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Title: SUGAR BOILINGS

Reference number: 7257

Date: 1945*

Sponsor: McLeans Edinburgh Quality Sweets

Sound: silent

Original format: 16mm

Colour: bw

Fiction: Non-Fiction

Running time: 11.50 mins

Description: How to make sweets at McLean's, Edinburgh. Includes the production of sugar boilings such as striped cinnamon balls and mixed striped rock, as well as offering an insight into the machinery and manual labour involved.

See also refs. 1752 and 7574.

Shotlist: [shotlisted from MiniDV, manual control track. Note: Overall running time at actual running speed of 16fps is 11.50 mins]

(0.00) [COL] McLeans Edin. Quality Sweets present title (0.19) [BW] pan along shelf filled with glass jars full of McLean's boiled sweets, these include 'Mixed Hawick Balls' and 'Striped Cinnamon Balls' (0.27) c/u someone opening a bag of Walker's sugar and pouring it into small bowl, following shot features industrial quantity of sugar being tipped into huge bowl. Boiling hot water is added, mixture is swirled together using wooden palette (0.52) mixture bubbles furiously (1.06) temperature is checked using thermometer, simmering vats of liquid now covered with lids (1.20) Pure Butter is added gvs same, the hot mixture starts to foam (2.00) bowl of hot liquid is poured into a huge flat tray (2.23) the now hardening yet liable mixture is rolled and kneaded (2.46) long 'snakes' of mixture are extruded through machine, twisted and lengthened by hand into thinner 'snakes' (3.46) lots of 'snakes' are laid out in rows... (3.52) ... put through machine where small chunks are chipped (3.57) hand cranking of this machine (4.05) chunks are tossed and shaken by hand (4.14) and now Cinnamon Balls length of softened mixture is wrapped repeatedly around a spike on wall (4.32) mixture is kneaded, glossy large 'cube' is produced (4.40) two people now knead the mixture, one has a dark 'cube' and one a lighter one. They stand at opposite ends of the table, line up alternate colours in strips, stretch this out by hand., cut into sections (5.07) striped sections now on table, the process is repeated several times to create multiple striped sections (5.17) large dark roll of mixture is placed on top of striped length. The striped length is then wrapped around the dark roll, everything is rolled into shape (5.27) this big 'snake' is extruded to create thinner 'snake using machine and manual 'squeezing', repeated process (6.06) smaller balls are produced by machine (6.20) gvs same, snake sections are fed through machine which punches out cinnamon balls (7.28) Chipping & Mixing the Cut Rock chunks of rock are spat out of machine (7.42) differently coloured rock chunks are added to mix, people mix the different coloured rock by hand (8.15) weighing batches of mixed rock on scales (8.24) funnelling rock into big glass jar labelled 'McLean's Mixed Cut Rock' . Jar covered with paper, lid screwed on (8.45) gvs rows of glass jars with different sweets inside, including 'Blackcurrant Toffee', 'Striped Cinnamon Balls', 'Assorted Fruit Toffee', 'Clove Rock Chips' (9.03) delivery boys unload wooden containers with the jars inside (9.16) Kids Corner young boys are handed sweets at the door of the factory (presumably leftovers)(9.33) 'Parkes Classic Confectionery' lorry is loaded up with wooden boxes full of jars of sweeties, (heavy work!) (10.08) SUGAR SWEET The End (10.31)