On Mon, 25 Apr 2005 10:28:34 +0200, Ian Hoare >
wrote:

Ian offers an excellent treatise on the proper roasting of beef while
simultaneously stereotyping and occasionally bordering on offending
some of his American friends.

I've got to agree with the beef recommendations, including the ageing,
the processing tips, the "no salt while roasting" warning, the high
temp sealing and even the spit roasting--although a modern convection
oven could mitigate the advantage a bit.

But, then, having suffered in recent years from being denied the
opportunity to donate blood during local drives as a result of my
eight year tenure in Europe where I might have been exposed to British
beef, I've got to ask where else in the world but the US can one find
quality, flavorful, economical, and untainted beef so readily
available?

>Most of the wine served will be from outside the UK, certainly. Not that
>that that would be relevant to the intrinsic quality of British food OR
>English wine.

My exposure to English wine (is that an oxymoron or merely a
possessive phrase?) is so limited that I will refrain from gratuitous
nationalism regarding France, Italy, Germany, Australia or (dare I
mention?) the USA.

>>What are the facts? My cookbook of traditional British recipes lists
>>"Quiche Lorraine" and "Croque Monsieur". I will credit the British for
>>recognizing good food when they see it, though.
>
>That's a good reason to criticise your cookbook, not the cuisine.

Does the criticism involve the crediting of the Brits or is the
identification of the QL and CM as British recipes? Grilled ham and
cheese seems a pretty generic dish to attribute to ANY national
cuisine.

>Equally, good old American Pizza, Apple Pie, Chowder and Meatloaf owe their
>origins to 4 different European countries, although they've all been adopted
>by the USA (some might say perverted) and most USAians would say they are
>American dishes.

Being a somewhat larger nation than Britain (although I heard in the
past that the sun never set on British soil...it seems to have shrunk
considerably in recent years), I can only note that most Americans
would identify pizza as Italian. Chowder is a distinctly regional dish
and seldom seen in most of the states except in cans. Fruit pie of any
can is multi-national and meatload is so generic as to defy
identification with a cuisine.

Now, to be technically correct, we could cite "chop suey" as an
American creation. But, I'd rather point to the cooking of the great
Southwest with its Mexican and Native American inspired dishes. Or,
the American South with things like Fried Chicken, cornbread,
hush-puppies, catfish, greens, rhubarb pie, pecan pie, etc.

There are other regional cuisines equally distinctive and while
restaurants seem to lack the quality of service of the finest Michelin
*** establishments, the level of the creativity of the top chefs is
very competitive.
>
>By those criteria, some of the best loved "American" favourites are British
>in fact.

Beyond the detailed discussion above and below regarding roast beef,
those best loved Brit recipes would be?
>
>I'd never claim that English cuisine is one of the world's top cuisines,
>though I would put in on a par with or ahead of several other European
>countries. What would be interesting, IMO would be to discuss at what point
>a dish becomes legitmately part of a nation's cuisine. For example, "Spag
>Bol" is on the menu in many an entirely british household. Not a very good
>Spaghetti Bolognese, certainly. Similarly, there are many thai influenced
>dishes that are becoming fast favourites.

And, let me note that Indian cuisine in major British cities is alone
worth the trip .
>
>I call it a defining dish, because it both demonstrates the strengths of
>English cooking (at its best) and its weakness (at its worst).
>
>To make top class roast beef, you must have grass fed beef, not fattened up
>on barley, not given a diet of hormones or antibiotics. It should be from an
>animal of at least three or four years old that is a beef variety, such as
>Aberdeen Angus, Hereford - or Charolais or Limousin. The animal should
>ideally be slaughtered near the farm where it lived, to avoid stress
>chemicals in its blood. These criteria alone make it extremely hard to find
>meat that is good enough to make a roast worthy of the traditions.

Nebraska in the US offers some excellent examples of grass fed beef in
a region with enough grass to pull it off properly.
>
>The meat should be quartered and then hung at least two weeks, though three
>weeks would be better. It should then be butchered in such a way that the
>cut to be roast should have both bone and its own covering fat. Sirloin and
>Ribs are both classic roasting cuts, and they should both have meat that is
>well marbled with fat, if the roast is to be excellent. It's no good
>roasting the very lean grilling cuts, or - worse the pot roasting cuts (US
>Top round, bottom round, blade steak) as is so often done. The smallest cut
>that can be roasted successfully will weigh from 2-3 kg.

Dunno where you draw the assumption that Americans would choose round
or blade or even chuck for preparation of a roast beef. The classic is
a standing rib roast and a "first cut" (about ribs 9-13) from prime
beef is the standard.
>
>Real roasting is done on a spit in front of a bright open fire. I recommend
>trying it at least once in your life, as it's an order better than the roast
>we all know, which is actually baking. The meat should never be salted
>before roasting as this has a tendancy to prevent the meat browning
>properly. The meat should be allowed to warm to room temperature after being
>seasoned (loads of pepper and dry mustard powder plus thyme).
>
>The meat should be roast in an extremely hot oven (225 or so) for a short
>time, from 20 mins to 40 mins per kg depending upon how it's liked, though
>over cooked roast beef is an abomination. It is normal to roast beef very
>rare at the centre, and carve the outside slices for those who prefer their
>meat (over) cooked. After 10-15 mins in the oven, the meat can be removed
>briefly, basted and then salted. Basting should be frequent - to imitate the
>continual basting of the true rotating open fire spit roast.
>
>English Roast Beef is traditionally served with roast potatoes, yorkshire
>pudding, horseradish sauce, gravy and at least two other vegetables
>depending upon the season. It is best accompanied by a top class burgundy
>from the Dijon end of the Cote de Nuits. Clos St Jacques, or, better, a
>Chambertin from a good traditionalist grower. But a 20 year old Hermitage
>isn't bad with it either. There is no better meal in the world.

