Millingdale
- You may be looking for the tie-in website.
Millingdale Ice Cream, alternatively Millingdale Ice Creams, and more commonly known simply as Millingdale, was a family firm and ice cream company that existed in both the Doctor's universe and Pete's World. They had a website, and were operated by the Millingdale family.
Products
Millingdale's main products were naturally ice cream, for which they served several flavours, as described on the "Our Flavours" page of their website, (PROSE: Our Flavours [+]Loading...["Our Flavours (feature)"]) although they also served sorbets, (PROSE: Our Flavours [+]Loading...["Our Flavours (feature)"], Disclaimer [+]Loading...["Disclaimer (Millingdale feature)"]) which also came in various flavours. Their ice cream was served in cones with their logo featured vertically along the side. (PROSE: Our Flavours [+]Loading...["Our Flavours (feature)"]) When their ice cream was packaged, the packaging detailed which cow's udders were responsible for the "tangy dessert". (PROSE: Disclaimer [+]Loading...["Disclaimer (Millingdale feature)"])
Flavours supplied by Millingdale included "traditional" flavours, such as vanilla, chocolate, and sprout, although they also offered "a number of choices for the more sophisticated palate".
Other flavours included Golden Age Delight, Christmas Surprise, Henrik's Surprise (which replaced Christmas Surprise), Red Pit of Delight, Chalk and Cheese, Royal Turkish Delight, Death By Chocolate, Madame du Popadom, Magpie Mayhem, Fish and Chips, Lady of The Lake, Silver Giant, Welsh Rarebit, Ghost Glace, and Peas, Peas, Peas. (PROSE: Our Flavours [+]Loading...["Our Flavours (feature)"])
They also provided a product called "Peanut Perfection", which they refused to disclaim "may contain nuts", as they believed that their customers weren't stupid and, in fact, were 37% smarter than people who ate other ice creams, according to tests. (PROSE: Disclaimer [+]Loading...["Disclaimer (Millingdale feature)"])
History
According to the home page of their website in the mid-2000s, Millingdale was established in 1860. (PROSE: Millingdale home page [+]Loading...["Millingdale home page (feature)"])
The Millingdale website had an "About Us" page. According to it, the Millingdale family had been making ice cream for so long that nobody knew who first created it. The recipe was passed down across generations, and in 1980, they decided to share the dessert with a wider audience.
Accordingly, the first Millingdale Ice Cream Parlour was opened in Newport on 23 June, 1981, and since then grew "rapidly", and by the mid-2000s, it had over 200 outlets and employed over 300 people. Despite this, the recipe was kept secret, and locked away in a vault at the Millingdale family home. The "About Us" page finished off by stating that their ice cream was made with "only the finest of fresh fruit, cream and other natural ingredients".
There were quotes featured on the website from Suzanne Millingdale (PROSE: Our Story [+]Loading...["Our Story (short story)"]) and Danielle Millingdale. (PROSE: Our Flavours [+]Loading...["Our Flavours (feature)"])
At some point, Millingdale supposedly performed tests which revealed that people who ate their ice cream were 37% smarter than people who ate other ice creams.
Cows owned by Millingdale in the mid-2000s included Arthur, Beatrice, Johnny, Damian, Millicent and Dalmatia, while fruit trees owned by them at the time included Old Faithful, Ol' Yeller, and Rotten Ol' Shrivel Fruit. Their disclaimer page depicted a Millingdale employee giving ice cream to a customer. (PROSE: Disclaimer [+]Loading...["Disclaimer (Millingdale feature)"])
By this point, Millingdale had a brief jingle, which they at least played on their website's home page. (PROSE: Millingdale home page [+]Loading...["Millingdale home page (feature)"])
In London, there was an advert for Millingdale at the time of the Dummy Massacre. (TV: Love & Monsters [+]Loading...["Love & Monsters (TV story)"])
Home-made ice cream made by Millingdale was sold at the 'Lancelot Café', a part of the Leamington Spa Lifeboat Museum, which was apparently local to Millingdale. This was advertised under the "The ‘Lancelot Cafe’" header on the Leamington Spa Lifeboat Museum website's "What's On" page. (PROSE: What's On)
In Pete's World, the readers of Defending the Earth! from the Doctor's universe went to the Millingdale website to look for "the secret of Henrik's surprise", finding the secret password "Gemini12" in the description of their ice cream flavour Henrik's Surprise. The readers' correspondant, "ChatGuest1", also had prior knowledge of Millingdale. (GAME: Cybus Spy [+]Loading...["Cybus Spy (video game)"])
In the Doctor's universe, in 2007, there was an advert for Millingdale in "Victor Kennedy"'s copy of The Daily Telegraph. (TV: Love & Monsters [+]Loading...["Love & Monsters (TV story)"])
Behind the scenes
The Millingdale company originated from the tie-in website Millingdale, one of many websites created by the BBC in 2006 to promote series two of Doctor Who. However, the world building of the site is complex due to its relationship to other contemporary websites at the time; fiction on the site, such as Our Flavours, references both the Doctor's universe and Pete's World without distinction or explanation, meaning that a website that exists in the Doctor's universe makes mention of Henrik & Son, a company that only exists in Pete's World (its counterpart is Henrik's Department Store) and vice versa.
