Antique Wrought Iron Sugar ‘Nips’ Or Cutters – Circa 1800s

Minimum Donation €31.00

An interesting set of Sugar Nips which are now becoming unusual to find as they were not considered ‘fine’ and worthy of collection until fairly recently. These Nips come from a private collection and are in good condition. The brace is slightly bent but still works. L:19cm (overall)

Only 1 left in stock

SKU: cc990 Categories: , Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

Description

Until the Victorians devised a method of presenting sugar in granulated form, it was sold in large cone-shaped sugar ‘loaves’. Households could buy a whole cone, or a lump sold by weight. Once at home, sugar nips were used to cut the hard piece of sugar into neat lumps. As sugar was expensive, the mistress of the house often oversaw this task, to ensure none was filtered away for use by staff, with the sugar often kept locked in boxes, just as precious tea leaves were stored in lockable tea caddies. The cone-shaped sugar loaf was a common sight until the later 19th century and everyone knew what it looked like, with even mountains and hats named after it. Even the paper it was wrapped in played a part in domestic life. Most sugar loaves sourced from the Americas were wrapped in blue indigo paper, which was recycled as a source of dye for yarn or cloth. The whiter the sugar, the more elegant, desirable and expensive it was. In medieval times, sugar was brought to Europe from the near East and for a long time it was an expensive luxury sold in tiny quantities alongside spices, being used for medicinal purposes or special concoctions cooked for the nobility. By 1600 sugar was becoming a little more available. The cone-shaped moulds for the loaves had holes in the bottom so the dark, treacly syrup from a mess of boiled sugar-cane could drain out. This didn’t leave perfectly white sugar in the mould, and ‘double-refining’ was used to produce a better grade of refined white sugar. Extra ingredients were used to encourage whitening and purification, such as clay and bullocks’ blood!

Additional information

Weight 0.2 kg