Old sweets, chocolates and snacks


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There is a rather odd shop near me which specialises in cheap alcohol mainly for the drunks. Strong white cider in huge quantities. However, they are worth visiting because they have little idea of good wine, and can often sell a decent wine at very cheap cost. The other half of the shop sells sweets the old way - in the big bottles. Now plastic of course, but lunjeelers are available there. And chocolate limes, which I have a weakness for.

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If I had any spare money I would occasionally invest in one of these:

Re# 130. Maybe the decrease in size of various chocolate bars, snacks and biscuits is due to the enforced introduction of metrication. Also on some I notice, the type of chocolate has altered. Perhaps

I think it was Berridge Rd. Central near to Stanley Rd. Jill although I'm sure lots of sweet shops sold them. I lived on Russell Rd. and loved the shops nearby. Such a choice of newsagents, chippies,

Lunjeelers is Barnetts trade name...they're a bit pricey nowadays. If you find a shop or market man that sells Edwardian sweets (and many of those selling old fashioned sweets do) their Orange cough is almost identical at a better price. Their Winter Easer too is more or less the same as Jakemans cough sweet.

Or if ever out Huthwaite way...visit the Edwardian factory shop.

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At Beamish museum, near Chester-Le Street, has a working sweet factory. They make various types, but the orange cough sweet/aka lunjeeler was (and is) a popular style. My favourite from there is a hard white sweet which, as soon as you put it in your mouth, releases a huge amount of eucalyptus flavour. I usually pack a few for my walks.

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My kids, bought me a bag of Sports Mixture for Fathers Day. They're much softer these days and as I munched my way through them last night watching the football I think I remember that back in the 60s they used to be sold loose.

Like Black Jacks and Fruit Salad I think they were 4 for a penny (1d). I recall the sweet shop on Berridge Rd we called Margo's where she (Margo) would pick them up with her bare hands and put them in one of those triangular white bags usually used for 2oz of loose sweets out the jars.Food hygiene wasn't around in the 60s!

The black ones were a lovely liquorice flavour but they've made them blackcurrant now which is a shame. The good news however is that in Rugby's Clock Towers Shopping centre near where I now live (Daventry) there's a bloke who sells Lion liquorice gums which taste just like the old Sports Mixture. He also sells some gums called Poor Bens which are liquorice and aniseed and are to die for. Anybody on here tried them?

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Lunjeelers were originally called "Lung Healers" but the trades description act put paid to that!

I was a rep for Barnetts for a while and got that info from 'the horses mouth' as it were!

I get a monthly news letter from "A quarter of" They informed me that "Sports mixture" have stopped being made, the company that bought out Lyons have put and end to them!

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My older sister was potty about Lucky Bags which she bought for 3d from Merrimans shop on the corner of Oakland Street and Berridge Road. Our grandfather used to shout at her for wasting the money, which he usually gave her, on these multi coloured packets which contained all sorts of rubbish.

Myself being almost 8 years younger than sis, grandad would take me with him every Thursday morning to collect his pension from the post office on Gregory Boulevard. Sometimes, we'd go into the bakery a few doors down from the Post Office. They also sold sweets and, if I'd been good, I'd receive a cone shaped white paper bag of dolly mixtures. I can still remember the delicious smell of that shop but cannot recall its name. I'm sure someone can refresh my my memory.

If grandad didn't buy dolly mixtures, I would be given an orange. Then on to the library in Hyson Green for a sniff of that other wonderful aroma....books! Gosh, I had a wonderful childhood. I'm so lucky!

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Could be. It was run by a family where dad did the baking, on the premises, while his wife and daughter served in the shop. The bakery was accessed by a sliding door behind the counter. They sold delicious sponge cakes and I recall buying slabs of butterscotch toffee in black wrappers from there for my great uncle's birthday every year when I was tiny. Happy days!

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Mercury dancer, you mention a lot of places that were very familiar to me. My family lived at the bottom of Bobbers Mill Road from the 1920s until the 1980s.

I recall Mr and Mrs Merriman emigrating to Australia, after which the shop was never the same again. My sister also bought Victory Vs there in the winter. I wasn't terribly keen on sweets but loved Caramac bars and milky bars. Still do!

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I was talking to my childhood friend, Jane, the other day. She lived in Hazelwood Road when we were young. Jane told me that the bakery cum sweet shop on Gregory Boulevard was called Crooks and I do believe that's correct. She has an unfortunate reason for remembering the place. Apparently, there was a broken grating outside the front of the shop and Jane fell down it as a small child, cutting her leg quite badly. She says she still has the scar. These days there would be a huge compensation claim! In the early 60s, she would probably have received a smack from her mother to go with it! How things change!

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Callard & Bowsers also made things like caramels, butterscotch and fudgie items too.

ALL very palatable I may say!

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I'd forgotten Merrimans until I read this thread. We lived on Grundy Street and walked past Merrimans on the way to school (Berridge Road). Mam used to get stuff 'on tick' and settle up on Friday (pay day).

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Mercury dancer

I well remember Smith's Foundry. Also knew a few people who must have lived near to you.

I took piano lessons for some years as a child with Edith Birch (Mrs Wells), went to school with Kim Machin, whose father was in the police force and a dog-handler. The dog was called Major and had a pen in the garden but was as soft as grease when off duty! The Cheetham family also lived in that area and their daughter was at school with my sister.

Small world!

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Jill

I recall Gerry Machin very well, and Major of course. One of his party tricks was to put an egg into Major's mouth and he would take it whoever asked Major for the egg. I went into the police and Gerry Machin and Len Smith (who lived in the police houses next door to each other) looked after me. I always wanted to be a dog handler but never got that far.

I was close friends to Kim and Gaye Machin, and also to Sharon Cheetham too!

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#120 mercury dancer

Small world indeed!

Kim and I were at Berridge together and good friends. However we went to different schools, she to Bluecoat and me to Manning, in 1969 and lost touch. I vaguely remember there being some sort of trouble around her father's job at that time.

There was also a boy at Berridge named Jeffrey Wyley..although I may have misspelled both names as he wasn't in my class at Berridge. He must also have lived somewhere close to you.

Major was a real softie who would wait til I sat down on the sofa, pin me there by placing both paws at the sides and then lick my face! Good thing he was friendly!

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Mercury dancer

I recall Major having a fearsome reputation but I never saw him in work mode. It saddens me to hear that his paws were burned. I hate to hear of any animal being injured.

Often wondered what happened to Kim and her family as I don't remember them being there in the 70s. Did they move away?

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My father used to talk about buying locust pods from a sweet shop in Beeston when he was a child in the 1920s, early 30s. He spoke about it so often that I began to wonder what they were. Then, lo and behold, on a visit to The Shepherd's Purse in Whitby, I found some!

This was some years prior to dad's passing. I purchased a bag and they were a tad more than the penny for a bagful of his childhood but I'd never seen anyone look so pleased when I presented them to him.

To me, they looked revolting but he chomped his way through them. Apparently, they are the seed pods of the carob tree. Must have seemed very exotic in 1920s Beeston. Not many carob trees on the way to Church Street Schools!

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.....just bought an Aero...first time for years.God knows what they've done to them. It aint my taste buds...it's crap chocolate.

Looks and tastes like those Doggy choc drops. :glare:

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