Ambrosia (food)
Encyclopedia
Ambrosia is a well known brand in the United Kingdom. Its original product was a dried milk powder for infants, but it is most famous for its custard
Custard
Custard is a variety of culinary preparations based on a cooked mixture of milk or cream and egg yolk. Depending on how much egg or thickener is used, custard may vary in consistency from a thin pouring sauce , to a thick pastry cream used to fill éclairs. The most common custards are used as...

 and rice pudding
Rice pudding
Rice pudding is a dish made from rice mixed with water or milk and sometimes other ingredients such as cinnamon and raisins. Different variants are used for either desserts or dinners. When used as a dessert, it is commonly combined with a sweetener such as sugar.-Rice pudding around the world:Rice...

. The brand plays on the fact that it is made in Devon
Devon
Devon is a large county in southwestern England. The county is sometimes referred to as Devonshire, although the term is rarely used inside the county itself as the county has never been officially "shired", it often indicates a traditional or historical context.The county shares borders with...

 (at a factory in Lifton), with well known strapline "Devon knows how they make it so creamy".

In the late 90s, there were commercials on the Ambrosia splat custards which feature custard splatting into the face of a man who lick it off and reply with "Mmmm, strawberry/banana/chocolate flavour" and at the very end, the end of the theme from Roobarb
Roobarb
Roobarb is a British animated television programme for children, originally shown on BBC1 just before the evening news. Each cartoon, written by Grange Calveley and animated by Bob Godfrey, was about five minutes long. Thirty episodes were made, and the show was first shown on October 21, 1974...

 can be heard.

In 1999 Ambrosia launched Ambrosia Splat Custard aimed at young children, as part of their marketing they sponsored popular Saturday morning kids TV show SMTV Live
SMTV Live
SMTV Live , also written SM:TV Live and in early promotional material SMTV://live, was a British Saturday morning children's television programme, first broadcast on ITV on 29 August 1998 and last broadcast on 27 December 2003.On the surface, the programme did not seem to stray away from the format...

.

History of Ambrosia

The Ambrosia creamery was founded in 1917 by Albert Morris, in his home village of Lifton, on the Devon-Cornwall border, to make a rich food for infants. He took milk from local farms, where most of the cows were the Red Ruby
North Devon cattle
The Devon is a breed of cattle from the south west of England. It is a rich red colour, and this gives rise to the popular nicknames of Devon Ruby or Red Ruby...

 breed, and dried it with roller dryers.

The product soon came to the attention of the British military, who took significant quantities for its soldiers, still fighting the first world war.

Just prior to the second world war, the Ambrosia creamery was the first company to start making creamed rice pudding
Rice pudding
Rice pudding is a dish made from rice mixed with water or milk and sometimes other ingredients such as cinnamon and raisins. Different variants are used for either desserts or dinners. When used as a dessert, it is commonly combined with a sweetener such as sugar.-Rice pudding around the world:Rice...

 ready in a tin. Following the outbreak of war the vast majority of production was placed in Red Cross food parcels.

After the cessation of hostilities Ambrosia relaunched the product, along with a creamed macaroni pudding.

In 1957, following increasing demand, the creamery opened a new factory near to the original production facility.

In 1990 the entire company was acquired by Colman's
Colman's
Colman's is a UK manufacturer of mustard and various other sauces, based at Carrow, in Norwich, Norfolk. Presently an operational division of the multinational Unilever company, Colman's is one of the oldest existing food brands, famous for a limited range of products, almost all varieties of...

 ltd., a famous brand of mustard. This in turn was bought out by Unilever
Unilever
Unilever is a British-Dutch multinational corporation that owns many of the world's consumer product brands in foods, beverages, cleaning agents and personal care products....

 in 2001. Unilever sold the brand on in 2004, to Premier Foods
Premier Foods
Premier Foods plc is a British food manufacturer headquartered in St Albans, Hertfordshire. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.-History:...

, where it is still a core brand, alongside others such as Bisto
Bisto
Bisto is a well-known brand of traditional British foods in the United Kingdom, most famous for its gravy products.-History:The very first Bisto product, in 1908, was a meat-flavoured gravy powder, which rapidly became a bestseller in the UK. It was added to gravies to give a richer taste and aroma...

, Branston and Hovis
Hovis
Hovis is a UK brand of flour and bread, owned by Premier Foods. The brand, which began in 1886, ended up as part of Rank Hovis McDougall in 1962 after a succession of mergers. RHM, whose bread making division has been known as British Bakeries since 1955, also owns the Mother's Pride and Nimble...

.
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