Joy of Amscol sticks in the memory

WHENEVER the word Amscol is mentioned to an Adelaide-raised baby boomer, their eyes glaze over and they seem to drift off with sweet memories.

WHENEVER the word Amscol is mentioned to an Adelaide-raised baby boomer, their eyes glaze over and they seem to drift off with sweet memories of hot summers and an ice-cream cone at the beach or the pictures or the special once-a-week luxury of a slice of Amscol ice cream from the brick after tea.

Even as I’m writing this, I’m immediately transported back in time to being a kid again, and Friday nights, when sometimes as a special treat we had takeaway fish and chips, and then Dad would carefully slice the brick of ice cream into six equal portions, served with mum’s preserved peaches from our peach tree.

It’s not hard to understand why we still have such a soft spot for Amscol – it was the ice cream we grew up with and people today still swear it was creamier and had a far better flavour than anything currently on the market.

Amscol stands for Adelaide Milk Supply Co-Operative Limited which took over the premises and goodwill of the Beauchamp Brothers in Carrington St in the city in 1922. Walter and Frank Beauchamp founded the original business in 1909 on the north side of Carrington St, just east of the Earl of Aberdeen hotel. Amscol was registered as the new company’s trademark on January 16, 1922.

It was an extensive business and produced bottled milk, ice cream, cream, cheese and butter. By 1940, in addition to the city premises the firm also had established factories at Woodside, Mt Torrens, Murray Bridge, Kadina and Cummins.

In 1965, Amscol purchased the Albert Terrace Houses in Carrington St and converted them for office and storage use.

The ice-cream brick was first introduced in the ’50s when refrigerators started to appear on the market.

Most brands in those days had a small rectangular freezer compartment inside the body of the fridge itself and the brick was made to fit snugly in. Later, as fridges were made with larger freezers, Amscol produced tins, and finally plastic containers for their famous ice cream.

Some memories from the Adelaide Remember When Facebook page and blog about Amscol included going to the corner shop on a Sunday to buy a brick of ice cream to have after lunch with “pudding”. “They wrapped it in lots of newspaper so it wouldn’t melt on the walk home”.

Others recalled the different flavours, including Rainbow, Dutch Treat, Honeycomb and Strawberry.

Dandies and Eskimo Pies were sold at the pictures on Saturday nights by tray boys, usually dressed in a semi-formal military style uniform; “and you had to line up to get them before they melted”.

By the ’60s, Amscol had introduced an ice-cream treat for footy lovers in SANFL team colours.

The multicoloured small blocks of ice cream were supplied with wafers and came in double blue for Sturt, yellow and blue for West Torrens, black and white for Port Adelaide, etc. I’m reliably informed the black ice cream was not to everybody’s taste.

The company also supplied milk for the government’s “milk for schoolchildren” program.

They produced special third-of-a-pint bottles of milk and although we loved the ice cream, many people have less pleasant memories of trying to chug down the warm, sour milk at recess time.

The scheme was introduced to ensure that all Australian children would be getting fresh milk and a good dose of calcium each day.

While the idea might have been fine, in practice there were a few problems. The truck would normally drop the milk off at about 9.30 and recess wasn’t until 10.30 (from memory) and on a hot Adelaide summer day the milk would go off.

No refrigeration was available and usually the teacher still made you drink your milk, off or not. It put many people off drinking milk even into their adult years.

Recalling the daily milk ritual at school, posters on our Adelaide Remember When daily blog recollected how some kids brought chocolate powder to mix with their milk or used flavoured straws. Another wrote of the smell of the warm, sour liquid; “I would run to the back of the line continuously until they were all gone”.

Amscol’s milk processing works and factory remained in the same city location right up until the company ceased trading in 1982 and was eventually sold and returned to housing.

Many will recall, I’m sure, the retail outlet off the side street from Carrington St where it was possible to purchase the full range of the locally produced products and which made “the best ice-cream milkshakes in Adelaide”.

Amscol may be gone but it’s certainly not forgotten … ”It’s a Food, Not a Fad”.