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Aaahh! Opal Fruits! Made to make your mouth water! I used to love Opal Fruits (and their minty cousins Pacers), those lovely little chewy fruity sweets were so tasty that a packet never used to last very long. OK, I know that technically they are still available today as Starburst, but somehow it just isn’t the same. With Opal Fruits you knew what you were getting – a gem of a fruity sweet! Starburst doesn’t really do it for me. It sounds more like it should be some kind of popping candy. Personally I still insist on calling them Opal Fruits, and apparently it seems somebody at Asda agrees with me, since were supposedly selling them as Opal Fruits very recently. Unfortunately I don’t have an Asda nearby to confirm this, and I’ve only just found out about it so perhaps that promotion has finished already?
Anyway, as mentioned Opal Fruits were deliciously chewy fruit sweets that came originally in four flavours, orange, strawberry, lemon and my personal favourite lime. As kids my sister and I tended to call them orange, red, yellow and green ones though. I seem to recall blackcurrant (purple ones to us) being a flavour as well, but the YouTube clip of the advert I found below doesn’t confirm this.
Getting the wrappers off was sometimes a little difficult, especially if they had been left in a warm place. It was all too easy to leave a bit of the paper stuck to the sweet, which usually was easiest to get rid of by popping it into your mouth and chewing a bit until the paper came away and you could pick it out. Alternatively you could just swallow it with the sweet of course! Come on, it was only paper!
They were made of an interesting type of chewy material that didn’t usually get too hard. It was normally possible to sink your teeth straight into an Opal Fruit after popping it in your mouth, no sucking was required before you could get your teeth involved.
Of course the most famous thing about Opal Fruits was the slogan “made to make your mouth water!” which featured prominently in all the advertising for the sweet. When very little I was a bit concerned about this and didn’t want to eat one just in case my mouth literally did become water – silly the things kids get scared of, isn’t it. Check out the video below and revel in that great theme song!
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Wasn’t blackcurrent one of the flavours in the 2nd lot of Opal Fruits ? A quick look at Wikpedia ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opal_fruits ) confirms the existance of Tropical Opal Fruits but the article isn’t clear about which flavours were in it.
Seems the thing about Asda having Opal Fruits was correct. Sounds like it wasn’t as popular a promotion as they hoped though (shame) as my sister-in-law visited yesterday with ten packets of them as they had been reduced to just 10p a pack!
Does anyone know where I can get a clip of one Opal fruit ad where a group of Scouts are at Echo Valley hiking and the master goes to shout but has a dry mouth so one of the kids asks..Mouth dry Skip? and hands him an Opal Fruit?
Did I imagine this ad or was it for real. It was out on the very early 80s.
If you know of it please email me xxx
Sorry mary, it doesn’t ring any bells with me, though I’m sure you aren’t imagining it. Was it an advert shown in the US by any chance?
Yes the advert with the scouts did exist! I remember it vividly when the scouts arrived at echo point and the pompous scout master tried to demonstrate the naural acoustics by shouting ‘hello!’ However all that came out was a dry rasp which provoked the hilarious schoolboy retort “Mouth dry skip?”
Oh how we all laughed!
Hi guys, I was that scoutmaster. I’ve been trying to find it too, it seems I never recorded it. Still acting – David Archer in “The Archers” and the rest. You can see other ads I did in this new page in my website.
http://www.bentinck.net/actor/commercials.html
If you ever find the Opal Fruits ad, let me know!
i have an original packet of opal fruits. never been opened! i wonder if they are worth anything now?
yes!!!!!!!!! i too have an original paper tube of original opal fruits. expiry date 08/08/1998 and the newsagents “keelers” sticker of 29p on it. it would b nice to know if they,re worth anything but i doubt it. cheers. simon