Showing posts with label producers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label producers. Show all posts

Sunday, January 28, 2018

Jimmy. Danny. Tony. Ninety Years Of Sweets ‘Neath Shandon’s Tower

Jimmy. Danny. Tony.
Ninety Years Of Sweets

‘Neath Shandon’s Tower
Danny Linehan

World Wars. Financial Crashes. Troubles  Galore. They’ve all come and gone since Jimmy Linehan started making boiled sweets under the famous clocks of Shandon (Cork) in 1928. 

But there were good times too and the family kept going through it all, making those still much sought after sweets in the same building (the upstairs also used for years by Fr O’Flynn and his Cork Shakespearean Society, known as The Loft). So the same building for the sweets; different faces now with Danny (Jimmy’s son) and Tony (Danny’s son) doing the hard work.
Press mould

Tony showed me some of the Shandon Sweets machinery when I visited the other day. Nothing too fancy here, just well-made mechanical machines that seem to go on forever. 

He showed me one of their original press moulds. “That’s a hundred years old at least,” he said. “We have a few of them. It is easier to switch the machine than the insert when we have a different sweet going through.” 

A sheet of the sweet-base goes through and the pressure squeezes it into the moulds. The sheet is still together when it come out the other side but the connection between each is so slight that is quite easy to shake them up and the individual sweets fall out.

And what’s in that base? Just sugar, glucose and water. It is heated in the large cylinder to 300 degrees and that reduces it down to “a molten sugar”. Check here for a video of Tony pouring it on to the work table. 
Tony and the Batch Roller

Some hard work on the table follows, about 40-45 minutes of pulling and rolling and then you have a product ready for the press-mould. 

Or maybe for the Batch Roller, a bigger machine. A large “ball” of clove sweet, for example, is put in and the machine squeezes it down to “ropes” from which they cut either the clove sweets that come in your little bag or maybe a Cork Rock. This machine is of a more recent vintage, fifties or sixties. See it in action here.  

Indeed, there is little enough modern machinery here. The muscles are relied on as most sweets are hand-made. But they do have one luxury, an electronic packing machine. “This can do the work of two,” enthused Tony. “And was very handy in the run-up to Christmas.” Then the Clove Rocks, Mixtures, Acid Drops, Apple Drops, Pear Drops, Lemon Rock, Butter Nuggets, Rhubarb & Custard, and more, were flying out the door.

The colours you see are all natural powdered food colour while the flavours come from natural oils. Tony told me that the multi-coloured sweets, the clove and the Bull’s Eyes for example, take a bit more work.
Hot Stuff

Boiled sweets are their mainstay and there’s been little or no change over the decades. “They are all natural, no preservatives, no additives, all Gluten Free.” He is often asked for sugar free sweets and did try them at one stage. They tasted quite well but the demand wasn't enough and the line wasn't continued.

I hadn't thought about it but sweets are seasonal. Tony pointed out that Cough Drops and Manuka Honey Lozenges are popular in winter while summer favourites are strawberry and pear drops and mixtures.

Then he told me that they make their own marshmallow here. And then I remembered it. It comes in its own cone, much like an ice-cream cone. And they also do fudge and toffee.


And where do they sell all these goodies? All around the country, from Cork to Donegal, both retail and wholesale. And there is also a great demand, maybe not in January but for the rest of the year, for sweets at the factory door. “When the weather picks up you could be kept going all day with it,” said Tony whose niece is called into action for that period.


By now, Tony and Danny were getting down to business. So I said goodbye and headed down John Redmond Street sucking a newly finished apple drop and wishing and hoping that the Linehans will still be going strong, still making those traditional sweets in 2028!

For more info (and pics) check their Facebook Page and the website below.



37A John Redmond Street
Shandon, Cork.
Tel: 021-4507791

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

West Cork Suppliers on Show

Say cheese: Fooling around with Val Manning

West Cork Suppliers on Show



Some of the top food producers and suppliers in West Cork were gathered in the ballroom of the West Cork Hotel in Skibbereen last Wednesday as part of the week long A Taste of West Cork festival, specifically there in the morning so that the visiting chefs for the evening’s highlight, the Celtic Cook-off, could sample and choose from the produce.

Delighted to get an invite to the morning session and meet up with some old friends from the markets and also meet some new ones. Manning’s Emporium  from Ballylickey had a stand groaning with some of the best cheese around: Durrus, Coolea, Gubbeen, Fermoy etc. and Val and Andrew were in top form. More top notch cheese too at the Milleens stand where Quinlan Steele was on duty.

Frank Krawczyk, a citizen of the world who loves his West Cork home, is one of Ireland’s best known salami and sausage makers. Loved his Bresaola and his treatement of a shoulder of pork, both tasty and moist, not to mention his cured ham. Frank, based in Schull, gives regular demonstrations at Ballyvolane House and O’Brien’s Chop House.
Frank Krawczyk

Axel and Marye Miret are the couple behind West Cork Garlic  and their product was used by winning chef Garry O’Hanlon. Caroline Hennessy was on the 8 Degrees Brewing stand and she was displaying the full range of their popular beers. Saw the ale again on the Friday, on tap in Cork’s latest craft beer pub, the Hub in Anglesea Street.

Two of the four people on the Celtic Cook-off working group, Avril Allshire of Rosscarbery Recipes and Sally Barnes (“the greatest fish smoker in the country”, according to one Tom Doorley) of Woodcock Smokery were both busy at their stands.

Lingered also at the Skeaghanore West Cork Duck stand, for the conversation and also for a sample or two. Here they like to keep it simple, natural and additive free. Read all about this wonderful product here.


The chefs had been down to the coast earlier in the mornings so there was no fish stand in the ballroom but the sea wasn’t forgotten as we met Sally McKenna of Bridgestone Guides and Jim Kennedy of Atlantic Sea Kayaking.  They had a very impressive display from the sea and the shore including Dilisk, Carrageen Moss, Sea Spaghetti and Wrack and more. Tasty stuff too and Masterchef winner Tim Anderson was shopping there.

Got to most of the stands but missed out on a few, including Brown Envelope Seeds. All of the suppliers were back for the Cook-off in the evening and the stands were kept busy as hundreds of people squeezed in.

A few more producers came too, including Glenilen and Matson’s Wine and Food Store of Bandon who, with Searson’s, were supplying the matching wines for the cook-off meals. Matson’s are offering 20 per cent off on the show wines for the next while. I got a taste of one of them, the Vallado from the Douro, a terrific red, easy drinking and delicious.

All in all, a great experience that underlined once again the quantity and quality of the producers in the area. And, another thing, these are friendly folk. So why not put the festival in your diary for September 2013. You won’t regret it!