Flat Tops

Ricoa Bite-Size Chocolates: Flat Tops. Photo by Mildred Cruz

What’s the difference from Curly Tops, also by the Ricoa company of the Philippines?

The Packaging

Flat Tops individual foil wrappers are orange, white and silver in color. There are thirty of these individually wrapped bite-size chocolate pieces in one 150-gram pack.

Curly Tops wrappers are red, white and gold in color. There was a time when Curly Tops were not individually wrapped in foil/plastic but came only in small brown doily cups — twelve in a tray packed into a box.

The Chocolate Piece Itself

Curly Tops are supposed to be swirly, hence the name, yet in recent years, they are manufactured and sold on the market as “Curly Tops” even when they literally have flat (!) tops. The sides are fluted, not smooth.

Flat Tops have had flat tops all throughout their history. They have RICOA embossed on top.

The Taste?

Flat Tops are labeled as Milk Chocolate. (As are Curly Tops)

To Americans, the mouthfeel of RICOA chocolate like Flat Tops and Curly Tops is distinctively waxy. That may be because of the absence of cocoa butter, which is a difficult ingredient to use in tropical countries like the Philippines where the climate heat is intense and would cause “real” chocolate products to melt at room temperature.

Flat Tops’ Ingredients List

Ingredients: Milk Solids, Refined Sugar, Hydrogenated Vegetable Fat (Palm Oil, Palm Kernel Oil), Cocoa Powder, Emulsifiers (Soya Lecithin, E476), Iodized Salt, Vanillin and Cinnamon.

Three pieces are supposedly 80 calories.

Curly Tops’ Ingredients List

Ingredients: Refined Cane Sugar, Milk Powder, Hydrogenated Palm and Palm Kernel Oil, Whey, Cocoa Powder, Soy Lecithin, Vanilla and cinnamon Powder, Iodized Salt.

Be advised that product formulations change over the years.

Allergen information for both: Produced in a facility that have peanuts or cashew nuts.

RICOA is a brand that belongs to the Philfood Division of ComFoods (Commonwealth Foods, Inc.), which is based in Mandaluyong City. Product of the Philippines.