If you were lucky they came from the ice cream man. During those summer months the ice cream van would tour the streets, selling his wares. Enticing you with his van jingle (which in the UK, was more often than not a version of Greensleeves) that let you know he was in your street or close by. If we were lucky, we got just a simple ice cream cone, or the cheapest of ice lollies, but that didn't stop us from being wide eyed and taking note of all the other wonderous iced treats on offer. All those lovely pictures stuck up on his van windows; vans from company's like Wall's, Mr Whippy and Williams (the latter, I later worked for when I was a student .... yes, I used to be an Executive Mobile Purveyor of sub temperature delights AKA an ice cream man!)
knickerbockerglory
Lets kick off this iced fest countdown with the king of them all; the knickerbockerglory. This was a special birthday treat type dessert, sold in many a shop and cafe. The picture is worth a 1000 words as to what it was; ice cream, tinned fruit, sauces, chocolate all topped with whipped cream and a fan shaped wafer biscuit.
These were special occasion treats only. That my sisters and I might get treated to once a year. Our eyes always lit up, our mouth's drooled when we saw some lucky person have one. We weren't to know it probably wasn't their birthday, it was just that they had money and was just a dessert to them. Say what you will about money making you happy etc, some things in life are best left as treats, as a once a year special event in our lives.
extra clotted cream
We knew as kids, never to ask mum for an ice cream when we heard the familiar tune, we knew money was tight. That didn't stop us hoping and wishing that, this would be the day she said "lets get an ice cream" though. Mum's poison was either a cone or wafer with clotted cream.It became a tradition in our family and even though mum is no longer with is, the saying, the phrase of hers remains today; "get a cone for mum with clotted cream, and tell him extra cream please because mummy is ill". Sometimes she got that free extra cream too, who knew that us innocent kids were being used to try and con the ice cream man?
99's
An ice cream cone, stuck with a Cadbury flake. What kid wouldn't want one? And if you were SUPER lucky, drizzled with an ice cream topping and 100's and 1000's
It might be normal scopped ice cream or the Mr Whippy, soft serve ice cream
choc ices
A block of ice cream, dipped in chocolate and always wrapped in a foil wrapping. These were often a treat for us on the rare occasion we were taken to the cinema. The only movie I really remember going to with mum as a child, was The Sound of Music. We went when some Welsh relatives visited us, as I recall. But we did go to other movies, and when we did the family ritual was always; we could either have sweets to go in with or an ice cream at the intermission (in the days when you went and saw more than one movie; "the double feature") But whichever we choose, we always wished we had choose the other at some stage.
coconut ice
These came later in my childhood, and my mother loved them, as did I. They were like a choc ice but it was a coconut flavoured ice cream with flecks of coconut in it. There was also a mint version that had a light green coloured ice cream.
lyon's king cornet
Another late comer (circa 1967) these were the start of luxury ice creams, the pre-cursor of the likes of the magnum, cornetto etc. A large sugar cone, pre-filled with ice cream, nuts and chocolate sauce, all cleverly wrapped with that cardboard lid on it. Along with the King Cornet there was also the King Stick and King Sundae, all were totally decadent for the time. They were, I remember advertised on TV by a king of UK comedy; Frankie Howerd, ohhhh, errrr, missus, no ......
happy faces
a revolutionary ice cream on a stick, made magically so that the different flavoured ice creams formed a face.
tubs
Ice cream tubs, were the pre-cursor to the ice cream sundaes. Plain ice cream in a waxed cardboard tub with wooden (later a plastic) spoon. These are usually what we got during the intermission at the cinema.
ice cream sundaes
A more luxurious form of ice cream tub, in various flavours like straberry, raspberry and chocolate. Flavoured ice cream in a tub with a swirl of sauce and chopped nuts usually sprinkled on top.
salisbury road ice blocks
These were made by one of our local shops, that was just down the road from my junior school. A crude type of ice lolly but cheap. As I remember they were about 2p as opposed to 6-8p for the commercial ones. They were a flavoured syrup or heavily flavoured water, that was always one flavour layered on top of the other; orange & blackcurrant etc.
ice poles
Still available, these are simply flavoured water in a vacuumed plastic tube that you take home and placed in your own freezer. A cheap treat during the summer.
jubilees
These I remember from my Welsh childhood. A strange shaped frozen juice or flavoured water, that kept a child quiet for hours and always left the sides of the mouth sore and it cut into them
cherry brandy and cider ice lollies
Can you imagine marketing anything to children these days that had alcohol connotations? Both though were packed full of flavour and did make us feel all grown up when we had them. The cherry brandy one, would leave you with an extraodinary deep red coloured tongue and lips
zoom and fab
Zooms were a rocket shaped sensation, triple layered and flavoured and aimed at us boys.
cornish mivvi
These last two were my mother's favourites, especially when we went to the cinema; orange maid and a cornish mivvi. The latter being an ice cream centre with an ice lolly coating/covering. There was something always extra special about that.
orange maid
Mum loved these, as they had a sharpness in flavour. Mainly being due I would think to the fact they were made with real orange juice and not just some flavoured water. The one thing I always remember them for was causing your tongue to stick to them and often ending up with a red tinge when you ripped it off your frozen tongue!
No comments:
Post a Comment