English cuisine

English cuisine encompasses the cooking styles, traditions and recipes associated with England. It has distinctive attributes of its own, but also shares much with wider British cuisine, largely due to the importation of ingredients and ideas from places such as North America, China, and India during the time of the British Empire and as a result of post-war immigration.

In the Early Modern Period the food of England was historically characterised by its simplicity of approach and a reliance on the high quality of natural produce. This, was in no small part influenced by England's Puritan flavour at the time, and resulted in a traditional cuisine which tended to veer from strong flavours, such as garlic, and an avoidance of complex sauces which were commonly associated with Catholic Continental political affiliations. It is possible the effects of this can still be seen in traditional cuisine.

Traditional meals have ancient origins, such as bread and cheese, roasted and stewed meats ,meat and game pies, boiled vegetables and broths, and freshwater and saltwater fish. The 14th century English cookbook, the Forme of Cury, contains recipes for these, and dates from the royal court of Richard II. In the second half of the 18th century Rev. Gilbert White, in The Natural History of Selborne made note of the increased consumption of vegetables by ordinary country people in the south of England, to which, he noted, potatoes had only been added during the reign of George III: "Green-stalls in cities now support multitudes in comfortable state, while gardeners get fortunes. Every decent labourer also has his garden, which is half his support; and common farmers provide plenty of beans, peas, and greens, for their hinds to eat with their bacon."

Other meals, such as fish and chips, which were once urban street food eaten from newspaper with salt and malt vinegar, and pies and sausages with mashed potatoes, onions, and gravy, are now matched in popularity by curries from India and Bangladesh, and stir-fries based on Chinese and Thai cooking. Italian cuisine and French cuisine are also now widely adapted. Britain was also quick to adopt the innovation of fast food from the United States, and continues to absorb culinary ideas from all over the world while at the same time rediscovering its roots in sustainable rural agriculture.

Traditional cuisine

The Sunday roast

Sunday roast, consisting of roast beef, roast potatoes, vegetables and Yorkshire pudding.

The Sunday roast was once the most common feature of English cooking. The Sunday dinner traditionally includes roast potatoes (or boiled or mashed potatoes) accompanying a roasted joint of meat such as roast beef, lamb, pork, or a roast chicken and assorted other vegetables, themselves generally boiled and served with a gravy. Sauces are chosen depending on the type of meat: horseradish for beef, mint sauce for lamb, apple sauce for pork, and bread sauce for chicken. Yorkshire pudding normally accompanies beef (although it was originally served first as a "filler"), sage and onion stuffing pork, and usually parsley stuffing chicken; gravy is now often served as an accompaniment to the main course. The practice of serving a roast dinner on a Sunday is related to the elaborate preparation required, and to the housewife's practice of performing the weekly wash on a Monday, when the cold remains of the roast made an easily-assembled meal. Sunday was once the only rest day after a six-day working week; it was also a demonstration that the household was prosperous enough to afford the cost of a better than normal meal. An elaborate version of roast dinner is traditionally eaten at Christmas, with almost every detail rigidly specified by tradition. Since its widespread availability after World War II the most popular Christmas roast is turkey, superseding the goose of Dickens's time. Before the period of cheap turkeys, roast chicken would be more common than goose, goose being unsuitable for small groups of diners. Game meats such as venison which were traditionally the domain of higher classes are occasionally also eaten by those wishing to experiment with a wider choice of foods, due to their promotion by celebrity chefs, although they are not usually eaten frequently in the average household.

Afternoon tea

Main article: Tea

It is a widespread stereotype that the English "drop everything" for a teatime meal in the mid-afternoon. This is no longer the case in the workplace, and is rarer in the home than it once was. A formal teatime meal is now often an accompaniment to tourism, particularly in Devon and neighbouring counties, where comestibles may include scones with jam and clotted cream (together known as a cream tea). There are also butterfly cakes, simple small sponge cakes which can be iced or eaten plain. Nationwide, assorted biscuits and sandwiches are eaten. Generally, however, the teatime meal has been replaced by snacking, or simply dispensed with.

