Essentially this is liquorice with all
sorts of sweet stuff mixed in to make it sweet and tasty. It is a bit
of a British thing, but nonetheless, it still tastes great!
A Bit Of history:
The marketing folks at Bassett's, (which assures us on their bags that they're 'The Original Allsorts') fondly
relates the following sweet tale (getit?... oh, never mind):
"Liquorice Allsorts – was
'discovered' in 1899. The story goes that when the company's sole
salesman, Charlie Thompson, was discussing business with a customer,
he knocked over his tray of samples, scattering his colourful sweets
on the counter. The buyer liked the look of the mixed-up
confectionery, placed an order, and Bassett's Liquorice Allsorts were
born."
The Components:
I examine the British edition of Bassett's
Liquorice Allsorts ('The Original Allsorts') here.
There is sure to be quite a bit of variation between countries &
manufacturers.
- Sugary-coconut stuff. This is, as
the name implies, a sugary substance with a hint of coconut. There
are three colours of this sugar-coconut (if I can trust what's left
in my bag, I gobbled most of it before starting to examine it, so I
might have missed one or two) - white, yellow, orange, pink and
brown.
- Liquorice. The black stuff that
should taste bad but are hmmm... nice.
- Little hard sugary balls – I
think it is the same stuff you can buy to decorate cakes. If you don't
know what I'm talking about, be at peace.
- Hardish blue and black liquorice
blend for the Bassett's man - as discussed bellow.
The Sorts
(British) Bassett's Liquorice Allsorts
consists out of the following eight sorts:
- The squares - they are like a
sandwich with the bread part sugary-coconut stuff and the filling
all liquorice. These I would deem a necessary component if you want
to sell your mix as an Allsorts..
- The squares max. (sure that is
where the fast food places got the idea) which are in essence a
double of the above, that is a layer of sugary-coconut stuff, a
layer of liquorice, a (thicker) layer of sugary-coconut stuff,
another layer of liquorice and to finish it all, you guessed it,
more sugary-coconut stuff.
- A bit of braided liquorice string –
similar to those in liquorice strings found in sweet hops, but only chopped in
short pieces.
- The Bassett's man – this is a
little man made of black and blue sweet tasting liquorice.
- A cylinder that is a layer of
liquorice on the outside and with the sugar-coconut stuff in the
middle.
- A wheel like construct where the
'hub' is liquorice and the outside is sugar-coconut. These always
taste more coconuty than the rest to me....
- A rectangular prism that consists
of two liquorice rectangular prisms and two sugar-coconut
rectangular prisms arranged in a chessboard like pattern (OK, a
very small 2x2 chessboard, butt still).
- A uhm.. a gooey wheel like shape,
made of clear stuff that tastes like liquorice with those small
decorative balls on it.
Disclaimer: Again I could have driven
some sort to
extinction before I started to document...
The Future?
The Bassett business were acquired
(gobbled up) by Cadbury Schweppes in 1989 but Liquorice Allsorts is still sold in the
UK under the Bassett brand.
Note About Spelling:
licorice is the American spelling and
liquorice the
British spelling (my favourite
sort). But if
Bassett ('The Original Allsorts') says
licorice is best spelled as
liquorice, then, well
there it is!