In between cycling and all the other stuff I do, I enjoy eating ‘traditional English Food’. I know the ‘fashion’ is to eat Pizza, Curries and Chinese and yes, sometimes I enjoy that too, but sometimes I just long for ‘English Food’, after all, I am not Italian!
I love trying foreign food but sometimes I need ‘my own culture’. I suppose it gives me some homely comfort in some ways.. even it Shepherds Pie.. hey, isn’t it called Cottage Pie..ah, that’s not the same!
My father was a good cook and he was brought up on ‘English cooking’. We had a typical Roast Dinner and we also had a very good tea with all the ‘proper cakes and crumpets’.. and we used to have it at 4pm. My mother used to bring the Gong, my father brought back from his school trip to India at teatime and we all rushed down for it on time. Tea time was an important almost ‘regimental’ family event. However, when he died when I was young, all that went (I am a bit cheesed off that my mother didn’t keep it up).
Breakfast and tea are my favourite meals. Nowadays I rarely have tea but I quite fancy bringing ‘that tradition’ back again.
In my blog, I will show my attempts and try and follow the English recipes I find.
I meet older people and they give me ghastly tales of ‘tripe and onion’… it’s sounds disgusting. Can you get tripe from the deli counter or do you have to trek to the nearest Slaughterhouse?!). Saying that, I prefer veggie meals, so whether or not, I go through with this is another matter!
Then in wartime, they used to have spam…I love that too. I am member of the Veteran Cycle Club and I suppose eating spam would be on par for the course.
I wonder if there are others feel the same and want to ‘rebel’ against this ‘alien food’ almost in every town and village. I know we are supposed to be ‘progressive’, but why is it at the cost of our identity and soul?
Some of the English food we have, has a lot of history behind it. I don’t know the history behind the curries!
I’ve seen a pub selling pie & mash, which is a good thing, but it’s in Kent not in the East End of London. I think it tastes better in the East End than in Kent! However, the East End has changed hell of a lot. It maybe out of place there now. Perhaps people in Kent are asking for ‘English Food to come back’.
You go to pubs & hotels in various towns and they all seem to be selling exactly the same things – curries, chips, caesar salads.. there’s so much competition now between restaurants. I think they need to try something different otherwise customers will just get bored. I rarely go to restaurants because they’re so boring now!