Tea itself, usually served with milk, is consumed throughout the day and is sometimes also drunk with meals. In recent years herbal teas and speciality teas have also become popular. Coffee is perhaps a little less common than in continental Europe, but is still drunk by many in both its instant and percolated forms, often with milk (but rarely with cream). Italian coffee preparations such as espresso and cappuccino and modern American variants such as the frappuccino are increasingly popular, but generally purchased in restaurants or from specialist coffee shops rather than made in the home. White sugar is often added to individual cups of tea, or brown sugar to coffee, but never to the pot.

For much of the 20th century Britain had a system where fresh milk was delivered to the doorstep in reusable glass bottles in the mornings, usually by electric vehicles called "milk floats", though it has now been largely replaced by supermarket shopping. Some areas of the country still, however, enjoy door to door fresh milk to this day.

Chip shops and other takeaways

Fish and chips.

England is internationally famous for its fish and chips and has a large number of restaurants and take-away shops selling this dish. It may be the most popular and identifiable English dish, however before potatoes were imported from the Americas the 'chips' would have been sections of roasted root vegetables seasoned with herbs, and salty butter. In some regions fish and chips were served with a side order of mushy peas with salt and vinegar as condiments. Foods such as deep fried breaded scampi are usually on offer as well as fishcakes (authentically a fish slice between two potato slices) and a number of other combinations. Scallops, battered potato slices that were traditionally cooked with the fish and sold cheaply, are still popular.

The advent of take-away foods during the Industrial Revolution led to foods such as fish and chips, mushy peas, and pie and mash. These were the staples of the UK take-away business, and indeed of English diets, however, like many national dishes, quality can vary drastically from the commercial or mass produced product to an authentic or homemade variety using more carefully chosen ingredients.

However, ethnic influences, particularly those of Indian and Chinese, have given rise to the establishment and availability of ethnic take-away foods. From the 1980s onwards, a new variant on curry, the balti, began to become popular in the West Midlands, and by the mid 1990s was commonplace in Indian restaurants and restaurants over the country. Kebab houses, pizza restaurants and American-style fried chicken restaurants aiming at late night snacking have also become popular in urban areas. Fusions such as chips with curry sauce, chips with kebab meat and so on are also found.

Sausages

English sausages, colloquially known in certain regions as "bangers," are distinctive in that they are usually made from fresh meats and rarely smoked, dried, or strongly flavoured. Following the post World War II period, sausages tended to contain low-quality meat, fat, and rusk. (Reputedly the term "banger" derived from the excessive water added to the mix turning to steam while cooking and bursting the casing with a bang.) However, there has been a backlash in recent years, with most butchers and supermarkets now selling premium varieties.

Sausages and mashed potato with gravy

Pork and beef are by far the most common bases, although gourmet varieties may contain venison, wild boar, etc. There are particularly famous regional varieties, such as the herbal Lincolnshire, and the long, curled Cumberland with many butchers offering their own individual recipes and variations often handed down through generations, but are generally not made from cured meats such as Italian selections or available in such a variety as found in Germany.

Most larger supermarkets in England will stock at least a dozen types of English sausage: not only Cumberland and Lincolnshire but often varieties such as Pork and Apple; Pork and Herb; Beef and Stilton; Pork and Mozzarella; and others. There are estimated to be around 400 sausage varieties in the United Kingdom.

Sausages form the basis of toad in the hole, where they are combined with a batter similar to a Yorkshire pudding and baked in the oven, this can be served with an onion gravy made by frying sliced onions for anywhere over an hour on a low heat then mixed with a stock, wine or ale then reduced to form a sauce or gravy used in bangers and mash.

Black puddings and white puddings

A variant of the sausage is the black pudding, strongly associated with Lancashire similar to the French boudin noir or the Spanish Morcilla. It is made from pig's blood, in line with the adage that "you can eat every part of a pig except its squeal". Pig's trotters, tripe and brawn are also traditional fare in the North. There are also white puddings, similar but lacking blood.

Pies and pasties

The English tradition of meat pies dates back to the Middle Ages, when an open top pie crust was used as the container for serving the meat and was called a coffyn. Since then, they have been a mainstay of English cooking. Different types of pastry may be used, including the lard-rich pastry of a raised pie. Meat pies generally contain fillings such as chicken and mushroom or steak and kidney pie (originally steak and oyster).