Great English wines all. Ooopps.
>
>In practice, in the majority of British domestic kitchens, the beef is too
>young, factory farmed, underhung, and from an inappropriate (cheaper) cut.
>The intrinsic quality that roasting brings out simply isn't there. I might
>add, that this is also the case in France, where - so far - I've never found
>a single example of roast beef half as good as that served even in the
>current dumbed down domestic version.
>
>The situation in the majority of small restaurants is considerably worse.
>Most will give up when faced with the difficulty of producing a perfectly
>roast cut, perfectly served at the moment the diners require it. They cook
>it in advance and flash reheat it at the moment of service. The vegetables
>equally will be reheated, and the essential accompanying gravy etc will
>themselves be travesties. It is hard to imagine anything much nastier.

I think you've just stated the case against British cuisine quite
nicely.
>
>But just as one should not judge American food by the glop served as Chowder
>in every restaurant chain in the States, so one should not judge English
>food by the travesty served in the average corner caff either.

Dunno what "restaurant chains" you were exposed to during your visits
to the States, but I haven't seen, nor would I expect to see, Chowder
in a sit-down chain in about 40 of the 50 States. In fact, the only
conditions under which I could envision a reasonable "chowder" would
be in New England (or alternatively the "Manhattan" version served
on-scene.) I suspect you could get a respectable chowder in the
Pacific NW coastal cities as well.
>
>Leaving roasting aside, although it IS the quntessentially british way of
>cooking, especially of game birds, there are many other fine traditional
>English dishes which stand comparison with anything from Europe.
>
>Steak and ?? Pie and pudding (?? can be kidney, mushrooms or oysters)

An acquired taste. Can be sublime. Usually a challenge to ingest.

>Chicken, cottage and shepherd's pies

Similar dependence on organ foods.

>Baked or boiled Gammon or bacon

Ahh, nothing like a little bit of boiled bacon to start the day.

>Spiced beef (silverside)
>Raised pies.

Krispy Kremes anybody?

>Pigeon pie
>Venison casseroles

Why ruin a good chunk of deer by over-cooking en casserole?

>Jugged Hare.
>Oxtail, tomato, peascot, jerusalem and broad bean soups. (and many others)

Now, we a bit of chile added and maybe the beans being pintos, we're
starting to get somewhere.

>Finnan haddock, smoked salmon, kedgeree, fish pie. Kipper paste, potted
>shrimps, crabs and salmon. Fresh scotch wild salmon poached in cider (US
>hard cider).

Try some Copper River Salmon in the US next time you visit, if it's in
the late spring/early summer. Makes your Scotch wild, taste like
canned tuna.
>
>Some of the world's finest cheeses come from the UK, think of a top class
>Stilton or Cheddar (though there are many others).

Indeed!
>
>And when it comes to desserts, even top french chefs have always admitted
>England's supremacy.

They died during the Revolution I believe. Victims of the Reign of
Terror.
>
>Apple pie, (and pear pie) Double crust fruit pies, cobblers, crumbles,
>steamed and sponge puddings, custards, fools, syllabubs, trifles. There are
>dozens of traditional british puddings that are a true delight when well
>made.

Some of those are wonderful, but a steamed pud takes an incredible
amount of port to be upgraded to delightful.
>
>The problem facing the average visitor to the UK, is not that there is a
>fine English cuisine, but to find it.

You do keep it hidden well. Traditional British reserve, I guess.

> Nearly all traditional English food is
>extraordinarily badly adapted to serving in restaurants, and there are very
>few restaurants indeed where it is done. What CAN be found, ever
>increasingly, are examples of modern english fine cooking, where traditional
>dishes or ingredients are recreated in a way that IS capable of being served
>well in a modern restaurant. But these restaurants are extremely expensive,
>on the whole. Nevertheless the cuisine exists, and competes on equal terms
>with anything from anywhere else in the world.
>
>I'm tempted to ask you, Dimitri to list half as many excellent truly
>American dishes. (Not counting those originating in the UK).

The previously mentioned fried chicken (pan, roast, deep, battered or
basted), chop suey (although admittedly insipid in most iterations),
pecan pie, catfish & hushpuppies, and the entire range of either
Tex-Mex or SW cuisine (they are distinctly different.)

Then we can add BBQ (dry or wet), chili (vice chile), sugar-cured ham
(not air dried), red-eye gravy, the increasingly endangered hand-made
hamburger, the entire panoply of the NY deli, the menu of the average
American mom/pop truck stop--particularly the "chicken-fried steak"
when done properly, loads of fresh fish dishes from the East and West
coastal regions, the traditional American turkey dinner, .....

Ahh, but I've kidded, teased and tweaked you enough.

Seriously, food is not a zero-sum game. Simply because one gives
credit to a national cuisine does not mean that another is inferior in
any way. It still must be noted, however, that perception often comes
very close to equaling reality. And, the perception of most folks is
that British cuisine is heavily dependent upon the immigrant ethnic
cooking of the former colonies and sadly lacking in the Anglo-Saxon
basics.



Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (USAF-Ret)
"When Thunder Rolled"
www.thunderchief.org
www.thundertales.blogspot.com