Something else we need to get off our chest: the Tunnock’s Teacake is not typical of the genre, where a flatter effort full of dried fruit is more the norm. This feeds into impassioned debate, doubtless fuelled by online death threats, as to whether the Tunnock’s Teacake is a cake or a biscuit.
We leave that debate to the academics, philosophers, anthropologists and other mobsters. It’s already taken hours of research to decide if teacake is one or two words.
Before proceeding any further, we offer the inevitable disclaimer or preface that is such a prerequisite for writers in today’s grimly judgmental world. To wit, we’re always antsy about including commercial products in this authoritative and influential series.
But this one is routinely described as “iconic” and, besides, it’s not as if we have any influence over what people buy or shun. That said, we did manage to get last week’s Edinburgh Hogmaninny bash cancelled. Result!
The other problem with this week’s Icon is that its makers have gone out of their way to describe it as British rather than Scottish. Its characterful chief is an avowed unionist into the bargain. Another sad case of “Scotland, land of cakes and traitors”? Well, steady on, you fellows.
The second part of that formula is rarely apposite, and certainly not in this instance. As for the first, isn’t everywhere a land of cakes? Sweet tooth? This news just in: every nation has a sweet tooth. It’s the same with Scotland frying. Every nation fries its food. Look at your Chinese or Indian menu next time and try to identify anything apart from raita that isn’t fried. But, yeah, only in Scotland.
In the interest of science, or at least exposition, I rented one of yon internets and looked up which country has the sweetest tooth. And it’s … well, it’s the internet so there are 13 versions of the truth.
However, unpicking the factoids, the top two appear to be the United States and Germany. Ireland, the Netherlands, Austria and Finland score highly too.
The United Kingdom, in various top tens, generally comes between fifth and seventh. Even then, doubtless it will be spun that Scotland, as ever, drags the United Kingdom down. In cinemas south of the Border, I am reliably informed, they have pick ’n’ mix but it is all of salad ingredients, lettuce in one container, grated carrot in another, coleslaw in another, and on these they munch contentedly while watching films.
Well, each to his own. It’s thought that each person in Scotland, without exception, has at some time or another tasted a Tunnock’s Teacake. It’s comfort food and, if there is any truth in Scotland frying and snacking, then it is to ward off the discomfort of our miserable weather and constitutional schizophrenia.
So, Tunnock’s: ya gotta love it. It’s a family firm founded by Thomas Tunnock in 1890, when he bought a baker’s shop in Uddington, Lanarkshire, where the factory is still based. It looks like Sunshine Desserts in The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin.
However, none of its senior executives, as far as we know, has faked his own death and taken up a new life as a labourer finding fulfilment working in a sewage works and looking after pigs.
Its top man, indeed, has always been devoted to the business. Now 91, turning 92 this month, Sir Boyd Tunnock is grandson of the aforementioned Thomas. The Times Literary Supplement branded him “the Willy Wonka of Tannochside”.
Sir Boyd (or Archbald; Boyd is his middle name) it was who first produced the Teacake in 1956. Today, it is exported around the world, bringing a little taste of home to expats in the likes of South Africa, Australia and Kuwait. It is big in Saudia Arabia and adored in Canada.
Nearer to home, a stooshie occurred in 2016 when the company launched an advertising campaign on yonder London underground with posters dropping the whole Scottish angle and describing their product as “Tunnock’s Great British Teacake”. Further outrage was fomented when it was claimed the Lion Rampant had also been dropped (untrue as it turned out).
The campaign was clearly piggybacking on The Great British Bake Off – a popular TV programme, M’lud – but led to a Facebook campaign called Boycott The Companies That Scared Scotland, which said: “This is the second time this company have p***ed on Scotland after funding a No vote in 2014.
What’s really petty is a millionaire interfering with a country’s democratic decision so he can sell more biscuits.”
Boyd hit back: “We could have said Scottish but you’re then promoting Scotland. We’re British. The vote said we’re British.” On Radio 2’s Jeremy Nutter Show he added that the exposure had been “great” free publicity. Previously, in 2012, he had described himself in a Herald interview as “Nationalist British”.
In the end, despite the product being branded “Tory teacakes”, most folk remained mellow about the mallow, and the brouhaha was seen as a storm in a teacake. Though doubtless discomfited as differences emerged, Alex Salmond had always been a fan and had served Rupert Murdoch with the foil-wrapped delicacies when the media mogul dropped in for tea at Bute House.
Today, Tunnock’s Teacakes continue to roll off the production line in their hundreds of thousands. The company makes other products, such as Caramel Wafers, Snowballs and Caramel Logs. Celebrity fan Chris Martin, out of that Coldplay, said: “You can’t choose between the Caramel Wafer and the Teacake. They’re like Lennon and McCartney – you can’t separate them.”
And you can’t separate Tunnock’s from Uddingston. The company employs more than 500 people there and, even when there was a strike in 2010, with workers wanting more than “crumbs”, the union admitted there was still “a great affection” in the community for the “proper Scottish icon”.
*******Our columns are a platform for writers to express their opinions. They do not necessarily represent the views of The Herald.
Robert McNeil is arguably Scotland’s leading writer on astronomy. He believes that, as Jupiter ascends to its fourth hydrant, this will be a good year for all Capricorns and Sagittarians.