Pork pies are almost always eaten cold, with the Melton Mowbray pork pie being the archetype. Open pies or flans are generally served for dessert with fillings of seasonal fruit. Quiches and savoury flans are eaten, but not considered indigenous. The Cornish pasty is a kind of small pie originally used by the tin miners of Cornwall. The thick, pastry crust was held in the hand while the clean pastry covering and filling were eaten; the crust would have then been disposed of due to the transmission of dirt from the hand. Pasties have also been seen deep-fried in Mexico City, having been brought over by the Cornish miners imported to work in the Mexican silver mining industry.

Another kind of pie is topped with mashed potato instead of pastry—for instance, shepherd's pie, with lamb, cottage pie, with beef, or fisherman's pie.

Cured meats and vegetables

Bacon and kippers

Northern European countries generally have a tradition of salting, smoking, pickling and otherwise preserving foods. Kippers, bloaters, ham, and bacon are some of the varieties of preserved meat and fish known in England. Onions, cabbage and some other vegetables may be pickled. Smoked cheese is not common or traditional, although apple-wood smoked cheddar has become available in many supermarkets. Meats other than pork are generally not cured. The "three breakfasts a day" principle can be implemented by eating bacon sandwiches at any time. (These have many colloquial names such as "bacon sarnies" or "bacon butties".)

Sandwiches

England can claim to have given the world the word "sandwich", although the eponymous John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich was not the first to add a filling to bread. Fillings such as pickled relishes and Gentleman's Relish could also be considered distinctively English. Common types of sandwich are ham, cheese, salad and non-traditional forms such as the "ploughman's lunch" (cheese and pickle).

Dishes of Indian origin

Kedgeree, a popular breakfast dish in the Victorian era.

In the Victorian era, during the British Raj, Britain first started borrowing Indian dishes, creating Anglo-Indian cuisine. Kedgeree and Mulligatawny soup are traditional Anglo-Indian dishes. The many varieties of Indian curry, of which Chicken tikka masala and balti are best known, are more recent. The word curry, meaning 'gravy', has been used since the medieval period. The chicken tikka masala is now considered one of Britain's most popular dishes.

Pickles, preserves and condiments

Pickles and preserves are given a twist by the influence of the British Empire. Thus, the repertoire includes chutney as well as Branston or "brown" pickle, piccalilli, pickled onions and gherkins. The Asian influence is also present in condiments such as tomato sauce (originally ketjap), Worcestershire sauce and "brown" sauce (such as HP). Because Britain is a beer-drinking nation, malt vinegar is commonly used. English mustard is strongly flavoured and bright yellow; served with meats and cooked with cheese; internationally noted for its pungency; and particularly associated with Colman's of Norwich. Pickles often accompany a selection of sliced, cold cooked meats, or "cold collation". This dish can claim to have some international influence, since it is known in French as an "assiette anglaise".

Cheese

Cheese is generally hard, and made from cows' milk. Cheddar cheese, originally made in the village of Cheddar, is by far the most common type, with many variations. Tangy Cheshire, salty Caerphilly, Sage Derby, Red Leicester, creamy Double Gloucester, pungent Lincolnshire Poacher and sweet Wensleydale are some traditional regional varieties. Cheddar and the rich, blue-veined Stilton have both been called the king of English cheeses. Cornish Yarg is a successful modern variety. The name 'Cheddar cheese' has become widely used internationally, and does not currently have a protected designation of origin (PDO). However, the European Union recognises West Country Farmhouse Cheddar as a PDO. To meet this standard the cheese must be made in the traditional manner using local ingredients in one of the four designated counties of South West England: Somerset, Devon, Dorset, or Cornwall. Sheep and goat cheeses are made chiefly by craft producers. Continental cheeses such as French Brie are sometimes also manufactured.

Pudding

During the dessert course, puddings such as bread and butter pudding, Eccles cake, Eton Mess, rhubarb crumble, apple pie, treacle tart, spotted dick, summer pudding and trifle are served. An accompaniment, custard, sometimes known as crème anglaise ("English sauce") is a substitute to "eggs and milk" made from cornflour and vanilla. These dishes are simple and traditional. There is also a dried fruit based Christmas pudding, and the almond flavoured Bakewell tart originating from the town of Bakewell. Crystallised Ginger or a Peppermint Sweet might be offered after a heavy meal to aid digestion.

