Londoners Learn to Love Their Grits (the Brits put their distinctive stamp on down-home cooking.)

The International Herald Tribune ^ | March 5, 2004 | Warren St. John

[Dead Dog]

Oh yah, forgot the Blue Cheese!

[Dead Dog]

If you put a little rock salt in that ice, the beer will get really, really, close to being frozen. Use too much and it will freeze. Outstanding! better living through Chemistry!

[DugwayDuke]

Just something I picked up in the days of my mis-spent youth like making a frozen "daquiri" with pink lemonade and gin.

[NZerFromHK]

Ironically, when the Americanized form of British and European food goes back to the UK and becomes increasingly common there, the average British people (or at least the editors at the Guardian and Spectator) will whine about another sign of Americanization of British culture. And ironically, there is no similar connotation if that food style comes back from New Zealand or Australia, or even Canada (in which case it is just regarded as a "colonial" cooking style returning to the mother country).

Other examples include composed salads, brunch, shrimp cocktail, meatloaf.

[NZerFromHK]

And the most populat British food today is...chicken tikka masala. (it is like a chicken curry) Fish and chips and roast beef seems to be steamrolled by many other ethnic cuisines as well.

[Dinsdale]

Haggis

Much to his dad and mum's dismay
Horace ate himself one day
He didn't stop to say his grace
He just sat down and ate his face
"We can't have this!" his dad declared
"If that lad's ate he should be shared"
But even as he spoke they saw
Horace eating more and more:
First his legs and then his thighs,
His arms, his nose, his hair, his eyes
"Stop him someone!" Mother cried
"Those eyeballs would be better fried!"
But all too late for they were gone,
And he had started on his dong...
"Oh foolish child!" the father mourned
"You could have deep-fried those with prawns,
Some parsley and some tartar sauce..."
But H was on his second course;
His liver and his lights and lung,
His ears, his neck, his chin, his tongue
"To think I raised him from the cot
And now he's gone to scoff the lot!"
His mother cried what shall we do?
What's left won't even make a stew..."
And as she wept her son was seen
To eat his head his heart his spleen
And there he lay, a boy no more
Just a stomach on the floor...
None the less since it was his
They ate it - and that's what haggis is

From: Monty Python's Big Red Book
Published by NTC/Contemporary Publishing
Publication date: September 1980
ISBN: 0809280477
(out of print)

[Charles Martel]

Not that I ever gave it any thought, but I just always assumed that Marmite was made of ground up marmosets. It just sounded right to me...

It does indeed sound correct - just like the ground meat - groundhog connection.

[don-o]

Quid, you done broke m'heart and it was worse than being drunk and run over by a Jerry Jeff Walker danged ol' train.

Jerry Jeff Who??

Yuu are speaking of either David Allen Coe (who sings the song) or the late Steve Goodman (who wrote it.)

[NZerFromHK]

But then, so are many Americans. What we know as pizza in much of the world is in fact an Americanized form of Italian pizzas. (Italian pizzas, esp from the Naples area where it was born, rarely adds meat on it) And "Mexican" food is also Americanized.

I think what people eat in English-speaking countries depends on where you are and what migrants you mix with. For example, in the US since there are significant numbers of whites descended from non-British and Irish immigrants, German and Scandinavian types of cold cut food and sausages (eg bratwurst) or cakes (eg black forest cake) are much more commonly seen in America than the UK or the Antipodes. You also have many Hispanic-descended poeple and that explains why Mexican food is more commonly seen in your country than here (eg chicken burritos with rice or turkey mole).

In contrast Australia is situated next to Southeast Asia and many Australians are familiar with the region when they stop over there on the way to Europe - one can say that Australians are as familiar with Singapore as Americans are with Canada. At the same time most foreign students in Australia are from SE Asia and Hong Kong. Predictably enough, food such as laksa or chicken green curry are so common that you can go into a restaurant run entirely by Australians of European ancestry and order such items, while most Americans and British are still mystified by what a laksa is.

