British cuisine
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British cuisine is the specific set of cooking traditions and practices associated with the British Isles. Historically, British cuisine has meant "unfussy dishes made with quality local ingredients, matched with simple sauces to accentuate flavour, rather than disguise it".[1] However, British cuisine has absorbed the cultural influences of the colonial era and post-war immigration, producing hybrid dishes, such as the Anglo-Indian Chicken tikka masala, often claimed as "Britain's true national dish".[2]
Occasionally vilified as "unimaginative and heavy",[citation needed] British cuisine has been judged by the full breakfast, fish and chips and the Sunday roast.[3]
Typical British dishes have for several centuries been based around a nutritious template - commonly known as "meat and two veg" - which normally consists of simply roasted, grilled or boiled meat (most commonly beef, pork or lamb) a green vegetable (steamed or boiled) and a root vegetable (usually a form of boiled potatoes, carrots or turnip).
British cuisine can be separated into national and regional variants, e.g. English, Scottish and Welsh cuisine or Yorkshire cuisine and Cornish cuisine, each of which have developed their own regional or local dishes, many of which are geographically indicated foods such as Cheshire cheese, the Yorkshire pudding, Arbroath Smokie, the Cornish Pasty and Welsh rarebit.
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[edit] Development of British Food Culture
Romano-British agriculture, highly fertile soils and advanced animal breeding produced a wide variety of very high quality foodstuffs for indigenous Romano-British. Anglo-Saxon England developed meat and savoury herb stewing techniques and the Norman conquest reintroduced exotic spices and continental influences back into Great Britain in the Middle Ages[3] as maritime Britain became a major player in the transcontinental spice trade for many centuries. Following the Protestant Reformation in the 16th and 17th Centuries "plain and robust" food remained the mainstay of the British diet, reflecting tastes which are still shared with neighbouring north European countries and traditional North American Cuisine.
In the 18th and 19th centuries, as the Colonial British Empire began to be influenced by India's elaborate food tradition of "strong, penetrating spices and herbs", the United Kingdom developed a worldwide reputation[4] for the quality of British beef and pedigree bulls were exported to form the bloodline of major modern beef herds across the New World. [3] Food rationing policies, put in place by the British government during wartime periods of the 20th century,[5] are often claimed as the stimulus for the decline of British cuisine in the twentieth century.
In common with many advanced economies, rapid urbanisation and the early industrialisation of food production as well as female emancipation have resulted in a highly modern consumer society with reduced connection to the rural environment and adherence to traditional household roles. Consequently food security has increasingly become a major popular concern.[6] Concerns over the quality nuritional value of industrialisation of food production led to the creation of the Soil Association in 1946 and its principles of organic farming are now widely promoted, and accepted as an esential element of contemporary food culture by many sections of the UK population and animal welfare in farming is amongst the most advanced in the world.
[edit] Modern British Cuisine
Modern British (or New British) cuisine is a style of British cooking which emerged in the late 1970s, and has become increasingly popular. It uses high-quality local ingredients, preparing them in ways which combine traditional British recipes with modern innovations, and has an affinity with the Slow Food movement.
It is not generally a nostalgic movement, although there are some efforts to re-introduce pre-twentieth-century recipes. Ingredients not native to the islands, particularly herbs and spices, are frequently added to traditional dishes (echoing the highly spiced nature of much British food in the medieval era).
Much Modern British cooking also draws heavily on influences from the Scandinavian[citation needed] and Mediterranean cuisines, and more recently, Middle Eastern, South Asian, East Asian and Southeast Asian cuisines. The influence of northern and central European cuisines is significant but fading.
The Modern British style of cooking emerged as a response to the perceived decline in quality of British food following the Second World War, and the resulting popularity of foreign cuisine, particularly that introduced by immigrants in the decades that followed.[citation needed] Recent Modern British cuisine has been very much influenced and popularised by celebrity chefs such as Fanny Cradock, Delia Smith, Gordon Ramsay, Nigella Lawson and Jamie Oliver, along side the Food Programme, made by BBC Radio 4.
[edit] Varieties
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[edit] English cuisine
English cuisine is shaped by the climate of England, its island geography and its history. The latter includes interactions with other European countries, and the importing 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 immigration.
[edit] Scottish Cuisine
Scottish cuisine is the specific set of cooking traditions and practices associated with Scotland. It shares much with British cuisine, but has distinctive attributes and recipes of its own. Traditional Scottish dishes such as haggis exist alongside international foodstuff brought about by migration.
In addition to foodstuffs, Scotland produces a variety of Scotch whiskies.
[edit] Welsh Cuisine
Welsh cuisine has influenced, and been influenced by, other British cuisine. Although both beef and dairy cattle are raised widely, especially in Carmarthenshire and Pembrokeshire, Wales is best known for its sheep, and thus lamb is the meat traditionally associated with Welsh cooking.
[edit] Dates of introduction of various foodstuffs and methods to Britain
[edit] Prehistory (before 43 AD)
- bread from mixed grains: around 3700 BC[7]
- dog: possibly a ritual food [8][9]
- oats: around 1000 BC[7]
- wheat: around 500 BC[7]
- rabbit: late Iron Age/early Roman[10]
[edit] Roman era (43 to 410)
- apple (?)
