Nothing beats a proper English breakfast
Also, beef wellington is pretty great if done right.
Nothing beats a proper English breakfast
Also, beef wellington is pretty great if done right.
Fish and Chips
Is shepherd's pie British? Or is that Scottish/Irish? 🤔 I like that, too.
Fun fact: 'fish and chips' was introduced to England by a Jewish migrant, same as pastrami for the USA. And shepherd's pie is British, but it's unclear whether it was northern England or Scotland.
Visited Scotland
Walked into a little mom-n-pop fast restaurant
Wondered wtf is a "deep fried pizza", ordered one.
Dude took a "frozen" pizza out of the fridge
Dude folded it in half and stuck it in an oil deep fry.
OMFG never tasted such sweet sin... crispy flakey crust on the outside, melty cheesy inside
Totally worth the 10 million calories and arterial hardening
I'm flabbergasted that I've never seen that dish in the US. Well done rando Scot!
Oh, this isn't 'rando'. Chippies in Scotland will deep fry any fucking thing. Pizza? Standard. Mars bar? Of course! In some chippies you can even take something you've bought somewhere else and ask if they'll batter and fry the fucker for you and they'll say yes.
Whenever I get home to Scotland, my personal supper of choice is the haggis supper - a sausage of haggis meat, battered and deep fried, and served with beautifully fried chips, of course. The second night I'm home (especially if the wife isn't with me) is a haddock supper. Fuckin' grand.
I don't have much of a sweet tooth, but I'm told by those who do that the deep fried Bounty is just the wrong side of the acceptable line of deep fried sweet shit.
What, did you think that was the one bit of Americana that didn't cross an ocean?
Nah, thought Scots like themselves enough to not eat like that.
This is somehow the second time Scottish self-loathing has come up on Lemmy. Here's the clip from Trainspotting.
I have no idea if that has anything to do with real life, or it's just a very famous movie, but they do eat a lot of weird fried stuff and have terrible health stats.
Lived in the uk for just over 10 years from 2000 to 2011. there were some great pub meals in both the north (around Yorkshire and Durham) and in the south west (Swindon / Bath).
I was very disappointed with Indian when I moved back to New Zealand so I guess that was good as well.
We cant get good Jamaican/Caribbean in small town NZ, and that was a good go to down south.
Steak and ale pie is delish!
Hm what is that? I know the words but I never heard them in this combination as a dish.
It's a pie with steak and ale in it
How does the ale stay in there? Or is it just a little bit?
I guess I'm an uncultured savage but yorkshire puddings. By a county mile.
the british food being shit discussion is never dormant for long. maybe it is shit but for me, of all the dinners i've ever had, nothing beats good bangers and mash
yeah, maybe i'm just shit at being english (i don't like tea or football either) but i am not compelled to defend the cuisine. if i could figure out exxactly why i like bangers and mash so much i might prepare a argument for it but 'i just really like it' suits me fine
Fish n chips hands down 100% final answer lock it in.
To anyone whos been to both places can you get "proper" fish n chips the world over? I've asked a few americans on xbox a few times and they tell me that its "fish and steak fries" and its basically the same thing, but it doesnt sound like it will be the same.
Chippy chips are a very specific thing and its incredibly difficult to explain that to someone who hasn't experienced it and just understands.
In America, the best approximation we can get to chippy chips are our steak fries. It's the cut of potato that's most similar, but there is a whole spectrum of doneness that one is rolling the dice on when ordering steak fries.
And you're right. There ain't nothing like chippy chips. I'm over here chasing a dragon when I should just be buying a plane ticket.
Oddly enough, the fast food Greek place here (not a chain) gets the closest to what I had in England.
I lived in the US for a while and never once had proper fish and chips. Even the 'English themed pubs' didn't do it right.
But there's some amazing American food and if you're just looking for British fish and chips while abroad you might as well go on a package holiday.
It's weird, even americans who actually try hard don't do fish and chips as well as brits who look like they're barely trying.
Its no good to me now, but my dream was to get a big van and go touring other countries selling proper fish n chips. Get a social media presence showcasing peoples reactions and announcing my next stops like a tour.
If everywhere else already has authentic chippies then its fairly dead already. I don't know if they do or don't without doing the traveling that that career was going to provide though.
You're right, US fish and steak fries are not in the same league as authentic UK fish and chips.
Let's start with:
Fish and chips
Chip butty
Yorkshire fishcake butty
Whitebait
Scottish smoked salmon
Cromer crabs
Potted shrimp
Scallops and Black Pudding
Sunday Roast (beef, lamb, pork, chicken, vegetarian)
Beef Wellington
Full English
Full Scottish
Full Welsh
Ultster Fry
Deviled kidneys
Mixed grill
Gammon, egg and chips
Steak and Ale pie
Steak and oyster pie
Meat and potato pie
Pork pie
Chicken and Mushroom pie
Scotch pie
Game pie
Fish pie
Shepherd's pie
Cottage pie
Steak and kidney pudding
Lancashire hotpot
Irish stew
Cornish pasty
Scotch egg
Sausage roll
Ploughman's lunch
Haggis
Afternooon / Cream / High Tea
And of course the full range of BIR curries: Chicken Tikka Masala; Madras; Jalfrezi; Vindaloo; Korma; Pathia; and Balti
And a bunch of puddings and sweet things, sticky toffee pudding, apple pie, mince pie, hot cross buns, etc., but I don’t have a sweet tooth
Depending on where you get said foodstuffs it can be everywhere from grim inedible sadness to glorious sublime perfection.
