Who buys posh crackers?

[evilharpy]

This is not intended to be goady - you'll never find me on Style & Beauty being arsey about people spending £2k+ on a handbag, and I have boxes full of overpriced Christmas decorations that come out year after year. I'm just genuinely confused on who buys posh Christmas crackers with slightly less crappy but still crappy prizes.

Examples here and here. Now obviously they are a bit nicer than the usual plastic tat you get in a box of crackers from Tesco, but apart from possibly the mini jar of jam, which will last till breakfast the next day, I can't imagine any of these prizes will be kept and treasured beyond the end of Christmas dinner. I could sort of understand it if it was something edible like fancy truffles, or something consumable like make up, or even a set of wind up racing Santas which we had one year (they were shit, they either went in circles or threw themselves off the edge of the table). And far less entertaining than a plastic fortune telling fish.

Does anyone here actually buy these?

We get the Meri Meri ones, they are really beautiful and lots of have fun things for the children inside.

Thanks - they look and sound fun!

👆🏻 this

These actually look really good, my fidget-loving daughter would love them. Adding to basket...

Please don’t underestimate quite how much confetti might be escaping from them! You could power a decent wedding with just a few of them…

Oh blimey. Maybe not. I don't want to still be finding it next Christmas!

I mostly make my own with the kits as I don’t like what’s on offer. I have been known to cram in sample perfumes/aftershave, a Christmas scratchie, Lindt balls.

There are other fidget toy ones like these https://amzn.eu/d/fdHIXe8

The confetti was a lot of fun, but a lot of confetti :-)

Stupid air head people who don't care about the planet and think stuff makes them happy.

You sound joyful. Glad I won’t be spending Christmas at your place.

They might all look nice on the table settings but think of the waste and plastic tat that most of them contain !

There are other creative ways to decorate a table and provide a small token gift to a guest! Just needs a little imagination.

But they are a lot of fun, they make a pop, they have silly jokes and fun hats and there’s the surprise element of “ooh what silly thing will I win”. Frankly, stacked up against the rest of Christmas extravagance, they’re hardly the main problem. And there are loads of non plastic options too.

I wish you can still easily find the plastic tat crackers. I love a fortune telling fish, a flippy frog and a plastic moustache!

But the shops have gone green and the cheap ones now contain card games, colouring sheets or such like.

Has anyone seen where I can buy a box of traditional ‘plastic tat’ ones?

Half price crackers at musicroom - it doesn't say in the description but I found a set on ebay that showed the gifts inside were nutcracker Christmas decorations. They have 2 designs of these and also boxed sets of 12 crackers that don't have gifts for £5.40 https://www.musicroom.com/christmas-crackers-traditional-nutcracker-6x30cm-rr61701?returnurl=%2fsearch%3fq%3dcracker

I normally buy crackers in the post-Christmas sales, but failed last January.
But even the sale ones were cheapies from long lost Wilco.
The bang is the main thing small grandson loves them.

However last year we hosted DS1 ‘s Brazilian in-laws. They were entranced, totally new to them. Here is the Brazilian mum’s take on it all:

This time it was an English Christmas
Here, on Christmas Eve, people also gather at their homes with their families, as is in Brazil, but the real celebration is on the 25th. In the morning, everyone wearing a Christmas Jumper (Christmas sweater) exchange gifts and cards, later during lunch, almost dinner because here 4 pm it is already getting dark, the traditional turkey with vegetables, a few other vegan dishes, wines and at the end of the dessert, the Christmas Pudding, Christmas cake, and other goodies. I prepared some sweets, brigadieros, made of coconut and cheese. They hit the nail. The ritual of the traditional pudding is interesting, it is flamed and then served with whipped cream, everything prepared by our host. After everyone was satisfied, a prank on Christmas Crackers was made. The cracker is a very old English tradition. It's in the form of a giant candy, filled with surprises and gifts, it also has charades and questions. Each one takes their own and takes the neighbour’s, crossing their arms and all pull at the same time snapping. Quite interesting . There was no way we do it, the prayers and not the party that every Brazilian usually does. But we had the grandchild as the center of attention throwing the party. 😍
Each place with its different customs and traditions. Gratitude to dear (TrickyD and Mr Tricky) for your impeccable hospitality.

Oh, it's a nutmeg grater 🤣 I was thinking I actually really wanted a mini cheese grater 😁

But apart from that, definitely a colossal waste of money!

I have bought expensive ones once and now buy the fill your own and add chocolate and a scratch card.

The one we have would work as a mini cheese grater too, @Thisiswhatitsoundslike81 😂 It has 4 different types of grating surface.

It’s great (no pun intended) for when you want to grate a small amount of something. It’s less unwieldy trying to grate a small amount of garnish over a dish with a tiny grater eg grated chocolate on hot chocolate or as a garnish, a sprinkle of lemon or orange zest, nutmeg in quiche Lorraine, Parmesan grated or shaved at the table, a teaspoon of frozen ginger or chilli, a small amount of grated carrot or apple. I am not sure it would be very practical if you wanted to grate enough for a cheese sarnie though 😂

ETA I think our grater came from a box of fancy (ish) crackers from Waitrose reduced to £2.50 in the sales.

I've bought them (but they were on sale) as they were our contribution to Christmas that someone else was hosting. They told us not to bring food/drink but we could do the crackers, so they needed to be fancy!

I searched and searched last year to no avail.

I don't want Crackers with paper games and quizzes in. How dull.

I buy them (Christmassy colours only) for the paper crown, the corny joke, and the bang. As well as for a good laugh at whatever plastic tat comes out.
Though must say a set of vampire teeth once went down very well with a young member of the family.

Personally I wouldn’t want any booze in ours (we always have plenty anyway), nor chocs, for the same reason.

Lakeland have some unusual crackers including murder mystery ones.

God, those ones are awful! The contents are not even 'luxury'.

If I was rich I would buy proper luxury crackers from somewhere like Chase and Wonder which beautiful candles as gifts as I do love a beautiful cracker. I made my own one year, they were lovely. But I think Sarah Raven has let herself down there.

We had metal puzzles in last years crackers and it was very entertaining , we all had a go at them . The year before we had mini brick ones and you had to build FC etc , the bits were tiny though , one of my sisters took all the bits home and was still building them in March ! This year we are having Cult Pens ones , no idea what is in them but they look lovely .

I would recommend the sockshop ones, my sons still wear their Christmas socks from 2 years ago.

In fact, think I'm going to get them again for this year.