- asparagus [11]
- celery
- chives [12]
- coriander [13]
- cucumber
- marjoram
- marrow
- onion
- parsnip
- pea
- pheasant [24]
- rosemary
- spearmint [14]
- turnip
- wine
[edit] Middle ages to the discovery of the New World (410 to 1492)
- kipper: 9th century (from Denmark or Norway)
- rye bread: Viking era,[15] around 500 AD[7]
- peach (imported): Anglo-Saxon
- orange: 1290[16]
- sugar cane: 14th century[17]
- carrot: 15th century[18]
[edit] 1492 to 1914
- turkey: 1524[19]
- cayenne pepper,[20] parsley:[21] 1548
- refined sugar: 1540s[16]
- lemon: 1577 (first recorded cultivation)[22]
- peach (cultivated): 16th century[22]
- potato: 1586
- horseradish:[23] 16th century
- tea: 1610 or later[24]
- banana (from Bermuda):[25] 1633
- coffee: 1650[26]
- chocolate: 1650s
- ice cream: first recorded serving in 1672.[27]
- broccoli: before 1724[28]
- tomato (as food):[29] 1750s
- sandwich: named in 18th century
- curry: first appearance on a menu 1773; first Indian restaurant 1809[30]
- rhubarb (as food): early 1800s[31]
- three-course meal: about 1850 (developed from service à la Russe)[11]
- fish and chips: 1858 or 1863[16]
- Marmite: 1902[32]
[edit] After 1914
- sugar beet: 1914-1918
- sliced bread: 1930[16]
- Chinese restaurant: 1937?[33]
[edit] See also
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Cuisine of the United Kingdom |
[edit] References
- ^ UKTV. "British cuisine". uktv.co.uk. http://uktv.co.uk/food/item/aid/532951. Retrieved on 2008-05-23.
- ^ BBC E-Cyclopedia. "Chicken tikka masala: Spice and easy does it". bbc.co.uk. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/special_report/1999/02/99/e-cyclopedia/1285804.stm. Retrieved on 28 September.
- ^ a b c Spencer, Colin (2003). British Food: An Extraordinary Thousand Years of History. Columbia University Press. ISBN 978-0231131100.
- ^ http://www.greatbritishkitchen.co.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=48&Itemid=52
- ^ Ina Zweiniger-Bargielowska Austerity in Britain: Rationing, Controls and Consumption, 1939-1955, Oxford Up (2002) ISBN 978-0199251025. For general background, see David Kynaston Austerity Britain, 1945-1951, Bloomsbury (2007) ISBN 978-0747579854.
- ^ see Hungry City: How Food Shapes our LivesSteel,C,Random House (2008) EAN: 9780701180379
- ^ a b c d "Bread in Antiquity", Bakers' Federation website [1]
- ^ http://archaeozoo.wordpress.com/2007/08/23/diet-and-romano-british-society/
- ^ Cuchulainn
- ^ "Unearthing the ancestral rabbit", British Archaeology, Issue 86, January/February 2006 [2]
- ^ a b "Cooking by country: England", recipes4us.co.uk, Feb 2005 [3]
- ^ "Chives", Steenbergs Organic Pepper & Spice [4]
- ^ "Coriander",The Best Possible Taste[5]
- ^ Grieve, M. "Mints", botanical.com - A Modern Herbal [6]
- ^ Hovis Fact File (PDF)
- ^ a b c d "Food History Timeline", BBC/Open University [7]
- ^ Lee, J. R. "Philippine Sugar and Environment", Trade Environment Database (TED) Case Studies, 1997 [8]
- ^ Stolarczyk, J. "Carrot History Part Two - A.D. 200 to date" [9]
- ^ Turkey Club UK [10]
- ^ DeWitt, D. "Pepper Profile: Cayenne", fiery-foods.com [11]
- ^ "Properties and Uses: Parsley", Herbs and Aromas [12]
- ^ a b "Fruits Lemon to Quince", The Foody UK & Ireland [13]
- ^ Coleman, D. "horseradish", Herb & Spice Dictionary [14]
- ^ Dunlop, F. "Tea", BBC Food [15]
- ^ Forbes, K. A. "Bermuda's Flora" [16]
- ^ "Coffee in Europe", The Roast & Post Coffee Company [17]
- ^ The History of Ice Cream canalmuseum.org.uk.
- ^ "Vitamin C - Broccoli, Brussels Sprouts", Your Produce Man, April 2005 [18]
- ^ Cox, S. "I Say Tomayto, You Say Tomahto...", landscapeimagery.com, 2000 [19]
- ^ "The history of the "ethnic" restaurant in Britain", Menu Magazine[20]
- ^ "National Rhubarb Collection", RHS Online, 2006 [21]
- ^ "Marmite", Unilever brand page [22]
- ^ "The history of the "ethnic" restaurant in Britain", Menu Magazine[23]
[edit] External links
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