Pointless Nostalgia: Creamola Foam

I keep getting those emails from people which tell you that if you grew up in ’60s, ’70s or ’80s, you should, by rights, be dead by now because, whereas children these days are wrapped in cotton wool by health and safety “gone mad” and the “nanny state”, we were allowed to go out to play by ourselves, swim in discarded water tanks, cross the road, go on away days organised by people we didn’t know, hide inside fridges, etc. There should be a Scots version of those emails which includes a section on how our parents bought, and, unwittingly and cruelly allowed us to drink, Creamola Foam. It’s true that many, many people of my age-group, especially back in the place I once called “hame”, are enchanted by the memory of this substance; but then, they’re probably the sort of people who still get a buzz from Benylin and Milk of Magnesia. Creamola Foam was manufactured in Glasgow from the 1950s. It came in the form of soluble crystals inside a wee tin with a pop-off lid and became, after the addition of tap water, a sweetly, colourfully, addictively foamy and utterly vile effervescent drink. It came in several alleged flavours: raspberry, orange, lemon, apple and, later, “cola”. (Apparently there was a “cider” one too but how that differed from the “apple” one, I have no idea – in any case, my grandmother used to give me Woodpecker to drink when I was three, believing it to be lemonade, why would I ever want cider substitute?) The tin boasted that it made “10 big drinks” and intimated that the product was, reassuringly, “fully sweetened”. As ever, there is currently a campaign to have the product brought back. For the sake of the future of teeth, I hope it’s left as a cheerful memory, a bit like the days when you could leave your front door open all day and night and never fear robbery or massacre.