Sweets For Your Sweet

Three top tips on the best sugar for your money...

Glickman's

Hidden in Glasgow's East End, a stone's throw from the Barras, amongst decaying businesses, pubs full of daytime drinkers and regeneration projects remains the bright red store front that is Glasgow's oldest sweet shop. Rows of glass jars are stacked high on shelves, full of multi coloured handmade sugary delights. Soor plooms, kola kubes, coconut mushrooms, fudge, bon bons, lucky tatties…and so the list goes on.

Entering Glickman's evokes an inevitable feeling of nostalgia. The family run store was established in 1903 by Isaac Glickman, who emigrated to Glasgow from Eastern Europe, taking advantage of the sugar refineries built as a direct result of colonial trade. Ships built on the Clyde brought sugar from the West Indies back to Glasgow, initiating many a Glaswegian sweet tooth.

In wartime Glasgow, business boomed. Glickman's now famous Cough Tablet – a 'medicinal sweet' – was one of the few confections not to be rationed, and queues reached all the way down the street. Today, Isaac's great grand daughter Irene Birkett continues to run the shop with the help of her daughter Julie, using traditional turn of the century recipes and cooking methods. However, that's not to say they have not embraced the 21st century, as the store has its own website where you can buy sweeties online.

With 'I Love Candy' recently opening on Byres Road, it seems that old school candy is all the rage. Secretly, we all want our sugar high from sweeties in a white paper bag…

Coco of Bruntsfield


If you're on a diet, Coco of Bruntsfield's must seem like a speakeasy during prohibition. Their organic, handmade chocolate is quietly served in the serene surroundings of a little boutique, decked out in subtle pinks and dark veneers. There's a sense of illicit pleasure here which is hard not to indulge, although the only liqueur you'll find is soaked in to chocolate dipped cherries. A selection of bars and bite sized chocolate infusions come in pretty boxes with vintage drawings of Tattooed women and Siren Mermaids tempting silently from behind the counter. So, after a tough January spent teetotal on Weight Watchers, for one weekend throw caution to the wind and saunter in on Saturday morning, with big dark sunglasses to cover up Friday night's excesses and slink up to the single row of seats, trashy magazine in hand. Ask the friendly, pretty lady behind the counter for a hot chocolate with classy toppings like cardamom, cinnamon and chillis. Sample some truffles or chocolate coated peanuts or their gooey soft brownies and, if there are any left, their Gordian knot solution to the perfect cookie: wherein they take a pretty great cookie and dip it in soft, chewy milk chocolate and voila, I am in love! But best of all are the little jars of unrefined Cocoa butter, which leaves your skin silky smooth and smelling of chocolate all day long. The rest of the weekend can now be spent, with friends and a box of chocolates, watching trashy horror movies and drinking cocktails. Best weekend ever.

Cakealicious

You won't find this hidden gem by walking the streets, but don't worry, we'll point you in the right direction. Open up your computer, type www.cakealicious.com into your browser and enter baking nirvana.

Cakealicious make exciting cakes. They're delicious for sure, no question, some of the best you'll ever eat. They're ethical too, all fair trade and organic ingredients. What's more, whether it's an
elegant bespoke two-layer cocoa occasion cake or a small box of beautiful lemon curd or raspberry cupcakes for a quiet night in, Cakealicious will do them all to order and deliver them to cake-cravers anywhere in Glasgow for a nominal fee.

Nothing says 'I love you' like personalised buttercream.