Savoury course

Another English culinary tradition, rarely observed today, is the consumption of a savoury course toward the conclusion of a meal. This now though may be eaten as a snack or a light lunch or supper. Some meals today end with a sweet dessert, although cheese and biscuits may be consumed as an alternative or as an addition. In Yorkshire, fruit cake is often served with Wensleydale cheese. Coffee can sometimes be a culminatory drink.

Drinks

Elderflower and elderberry cordial is a refreshing and fragrant non-alcoholic beverage, made from the flowers and berries of the elder bush. Apple juice in its fresh pressed form, and varying stages of fermentation would be drunk, warmed and spiced in the winter time. Locally growing fruits and berry extract would also be used to flavour water with their juices. Roast dandelion root and the fresh leaves would be made into teas and tinctures and drunk for good health. Other herbal teas such as rose-hip, raspberry leaf and nettle, amongst others, would also be drunk in this way.

Alcoholic drinks

After Romanisation wine has been served with meals. As a less formal accompaniment to meals, or alone, varieties of beer or cider are also drunk. Southwest England has historically been known for drinking cider, causing it to be classified in the "Wine Belt" (fruit drinks being categorised as wine) rather than the Beer Belt with the rest of England. Not only apples are used, but perry (made from pears) and plum jerkum (from plums) have found popularity in their respective regions.

International and fusion cuisine

Chicken Tikka Masala and Naan bread.

Indian cuisine is the most popular alternative to traditional cooking in Britain, followed by Chinese and Italian cuisine food. Thai, Spanish, Jewish, Greek, Tex-Mex and Caribbean restaurants can also be found, with American and Middle Eastern food mostly represented in the take-away sector. Whereas most international food is pitched in the middle of the price range, French food tends to be considered haute cuisine.

Indian restaurants typically allow the diner to combine a number of base ingredients– chicken, prawns or "meat" (lamb or mutton)– with a number of curry sauces, without regard to the authenticity of the combination. (Many restaurants are run by Muslims from the Indian sub-continent, so pork is rarely offered.) Meals are almost always accompanied by rice, usually basmati, with bread sometimes ordered in addition. India's well-developed vegetarian cuisine is sketchily represented.

Anglo Indian Fusion food started during the British Raj with such dishes as mulligatawny soup, kedgeree and coronation chicken. The process continued with chicken tikka masala in the 1960s and Balti in the 1980s, although some claim the latter has roots in the subcontinent.

Chinese food is predominantly derived from Cantonese cuisine, and so adapted to Western tastes that Chinese customers may be offered an entirely separate menu. Spare ribs in OK sauce is an example of crossover cuisine.

Caribbean and Jewish food are mostly eaten within their respective communities, although bagels are becoming more widespread as a snack.

Reputation abroad

English cuisine may suffer from a relatively poor international reputation when compared to that of Italian cuisine or French cuisine. However, for many English people this perception seems outdated, for the poor reputation of industrially produced urban food in the twentieth century did not ever really represent the quality of food cooked in the home. Traditional English food, with its emphasis on 'meat-and-two-veg' falls squarely into the north European tradition extending from Northern Germany to the Low Countries and Scandinavia, albeit with a French influence.

During the Middle Ages and Enlightenment, English cuisine enjoyed an excellent reputation; its decline can be traced back to the move away from the land and increasing urbanisation of the populace during the Industrial Revolution. During this process Britain became a net importer of food. British food also suffered heavily from effects of rationing during two World Wars (food rationing finally ended in 1954), followed by the increasing trend toward industrialised mass production of food. However, in Britain today there is a renewed fascination with the culture of food popularly led by celebrity chefs who seek to raise the standard of food understanding in the UK.

In 2005, 600 food critics writing for (British) Restaurant magazine named 14 British restaurants among the 50 best restaurants in the world with the number one spot going to The Fat Duck in Bray, Berkshire and its chef Heston Blumenthal. In particular, the global reach of London has elevated it to the status of a leading centre of international cuisine. Meanwhile the heavy promotion of gastronomy as a post-industrial economic solution has led to a proliferation of very fine quality producers across the country.

Vegetarianism

Since the end of World War II when their numbers were around 100,000, increasing numbers of the British population have adopted vegetarianism, especially since the BSE crisis of the 1990s. As of 2003 it was estimated that there were between 3 and 4 million vegetarians in the UK, one of the highest percentages in the Western world, and around 7 million people claim to eat no red meat. Restaurants will have at least one vegetarian meal on the menu.

