike/rise in blood sugar levels for a brief period, followed by spike in insulin level which would correlate with sleepiness.
- maverick_iceman 10y agoHuh, I always assumed Horlicks (and Complan) were health drinks. Because of the pervasive advertising I didn't even question this claim. Now I feel pretty stupid.
- sidcool 10y agoIsn't this lying then? They call it innovative marketing.
- larrysalibra 10y agoIn Hong Kong, Horlicks is usually on the menu at traditional Hong Kong restaurants along with milk tea, iced tea, coffee/milk tea, Coke & Coke with lemon. It's served through out the day and boy is it tasty.
- KSS42 10y agoIt's on the menu at Hong Kong style cafes here in Toronto, along with Ovaltine. It is usually included in the meal price, whereas cold drinks are extra money.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- golemotron 10y ago> The fact that the same liquid can be perceived in two such different ways is a great example of the "crazy nonsense and beauty of marketing", says Andrew Welch. The third way is to recognize that it is essentially milk, and milk has been consumed both before bed and upon waking millennia before modern marketing.
- anon_lastname 10y agoPoo
- robert_tweed 10y agoSome random facts I learned about Horlicks recently, totally unrelated to the article: - Horlicks is a form of gruel, but they don't use the term in their marketing because of the negative connotations from Dickens. - Horlicks was supposedly invented to make milk easier to digest for the lactose intolerant. I have no idea if there is a sound scientific basis for that, but the fact it's no longer marketed that way suggests not. Also, the uses mentioned in TFA both make sense. Horlicks is just milk with added malt, both of which are full of calories (good in the morning[1]) and caffeine free (good in the evening). Milk also contains small amounts of melatonin and tryptophan, both of which promote sleep, but the amounts are so small the effect is negligible. [1] There seems to be some evidence that a high carbohydrate breakfast is not a good thing at all, so don't take this as a recommendation. Edit: typo
- markdown 10y agoNever heard of Horlicks, but we have Milo and Ovaltine in Fiji that seem to be similar.
- cossatot 10y ago"From Germany to the United Arab Emirates to China you can visit the same shops, buy the same furniture, eat the same food, watch the same programmes and listen to the same music." A few years back I was on a geology expedition in western Tibet, and we left the unpopulated valley we'd been in for several weeks and headed a few hours farther west for supplies, where our Dongfeng driver thought there was a town. There was, sort of, so we went to the little store to get some coffee and any other nonperishables. At the market, they had never heard of coffee. But they had Redbull, so we got that instead.
- peteretep 10y agoRed Bull and other Thai energy drinks are popular because they're cheaper than coffee in Thailand. That said, Thai Red Bull is a pretty different beast from what you'll find abroad -- it's thick, sweet, and flat, like cough syrup. When you drink it in the quantity that I do, it's easy to forget coffee tastes terrible, and that we acquire a taste for it over time because caffeine is addictive. To enter new markets, it needs to be the only caffeine source or needs to have fashionable connotations. Red Bull tastes like candy, and has universal appeal.
- halestock 10y agoThat coffee is an acquired taste only because of its caffeine content sounds pretty specious to me. Do you have a source for that claim? I'm willing to bet you could still come to appreciate the taste of coffee only drinking decaf.
- peteretep 10y ago> Do you have a source for that claim No. :-) I am going off the basis that people come to enjoy the taste of specific brands of cigarettes they smoke a lot, as a result of nicotine addiction. I also don't have a source for that, but when I read it ... somewhere ... it was presented as well-sourced. > I'm willing to bet you could > still come to appreciate the > taste of coffee only drinking > decaf Perhaps. I'd be just as willing to bet that most people don't because they never drink enough of it to get to that point, on account of it not having psychoactive chemicals in it.
- zem 10y agointeresting. as an indian growing up in the 70s/80s, i had horlicks as a teatime drink when it was cold outside.
- _delirium 10y agoThe article doesn't mention this, but some relevant backstory for the quasi-medical claims is that Horlicks originated in the US in the late 19th century, at the height of the "patent medicine" craze. The same one that gave us Coca Cola, along with various other less remembered quack cures. The company was started in Chicago in the 1870s by two brothers who had immigrated from England. One of them moved back to the UK about 20 years later, where he began importing the product, and later opened a UK subsidiary (the 1906 date the company quotes in UK marketing is the opening date of the UK subsidiary's first factory). It subsequently lost market share in the US, disappearing entirely by the 1930s, so is now hardly remembered by any Americans still alive. But it found more enduring success in the UK, which also spread it to its colonies.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- vacri 10y agoThis dichotomy reminds me of scones/biscuits. Here in Australia (and UK/NZ), scones are dainty things associated with middle-aged women and afternoon tea. In the US south, biscuits (same thing) are manly things to eat with a hearty breakfast.
- rodgerd 10y ago> scones are dainty things associated with middle-aged women Nothing dainty about what happens when you put scones, cream, and jam in front of a bunch of kids.