The Golden Ticket Saga - How would you deal with this?

On Saturday we ventured to the open day at Sacrewell Farm with my sister and her two beautiful children.
It is an amazing place and I would recommend it to the young and old, if you have children or not.

We had a really fun time in the play barn, a great time seeing the animals and all of the children had a go at playing pooh sticks.

Now, when we first came in to the farm, a lovely lady told us to look out for the hidden golden tickets that are all over the farm in the chances of winning a prize.

We were lucky, not only did we find one, we found three tickets. One for each of the children..........phew!

For the last half an hour of looking at the animals Tor would constantly ask, "when do we get to hand in the golden tickets?" I distinctly remember a golden ticket song starting up!

We arrive back at reception and Tor excitedly hands in his Golden Ticket. He gets offered a bowl with raffle tickets in and he chooses one. The number on the raffle ticket  matches one of the fantastic prizes on the table in view.

Both of Tor's cousins do the same and receive a cuddly pony and a puzzle. Perfect prizes and smiles all round.

Tor is handed his prize. Its a bottle of blueberry cordial.

Silence.

I am not really sure what to say to him.

He is not really sure what is happening.

As you can imagine, for a seven year old boy, this is not really the prize that he was expecting or would like.

I would like to say now before I venture further into the story that all of the prizes that Sacrewell Farm had on display (including the bottles or cordial) were brilliant prizes and I in no way would expect them to have done anything about the poor luck that Tor had been dealt.

So, we were then on the receiving end of a rather tearful, cross and confused little boy. I did feel very sympathetic and could understand the tears. What I struggled with was the anger and the fact that he expected something would be done about it if he cried and stomped and generally had a strop.
As far as I am concerned that he does need to understand that sometimes life isnt always fair. It is how you react to things that is more important.
I started to get very cross with him, at his back biting and his tears. I would not back down and I expected him to calm down.
I did tell him I understood why he was unhappy but until he calmed down that nothing could be our would be done about it.

So in the middle of the entrance to a very busy place, filled with families, I told him off, I shouted at him. He cried and tried to sit down. I told him to stand up.

I do have to praise my beautiful niece and nephew for being extremely calm, they looked affectionately at their cousin and obviously cared that he was upset.

My Sister was a saviour. Unbeknownst to myself and Tor, she had purchased a tiny little cow for him. She came over and backed me up and explained that he needed to calm down.

We left after a few deep breaths and drove back to my sisters house. It was not until Tor had completely calmed down and that I had said that it was OK, did my sister hand him the little cow (affectionately known as Moo-Moo now).

Tor was very pleased and very appreciative. I was very appreciative. Thanks big sis!

So, how would you have dealt with the situation? I look back and do not know if I acted the right way. But, at the same time I am not sure how else I would have dealt with it.

I am definitely open to ideas from everyone!