Lists

English food writers and chefs: a selection

3

Examples of English cuisine

For more complete lists, see the British section of the List of recipes. For traditional foods protected under European law, see British Protected designation of origin.

Savoury dishes

• Bedfordshire clanger
• Bangers and mash (sausages and mashed potato)
• Beef cobbler
• Beef Wellington
• Black pudding
• Bubble and squeak
• Cauliflower cheese
• Cheese
• Chicken Tikka Masala
• Cornish pasty
• Cottage pie
• Cumberland sausage
• Devilled kidneys
• Dumplings
• Faggots
• Fish and chips
• Full English breakfast
• Game pie
• Gooducken
• Gravy
• Hash
• Hog's pudding
• Jellied eels

• Lancashire hotpot
• Lincolnshire sausage
• Liver and onion/Liver and bacon
• Mint sauce
• Parmo (Teesside)
• Pease pudding
• Pie and mash
• Ploughman's lunch
• Pork pie
• Potted shrimps
• Shepherd's pie
• Scouse
• Stargazy Pie
• Steak and kidney pie
• Steak and ale pie
• Steak and kidney pudding
• Steak and oyster pie
• Stottie cake
• Suet pudding
• Sunday roast
• Roast beef, horseradish and mustard
• Roast lamb with mint sauce
• Roast pork with apple sauce
• Toad-in-the-hole
• Welsh Rarebit/Rabbit
• Yorkshire pudding

Sweet dishes

• Apple pie
• Bakewell tart
• Banoffee pie
• Battenberg Cake
• Bread and butter pudding
• Christmas pudding
• Cornish Clotted cream
• Crumble
• Custard
• Dumplings
• Eccles cakes
• Eve's pudding
• Fool
• Gypsy tart
• Cornish Hevva Cake
• Jam Roly-Poly
• Kendal mint cake
• Knickerbocker glory
• Madeira cake
• Mince pie
• Parkin
• Pound cake
• Queen of Puddings
• Saffron cake
• Scones
• Spotted dick
• Sticky toffee pudding
• Summer pudding
• Sussex Pond Pudding
• Syllabub
• Trifle
• Treacle tart

Other specialities

• Chutney: peach; mango; lime;
• Picalilly
• Horseradish sauce
• Green tomato chutney
• Stilton cheese
• Cheddar cheeses
• Wensleydale cheese
• Yarg (a cheese)
• Lancashire cheese
• Caerphilly cheese
• Red Leicester cheese
• Double Gloucester cheese
• Curd cheeses
• Cottage cheese

Meals

breakfast, elevenses, brunch, lunch, dinner, supper, dessert, tea

Dates of introduction of various foodstuffs and methods to Britain

See Dates of introduction of various foodstuffs and methods to Britain

See also

• British cuisine
• Welsh cuisine
• Irish cuisine
• Gibraltarian cuisine
• Anglo-Indian cuisine
• Scottish cuisine
• Cornish cuisine

References

• Hartley, Dorothy (1954) Food in England. London: Macdonald (reissued: London: Little, Brown, 1996, ISBN 0-316-85205-8). This is a charmingly old-fashioned survey of the history of English food from prehistory to 1954, full of folk wisdom and recipes (not all practical).

Further reading

• Ayrton, Elisabeth (1974) The Cookery of England: being a collection of recipes for traditional dishes of all kinds from the fifteenth century to the present day, with notes on their social and culinary background. London: Andre Deutsch
• Ayrton, Elisabeth (1980) English Provincial Cooking. London: Mitchell Beazley
• Grigson, Jane (1974) English Food. London: Macmillan (With illustrations by Gillian Zeiner; an anthology of English and Welsh recipes of all periods chosen by Jane Grigson, for which she was voted Cookery Writer of the Year. A revised and enlarged edition was published in 1979 (ISBN 0 33326866 0), and later editions were issued by Ebury Press with a foreword by Sophie Grigson)

External links

• UK Vegetarian Society
• Wikibooks: Cookbook: Cuisine of the United Kingdom
• George Orwell: A Nice Cup of Tea
• British Library Food Stories, a century of revolutionary change in UK food culture