When Picasso meets Chocolate

The summer holidays have just started and the Market Hall in Shrewsbury has come alive with lots of great activities!
This weekend see’s the Bird’s Nest Vintage Flea Market, a 3 day event organised by The Birds Nest, show casing fantastic local vintage wares and bands. I always make sure the Toot Sweets shop is filled with an array of retro sweets, delicate handmade macaroons, and scrummy chocolates!

Coming up this Wednesday (3rd of August) I’ll also be doing something else very exciting within the Market Hall. As some of you will know from my previous blogs Compost Kids, run my artist Sam Pooley is a gallery/ workshop based just around the corner from Toot Sweets. Sam runs regular Art classes for Toddlers, but over the summer she will be offering a range of different classes for all age groups.

On Wednesday I will be helping her run a class looking at Picasso, we’ll be making cubist inspired lolly pops and painting with chocolate (you can eat your artwork!)
The class is open for 8-15year olds; it costs £10.00 and starts at 3pm.
If you are interested in booking a place please contact Sam on 07531 824561 or email Julia: julia@tootsweetschocolates.co.uk

Reasha’s Work Experience

Every so often we’re joined by someone on a work experience placement, we always ask them to write a blog about what they’ve been up to ……

Why do we do work experience?

To get a full idea of the working world and experience a work place environment: I think this week (all 4 days of it) I have definitely
achieved that goal.

My name’s Reasha and Toot Sweets is where I am doing my work experience.  To be quite honest with you, I hadn’t been in
the Shrewsbury Market Hall since I was… 7 but this week I’ve been honoured to work within its midst. I’ve always loved sweets and chocolate, I mean who doesn’t, so naturally it’s been a delight to be around them, package them with cute curled
ribbons and even make the ridiculously professional chocolates that are displayed in the counter.

I always believed sweets to be, just that, sweets: but when you really look into it you find that there are just so many traditions and
stories behind them. Everyone has one kind of sweet they were never allowed as a child or spent their pocket money on every day after school: to listen to the tales is just wonderful.

I’ve discovered so much about the delicious chocolates they sell in Toot Sweets. It’s just incredible how much we take chocolate for
granted; it’s got such a beautiful taste, aroma, ‘snap’. Working in Toot Sweets, even for this short amount of time, has really opened my eyes to the opportunities and wonders of the profession: it’s been a real once in a lifetime experience so
for that, Julia, thank you.

I don’t want to finish on a cliché but I think I’ll have to: if you’re ever around Shrewsbury and you fancy a more than sweet treat, pop in
to Toot Sweets. It really is a fantasy.

Lucky Bags- What would you have in your’s?

I’ve just had a conversation with several people
on twitter about Lucky Bags. I used to lovely getting a lucky bag as a child
and seeing what surprises would be inside. Like lots of traditional sweets
everyone I have spoken to tonight has very fond memories, and we’ve now got on
to the topic of what we’d like in a Lucky Bag if we were to have one today, so
I thought I’d open up the question to the readers of my blog.

My bag would definitely have to have a sachet of
popping candy, some refreshers and a giant Curly Whirly (you know the huge ones
we used to have as children)

So let me know what you’d like to see in your
lucky bag and any childhood memories you have of Lucky Bags

 

2 Gold Stars won at this year’s Great Taste Awards by the Guild of Fine Food

This Saturday I found out that I had won 2 Gold Stars at the Great Taste Awards run by the Guild of Fine Foods for my Shropshire Lavender Truffle in Dark Chocolate. Some of you may remember that last year I won 1 Gold Star for my Shropshire Lavender Truffle in White Chocolate. I also won 2 Gold Stars for my Dark Chocolate Butterscotch in 2010.

I’m really glad to see that a little bit of tweaking to my Lavender Truffle has meant I have won 2 Stars. To make the Lavender Truffles I use Lavender grown by Shropshire Lavender and locally sourced cream. The truffle has a very creamy consistency and is encased in delicious chocolate (It’s available in White, Milk and Dark).

Once I have the feedback from the judges I will post some of the details 🙂

If you don’t know much about the Great Taste Awards I’ve listed some interesting facts from their website below

•  7482 products were entered this year by over 1500 companies.
• All the tasting is blind and 350+ judges are used; they range from fine food retailers, chefs, restaurant critics, food writers and other industry experts.
• Of the 7482 products entered 1686 of them were awarded 1 Star Gold, 608 products were awarded 2 Gold Stars and 114 food products received the special 3 Gold Star.

I’d just like to take the opportunity to thank all my lovely regulars and hopefully after reading this post some of you might take the opportunity to pop into my shop in the Shrewsbury Market Hall.

I can still send chocolates out my mail order as well, so please email ( julia@tootsweetschocolates.co.uk ) me if you’re interested

Sophie’s Work Experience

Every so often we’re joined by someone on a work experience placement, we always ask them to write a blog about what they’ve been up to ……

Hi, I’m Sophie and I go to the Wakeman School in Shrewsbury.
At the moment I’m working here at Toot Sweets in the Market Hall for my work
experience. So far it has been really enjoyable, and I’m sure I will enjoy this
week just as much. Ever since I was small I’ve had a passion for sweets, so as
you can imagine, working in a sweet shop has been absolutely amazing. I’ve been
doing all sorts of cool stuff while I’ve been here, like;

– Bagging up sweets
– Helping to refill sweet jars
– Making little signs for the sweets
– Helping set up displays
– Even chocolate tasting!

As you guys can see, I have been having lots of fun, but I’ve
also been learning tons of fascinating stuff too! I’ve learnt all about
customer service, and all about chocolate tasting. You know, chocolate tasting
isn’t just about taste; it’s about the smells, the appearance, and the
explosion of flavours when you bite into it. It’s almost indescribable.

I’ve done pretty much everything I came here to do, and it’s
been amazing! But there are a few things I would like to do before I go… like
learn how to do proper icing on cupcakes. I adore making cupcakes at home, but
I can never get the icing how I want it, so I would love Julia to show me how
she does the simply amazing icing on her cupcakes. I want mine to look almost
as beautiful as hers do.

So, that’s enough from me. But if you ever get a spare
moment, and you are craving something sweet, head down to Toot Sweets in the
Market Hall, because the things here are indescribably wonderful. 🙂