'Addictive' Sweets?

I used to get given a cocktail glass (one of those sort of triangular from where it joined the stem, but round glasses like a wine glass IYSWIM) of Crabby's Ginger Wine by my (very strict!) Grandmother at Christmas... Probably from about 7 or 8 years old! My Mum used to give me a dip of her finger of sherry too, from a much younger age.

My Mum's friend, an honorary Auntie, used to give me Babycham when we went there for meals, probably from when I was about 10+.

How life has changed!

I do remember the candy and the chocolate pretend ciggies. I can't see how they would encourage kids to become smokers - the taste is so VERY different! LOL. Regret to say that I am a smoker, but I think that's more down to the fact my Dad smoked and I wanted to be like him rather than like my Mum, who did housework all the time (he went out to work in an office). Sigh. Still trying to give up with the help of e-cigs, but it's a long process.

I loved the chocolate cigarettes with rice paper, I think they came in a realistic packet, soft like the Peter Stuyvesant cigarettes? Christmas always brought licorice and chocolate smokers' sets too, and I still love licorice. We too had a small glass of home made ginger wine at New Year, with shortbread, and I daren't make tablet.......it is like crack, immediately addictive!

@Auntieflo “My mother says licorice gives you a good run for your money” Eccles, the Goon Show circa 1955. I also adore licorice.

I well remember the sweet cigarettes. They were sold in packs of ten in a sweet shop near my school.
Haha...I can almost taste them while typing and can certainly remember the owner asking if we wanted the 1d or the 2d tray. There were big sweet jars with twisty sticks of barleysugar and papery flying saucers with sherbet inside. My favourite were Squirrel dolly-mixtures, 2oz in a conical paper bag. Walls briquettes for 3d, where you tore off the cardboard strip round the slice after sandwiching it between 2 wafers. So many great memories.
As for Ribena, Tesco removed it because of the high sugar content. Not a great drink and the percentage of blackcurrants is about 5.

In the 1930s my mother gave my sister and I a halfpenny each to spend on the way back to school after lunch. I well remember the sweet cigarettes, liquorice boot laces, tigernuts, etc and all the sweets that were in glass jars and sold in paper bags.
When I was in the WAAF during the war we had a ration from the NAAFI of cigarettes and chocolate. I always swapped the cigs for chocolate.

So many memories ... I'd forgotten all about tiger nuts - I loved them! And to make one or two of you jealous, I can still buy flying saucers here (The Range - if you have one near you.) And what about spearmint cushions, and fairy cushions (which tasted of perfume)? Palm Toffee - which came in bars that you could suck into a point. I think this came in chocolate, strawberry or banana flavour, and was like a toffee sandwich with dark brown, pink, or yellow toffee in the middle. I wonder why confectioners stopped making these sweets ...?

And - please help - what is 'Tablet'? I seem to remember my mother-in-law talking about it. She came from Durham - is it a Northern thing?

Tablet is very crumbly, sugary fudge. The recipe was given to me by a Scottish colleague. The problem is the quantity you make!

On rainy days when we were children my mother would help us make coconut ice as well as fudge.

I love Fisherman's Friend, I could eat a whole packet.

Also remember as a child buying Barley Sugar Sticks that you could suck for hours - really bad for your teeth!

Tablet is crisp, not soft and fudge like, absolutely packed full of sugar, but delicious. You should be able to google a recipe, but be warned!

We called Minibaggs's Ribena "children's wine" when there was a celebratory meal and adults were drinking wine. Even at a very young age I think kids can understand that some things are suitable for an adult and not for a child, especially if you explain why. They might not understand the details but they understand the concept.

Mine all did anyhow.

What's wrong with drinking wine 'later', like when she's an adult?

When I was very young my grandfather used to give me a glass of orange with a drop of gin in it when we had Sunday lunch. There was always a very small glass of cherry brandy at Christmas and none of it turned me into an alcoholic. I also smoked many, many sweet cigarettes and liquorice pipes, but never the real thing.

I, too, remember the sweet cigarettes and the chocolate ones. There were fake cigarettes which were filled with something like talc so when you blew gently, a puff came out of the tip. I have never smoked but one of my sisters smoked from a very young age. I don't think the sweets had any influence, but friends, funds and opportunity certainly did.

You should be able to google a recipe, but be warned!
Perhaps at Christmas GillT57!

You can still get candy fags theyre just not called that any more they are packaged as superhero stick candy. Taste the same as I remember

Used to eat a lot of those chocolate tools, spanner’s , hammer’s etc as a child - unfortunately never turned me into a DIY ‘ er!!????

Apologies if this has been pointed out already: surely mummy's glass of red wine will be the biggest influence on the little girl? If mummy does it, it must be OK, mustn't it?

Yes Lizzy
But rather she tells teacher that mummy drinks wine to "I drink wine"

I suppose what I meant was that if mummy has been observed having a glass of wine, then objecting to Ribena in a sherry glass is akin to shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted! It's rather hypocritical too. Don't do as I do, so as I say! (Where would we be without our fantastic English language?)

Also, playing devil's advocate, my parents rarely drank anything stronger than tea but it didn't stop my sisters or me enjoying a drink.