{
    "id": 1070937,
    "title": "Sweet traditions around the UK",
    "slug": "sweet-traditions-around-the-uk",
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    "modified": "2026-09-26T13:07:06+01:00",
    "excerpt": "Yellowman at the Lammas Fair, free mints at Everton, treacle toffee on Bonfire Night and 80 million Easter eggs: sweet traditions around the UK.",
    "content_text": "Many British sweets are tied to a town, but some are also tied to an occasion: a fair, a match day or a night of the year. Here are some of the sweet traditions still kept around the UK.\nYellowman at the Ould Lammas Fair\nEvery year on the last Monday and Tuesday of August, Ballycastle in County Antrim holds the Ould Lammas Fair, linked with the Lammas harvest festival. Records go back to the 17th century, and in 1606 Randall MacDonnell obtained a charter for six fairs a year, one of them on the last Tuesday in August, the same date the fair keeps today. It is widely considered the oldest fair in Ireland.\nTraditional foods are sold there, including dulse, a type of edible seaweed, and yellowman, a golden local version of honeycomb toffee: see yellowman\nThe Toffee Lady at Everton\nEverton Football Club are known as the Toffees, after the toffee shops of Everton village. One was Mother Noblett's, a sweet shop that sold Everton Mints. The link lives on in the Toffee Lady tradition: before the start of a game, a girl walks around the edge of the pitch, tossing free Everton Mints into the crowd: see Everton mints and Everton toffee\nTreacle toffee on Bonfire Night\nBonfire toffee, also known as treacle toffee, Plot toffee or Tom Trot, is a hard, brittle toffee that tastes strongly of black treacle. It is linked with Halloween and Guy Fawkes Night, 5 November: see treacle toffee and slab toffee and the toffee hammer\nChocolate eggs at Easter\nChocolate eggs have a long British history. In 1873, J. S. Fry and Sons of Bristol produced the first hollow chocolate egg, and Cadbury made its first Easter egg in 1875. Around 80 million Easter eggs are sold in the UK, and their packaging has gradually moved from plastic to recyclable card and paper.\nHawick Balls and Bill McLaren\nIn the Scottish Borders, Hawick Balls, minty, buttery boiled sweets, are linked with the rugby commentator Bill McLaren. He came from Hawick, was never without a bag of them, and used them to start conversations: see Hawick Balls\nChristmas\nChristmas brings its own sweets, from chocolate coins on the tree to sugar mice in the stocking: see the history of Christmas sweets. For more sweets tied to their home towns, see the sweets named after places",
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