Frogleg muttered....

Not even universal in the Southern US.
>

.....and there you contraverted yourself. In the South, "class" (in the
case of cultural antecedents, income, environment) has everything to do
with "sweetening", its use and misuse. As for processed sugar being cheap,
I'm sure all the Mexican families which still prefer piloncillo, cones of
brown sugar, still cheaper than white sugar in Mexico, will be the first to
tell you that their choices on a beans and torilla income always were price
sensitive. Until 1940 or so, refined sugar was more expensive in the US
than the raw and unprocessed varieties, forming the tastes and preferences
of a large market segment (for whom such luxuries as white sugar and
"pastry" flour were like lace cutrains among the Boston Irish, almost
cliches marking income change if not social mobility).


.....and I only have a pouund of Smithfield Bacon and a pack of Smithfield
ham sausage in the refrigerator at the moment, neither the resulkt of the
dry cure process given "Smithfield" Hams, so for all the association's
efforts, the results have been fruitless. Actually, the company in
question is near Jamestown (and purveys bottom of the line processed pork
products.

Don't you suppose that pumpkin became a "dessert", because the number of
folks who would enjoy it in the vegetable role were few, and those
who could afford molasses, honey or best of all sugar certainly
applied it lavishly (along with the heavily sugared "vegetable" versions of
sweet potatoes found in the North in lieu of the still common baked sweet
potato, now limited to the rural South and a handful of restaurants.

On the other hand, given sugar, Southerners (predominately in African
American groups or households with African American cooks) left off the
marshmallows and turned to "sweet potato pie", a menu item as class
conscious as any in the Joy of Cooking...consumed randily by Blacks and
poor (or formerly so) whites.

....and then there were the servants of 18th century littoral New England on
several occasions revolting against the practice of being fed on lobster,
then the cheapest of seafood products.

TMO