Title: About British Food
Categories: Info British
Yield: 1 Servings

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Info file

Great Britain, an island country in northwestern Europe, is really four countries -- England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. British cookery has been much maligned and has improved dramatically in the restaurants and country inns in the past decade.

Traditional British cuisine is substantial, yet simple and wholesome. The Brits have long believed in four meals a day. Their fare has been influenced by the traditions and tastes from different parts of the British empire: teas from Ceylon and chutney, kedgeree, and mulligatawny soup from India. The British nanny has also played a role with her nursery favorites, such as Bread and Butter Pudding, Spotted Dick, and Treacle Tart. Roast beef with Yorkshire Pudding and Plum Pudding are important contributions to international cuisine. Other popular dishes include Cornish Pasties and Beefsteak and Kidney Pie. The English developed a line of spicy sauces including ketchup, mint sauce, Worcestershire sauce and deviled sauce.

Today there is an emphasis on fine, fresh ingredients in the better restaurants and their markets offer countless worldly items. Salmon, Dover sole, prawns, game, and lamb are choice items. Wild fowl and game are specialties.

Among English cakes and pastries, many are tied to the various holidays of the year. Hot Cross Buns are eaten on Good Friday, Simnel Cake is for Mothering Sunday, Plum Pudding for Christmas, and Twelfth Night Cake for Epiphany. Local delicacies include Bath Buns, Chelsea Buns, Eccles Cakes, and Banbury Cakes. Cheeses are choice regional specialties, including Stilton, farm-house cheddars and Cheshire Cheese.

The Scotch have their own national dishes, based upon wild products and food, locally produced in this northern region. They include oats, barley, fowl, game, mutton, salmon, herring, and haddock. Oat cakes, shortbread, black buns, bannocks, finnan haddies and haggis are specialties.

Ethnic restaurants -- French, Italian, Indian, Greek, Thai and many others ~- are very popular in the British Isles.

English Breakfast

The traditional English breakfast is a bountiful event, and generally included in the price of a stay at a bed and breakfast hotel. It includes a glass of orange juice, a bowl of cereal, and a plate of crisply grilled bacon, sausage, or finnan haddie, fried or scrambled eggs, and grilled tomato halves, sauteed mushrooms, and fried bread. A rack of freshly made toast, butter, and marmalade and tea or coffee accompanies.

Lunch in a Pub

A Pub lunch is a fun way to enjoy the midday repast. Pubs are located throughout the country and offerings include both sandwiches and hot food along with beer and ales. Smoked salmon and cress on brown bread and the Plowman's Lunch, a plate of cheese, chutney, pickles, and bread are classic.

Afternoon Tea

Afternoon tea is a custom, often served between 4 and 6 PM. It can include a plate of delectable little sandwiches -- cucumber, seafood, deviled meat or egg -- scones, buns, tarts and cakes. Tea shops offer scones with clotted cream or Devonshire cream and jam.

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