Milk bottle tops

I remember that! Also, when we were in the infant class in the mid 50's, we were given the rolls of foil that had had the tops stamped from them (so it was only the empty circles that remained in the strip), and we made Christmas decorations from them. When I think about it, it's a wonder that none of the children cut their hands...

Yes. I remember Christmas bottle tops.

And I remember cardboard ones (much earlier) that we pressed the middle bit out to put our straw through.

When the milk froze we convinced ourselves that it was ice cream.

I'd forgotten about the foil cutouts, GMG. But, Jingl, I remember the smell of half thawed milk - ugh!

Does half-thawed milk have an odd smell? I'd never noticed that. I will do a sniff test next time I thaw some.

I sometimes get a bit of a sore thumb when taking the current lids off plastic containers. Thaw some ----> sore thumb.

Sorreee!

The icicles in the milk and the tops popped of the bottles on the step when it was frosty. Even worse when the milk was warm in the summer. Urgggghh.

The crates of little bottles were brought in and placed beside the fire in the classroom. The milk gradually thawed out, but like Ariadne said it tasted and smelled awful! There used to be a iron rail around the roaring fire in the classroom and there were always socks drying on it! Remember the straws were waxed and went flat while you were sucking the milk up?

There was an old black pot-bellied wood stove in the middle of our classroom surrounded by little iron railings, and the milk bottles would be placed inside this to thaw. We ended up with an iced/ thawed mixture which was disgusting. I can still smell it......urgh.

Ariadne you are right the smell of the milk was horrible as was the taste put me off milk forever.
Butternut I can recall the black pot-bellied stoves in the class rooms. they used to glow at the bottom and I was sure they would explode !

Never took school milk because I always loathed it. In the 1940s,cardboard disks with a hole in the middle were much in demand for making pom-poms. When my DSs were small I made bells for the Christmas tree from the foil tops by shaping them over the top of a lemon squeezer.

I always hated milk, still do, but had to have it because my mother wouldn`t send a note. One morning, in 3rd year infants, something other than milk came up the straw and was crawling in my mouth! I screamed and spat it out, and haven`t touched a drop of milk since.

numberplease

Our English teacher used to stand in front of the stove whilst reading to us, with her skirt hitched up at the back!

I absolutely loved the school milk in its wee 3/4 bottle; I don't remember the Christmas foil tops though. When I had daughter No.3 and was in hospital for a week before she was born, we had to have milk at night and all the other Mums gave me theirs - no wonder I am so porky. Somehow, milk in a 2 litre plastic bottle doesn't have the same appeal as those little school bottles.

I too enjoyed the small bottles of milk each day even when warmed in front of the stove. Mind you I liked pink custard and tapioca at school as well so perhaps I'm a bit of an oddball

There was a girl in our class, called Irene Jepson, she was a tiny little thing, used to drink about 10 of those little bottles every morning, courtesy of all the people who hated milk! AND she stayed tiny!

My primary years at school were made hideous by school milk. I never drank fresh milk even as a toddler and school breaks were a constant worry about how to quietly get rid of milk without drinking it and without being seen.

One school I went to served it warm with lunch and all my lunchtimes were spent having a stand-off with staff as I was kept, even into the afternoon school session sitting at the table refusing to drink it and retching and being in sick if I did. Why I did not tell my mother I have no idea, one just didnt take home tales from school.

There was always some strange child in my class who was happy to have my milk!

Oh annobel so I am strange then!

I'm really puzzled about the smell of half-thawed milk that has been mentioned. I freeze milk every week because I have groceries delivered (shared car not available most of the time, supermarket twelve miles away, hate shopping anyway, cartons too heavy to carry from village shop) and get enough milk to last the week at once. I often start using a new carton before it has completely thawed. There is no unpleasant smell. Was the school milk actually being warmed by the fires, so the milk was half-cooked as well as half thawed? That's the only thing I can think of to explain an unpleasant smell, except that warmed milk doesn't smell unpleasant either. Very odd! Maybe the milk wasn't fresh.

I enjoyed my school milk and didn't drink much other than milk or water until I was an adult.

Yes, it was being warmed whilst de-frosting - perhaps that's the explanation. I freeze my milk too, and don't notice a funny smell when having de-frosted it.

In our school, Bagitha we had a radiator with narrow metal shelves fixed to the front of it. The milk (a third of pint each) was put on those to thaw and was tepid by the time we drank it. It tasted OK (though I have never been keen on milk as a drink ever since) but inevitable some drips must have got onto the shelves and the radiator, or perhaps the bottles were splashed while they were being filled, because there was a lingering smell of old milk clinging to the outsides of the bottles. It got onto your hands too.

The milk came from a local farm, who also supplied milk door-to-door. This was not in bottles, but was poured into whatever can or jug you had set out ready. It was paid for pro rata, but whenever the farmer's son was on deliveries, my mother reckoned she got about half-a-jug at full jug prices. She suspected he was making his own little profit.

Remember the way when you opened the bottle your thumb would go suddenly through the centre of the cardboard top and shower you with milk?