British tourists have travelled to the Mediterrenean region and they do have many South Asian migrants. Consequently you see much more "generic Mediterrenean", Spanish, and Indo-Pakistan style of cooking than Australia or America.

NZ is more complex: its (European/white) population is much more homogeneously British-Irish (eg 95% of European NZers are British-Irish while only about 1/3 of American whites are British-Irish in ancestry) and given that they are still the most British of all former British colonies and NZ's closest neighbour is Australia, so they tend to trend whatever British and Australia like to eat now. Interestingly, the significant number of Pacific Islanders does not produce any Pacific Island style food (the Samoan NZers I know pretty much eat Western food in daily life).

Canada tends to have much more authentic Chinese food than when you cross south of the 49th and given its French Canadian populations in Quebec and Acadia, Canadian food seems to be more French elements. And in light of the "diversity" and salad bowl talk of Canada's multiculturalism, it seems that Canada produces few fusion food when compared with the United States or even Australia or NZ.

Food is often a very interesting subject. And it is very easy to separate intellectual and tempermental conservatives in this area. Intellectual conservatives likes trying different food and embrace different styles (because much of conservative ideas like morality or free market has nothing to do with keeping old fashioned in what you eat), while tempermental conservatives seem to have a response like "No thanks, I'd rather have a good ol' corned beef sandwich complete with pickled cucumbers/dills." when asked whether he loves tacos or laksas.

[NZerFromHK]

BTW, Burger King is British-owned. :)

[NZerFromHK]

I think the British culinary scene has changed imcomparably in recent years. Chefs such as Jamie Oliver or even Gary Rhodes (who prepares more "British" food than Jamie) produce dishes that would be very alien to the fictional character of Phileas Fogg (of the novel Around the World in 80 Days, who could be assumed to be a archtypical idealized mid Victorian-era Englishman).

[cyborg]

I guess people find curry to be more tasty than fish and chips *LOL*

[xJones]

Yuu are speaking of either David Allen Coe (who sings the song) or the late Steve Goodman (who wrote it.)

Ouch! You're right, and there's nothing left for me but Huntsville Prison. :)

[Wallace T.]

Different environments cause adaptation, as does cross-cultural exposure. The South and the lower Midwest have the highest concentration of British descendants in the United States. Yet Southern cuisine has borrowed from French, Spanish, Mexican, and Caribbean sources as much, of not more, than other regions' cooking styles. Barbecue and deep frying, traditional Southern cooking methods, were virtually unknown in the British Isles in the 18th Century. The relative absence of continental European immigrants in the South had its impact as well. Italian, Chinese, German, and other cooking styles were late comers to Dixie compared to the Northeast, the upper Midwest, and California.

[NZerFromHK]

Agreed. I was reading Gary Rhodes' New British Classics (its American edition is called New Classics) the other day and he remarked that outdoor barbecue itself is a pretty recent phenmenon in Britain itself: it was "adopted from our barbecue-mad American, Australian, and South African cousins - definitely something to do with the weather!" (New British Classics, pp 273)

[NZerFromHK]

Many of the Brit's I've met and worked with seem to be like teh Euros in that they are fashionably critical of Yanks (prison good, Grits like vomit, ect) yet very thin skinned. That makes them and their culture fair game (but only in fun, and with respect mind you).

You can turn the table in another way and tell these British that it was not too long ago that their ancestors look down on Americans as "brash upstart colonials" and a little bit longer into the past, their ancestors actually ruled these your ancestors. (Many British poeple living today don't have a clue that the USA was once part of the British Empire - a survey indicated only 1/3 are aware of the fact while 90% of these same respondents answered correctly about Canada as an ex-British colony)

[Dead Dog]

I don't want to comparison match with anybody about ignorant countrymen. We did elect Clinton twice.

[Pompah]

Yeah-Huh. Count me with the hillbillies too.

My Grandmother was one of the last "Southern Belle's" from Northeast Texas. She referred to anyone who put sugar on a mess of Grits as a " DamnYankee ".
I never put anything but butter,salt n' pepper on mine.