Homage To Fudge

I'm rather enjoying Monday evenings in, at present. There is a string of programmes I don't like to miss: Junior Mastermind; University Challenge; a delightful repeat of Rick Stein's Food Heroes Christmas Special featuring dear Chalky (RIP) which, I confess, brought a little dewiness to the eye. The televisual highlight was Monarchy: The Royal Family At Work. I have always had immense admiration for HM The Queen and our Royal Family. This programme reinforces my view.

During the evening we opened a carton of fudge which we'd been given as a present. My mother always used to make fudge at this time of the year and the fudge we tasted this evening was close in taste to Mother's. The Observer newspaper reckons it is "the world's best fudge" and I won't disagree with that. It's simply called Burnt Sugar Original Crumbly Fudge and is made by a company called Burnt Sugar which seems to be based in Oxfordshire. I've also tried Sainsbury's Taste The Difference fudge, which I think is very good; and Thornton's has a good flavour too. However, I think the Burnt Sugar fudge has the edge. I see it has only six ingredients, which is to its credit: no long list of additives etc.

Colin Cather, who is the managing director of Burnt Sugar and a fellow Ulsterman, has just told me that their fudge is now available in Tesco & Sainsbury.