Also you forgot Toad in the Hole
I didn't forget it. I'm just not a massive fan of toad in the hole, tbh.
British food
Irish stew
ಠ_ಠ
They make a mean Irish stew in Northern Ireland. So, yes, Irish stew.
Just to clarify / confuse but both Irelands (republic and north) are on an island in the British Isles… but, yeah, the Irish Irish certainly ain’t British; as we’re using it here.
Vindaloo.
Phall. If you know, you know.
When I lived in the states for a while, I'd often crave a curry. Me and another Brit would head out to an Indian restaurant and usually order a Vindaloo. The waiter would say "Are you sure, it is quite spicy hot." And we'd tell him we were British and he'd say "Oh, I understand." and give us what we'd asked for without further comment.
I'm from the EU, but I love making shepherd's pie. It's pretty easy and when done correctly, it is an absolutely fantastic dish.
Shepherd's Pie, though I confess I've never made it with mutton. If you use ground beef, it's called Cottage Pie.
I use hot Italian sausage. I don't think there's a name for doing that. At that point you're mixing up Cottage Pie with bangers and mash (mashed potatoes and sausage). And I'm okay with that. All those dishes are good. Mixing things up is what I do.
I watched a YouTube food historian Max Miller talk about shepherds pie and he mentioned that there is t really much of a correlation between what meat you use and whether it is “Shepard” or “Cottage” pie.
Grilled salmon from the Lune river served with roasted potatoes, honey glazed parsnips and grilled green beans.
Would you like a Jelly Baby?

Fish and Chips with vinegar in a newspaper, it's surprisingly good. I had it somewhere in a suburb of London in some traditional shop and the grandma who was in front of me put so much vinegar on hers that the whole counter and floor was soaked in it.
No traditional shop would ever give you vinegar. It was non-brewed condiment.
Two things definitely stand out for me:
There's something about a sunday dinner on a rainy day...the day after a night out.
Had a really good steak and ale pie in a pub somewhere. Also, fish and chips is wildly overrated.
My grandmother was British, and she'd cook the most amazing roast potatoes I've ever had. Its just a shame she made them by sacrificing the roast beef...
Since other people are posting haggis, then the fucking BANGER haggis pizza I had when I visited the U.K. More of a Scottish thing though, no?
More strictly then I suppose Fish'n Chips or a Cottage Pie. I has those too over there. Can't say it's noticeably different from the local Atlantic Canada themed joints all around me in a landlocked province 😅.
Haggis is totally a Scottish thing, but it depends on who you ask whether Scottish counts as British or not. Some people get surprisingly militant about it
Haggis pizza?! I need to try this.
Maybe I was just cold and wet and hungry and tired, but the best haggis I've had was on a baked potato with cheddar cheese at the Culloden battlefield visitor center cafe. Man that hit the spot.
I'm a Brit, and personally, I think a lot of the staples we are weirdly defensive of are not that exciting. A Sunday roast? Sure, it's probably associated with family and comfort or whatever, but give me Thai, Mexican, Italian, Japanese food, etc., over it any day.
That said, the two I will defend to the grave are a decent fish and chip supper and an English/Scottish breakfast.
Full Fry-up Breakfast
Haggis and cock a leekie soup. Mince and tatties are a close second.
Also, everyone (including me in my other post) is going savoury — how about sweet? Aero bar, in mint. Perfection. Bark candy mostly only comes in chocolate, or dark chocolate. Sometimes vanilla (white chocolate, which is not chocolate, it's vanilla and vanilla should own it because "white chocolate" is awesome, though it should really be called "Vanilla candy bark," but "bark candy" is really only known as... chocolate... hence "white chocolate"). Fun fact, I've had all kinds of bark candy. When I was a kid, I got it in orange and raspberry as well. Now it's only chocolate and... what I mentioned. Oh and mint chocolate, like Andes mints, but also those pastel-coloured mints that sometimes have the little white balls of hard sugar on them (I think those are just straight up mint bark though).
Again why TF don't we have bark candy in other flavours?
Liver and bacon with onion gravy, served with mash.
Dippy eggs with marmite on the soldiers
Jaffa cakes
OMG IT'S A SPINOFF POST I LOVE YOU TOO

I've literally never traveled more than a few states away and I hated every second...
fr though traveling is sooooo stressful to me but people worldwide fascinate me. So different but so similar at the same time. Instructions unclear I now want strippers at my funeral.
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