The Scottish nougat ice-cream wafer is being cancelled, oh no!

It could be the end of the road for this treat

It should be totally illegal to discuss ice-cream in January.

Still, my hand has been forced, since STV reported earlier this week that Cambuslang’s Waverley Bakery, who also make fan wafers and oyster delights, is planning to cease production of their nougat wafer.

They’re the last supplier of this iconic Scottish treat.

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There is optimism, though, as a company called Aldomak, who make tablet, fudge and macaroon bars, is attempting to raise funds to support and modernise their nougat creation facility. They were one of the producers 20 years ago, and have the ‘expertise and passion’, but, it seems, not the staff levels or new fangled kit yet.

They’ve set up a Save the Nougat crowdfunding page, where you can make monetary pledges that will entitle you to a box of these goodies, a certificate and other merch.

So, there is hope. And, if this wafery treat doesn’t bounce back, I suppose it’s a case of use it, or lose it.

Food evolves. I mean, the Victorians had penny licks - a daub of frozen cream that was sold in a glass container, which, after being sooked clean, was handed back and instantly reused. They were banned in London in 1899, after being blamed for an outbreak of cholera.

It was the waffle cone that replaced this receptacle.

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Still, out of the penny lick fans that were left standing, there must’ve been somebody who was gutted to see the little glass cups go.

However, this is different, and I’m sure that some of us feel a bit responsible for the neglected nougat’s potential demise.

Unless a shard of wafer poked you in the eye, it never hurt anybody.

It’s just that, while we were cooing over the latest cookie dough gelato, served naked but for a brightly branded tub, the nougat was fighting for its life.

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We don’t deserve to keep the things that we never eat, and it’s admittedly been an awful long time since I ordered one of these.

I could’ve gone to somewhere old-school like University Cafe in Glasgow, and had this, with a banana split for afters, but that was an experience that was always booted down my very long list. Always manana, manana, for the banana (split).

Banana splitBanana split
Banana split | Brent Hofacker - stock.adobe.com

This whole debacle has also reminded me that it’s been ages since I asked myself the question, why is it even called a nougat, when it contains marshmallow?

I guess it’s too late to get an answer. It seems rude to ask at this point.

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Still, nonsense aside, there’s a personal reason why I don’t want it to be obsolete.

This foodstuff gives me the sentimental feelings, since a double nougat was always my late dad’s favourite.

When my sister and I were children, our parents would very occasionally, after a dinner of Crispy Pancakes or lamb chops, take us to a now defunct ice-cream parlour that was somewhere on a main road near Edinburgh’s Craigleith.

There was no sitting in. Instead, we’d take our spoils away and have a car picnic.

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Dad must’ve been so paranoid about us messing up his upholstery, but he didn’t let it show.

My order was always a scoop of chocolate in a cone, while my little sister would go for strawberry. Mum would have boring old vanilla, and dad would have this absolute behemoth of a device. It wasn’t ice-cream. It was Brutalist architecture.

The chocolate-dipped bricks of stuffed wafer would be sandwiching two large scoops of vanilla. No dragon’s blood was added.

We’d all lick silently, but I’d watch him from the back seat, as he negotiated the drips, and the two nougats - always a double, never a single - would begin to slide around like shoogly tectonic plates. There were never enough napkins provided.

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I was envious, but this wasn’t for kids. The nougat was always a grown-up thing, in the same category as boozy chocolates or olives.

This was also a manly treat, like Cadbury’s Wholenut. It was a messy business and had to be conquered.

So, I’ll be sad if it goes.

I will add it to my list, as I’m always on a quest for discontinued and archaic foodstuffs.

For example, I spend half my time wandering around supermarkets, looking for tinned cod roe. It’s my octogenarian mum’s fave, on toast with a squirt of lemon, but they don’t seem to do it anymore.

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For a while, it could be discovered in ASDA, on the bottom shelf near the pickled mussels and snubbed sardines. Then, it was gone, like the final Dodo.

I asked, and they looked at me as if I’d requested a penny lick.

Of course, you can buy it from fishmongers, but it looks intimidating in that state.

My mum is also one of the few who still buys corned beef and tongue for her sandwiches. Her daughters occasionally revisit those meats. We’re not proud.

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My sister bought some at a deli counter, and the guy said that she was the only person under 80 who’d ever requested it.

Enjoy these foods while you can. You’re only ever one step away from your favourite snack being scrapped for eternity.

I haven’t been the same since Terry’s Neapolitans were discontinued, back in 2005. It’s made me edgy, and, after what they did with Caramac bars in 2023, I live in fear that they will soon scrap Revels, since nobody but me enjoys them. They seem to have already removed the raisin and peanut ones. It’s probably not too long before the orange and coffee disappear.

Anyway, I won’t get too far ahead of myself.

Let’s concentrate on rescuing the nougat for now.

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