This month we’re loving

Supermarkets now all hand out free monthly magazines to their shoppers. These are usually glossy publications with recipes and promotions of particular products. The Co-op magazine is particularly good and the Marks and Spencers food magazine (‘What’s Fresh at M&S’) is particularly bad. I only noticed this because I rarely shop for food at M&S, but their August 2019 edition includes an article that intrigued me. This is headed:
    ‘This month we’re loving... Our celebrity tasting panel take their pick from our new summer-ready treats’.
The four celebrities are Emma Willis, Paddy McGuiness, Amanda Holden and Rochelle Humes. Each have supposedly selected a different M&S food product and include a sentence in its praise. For instance, Emma Willis says “I’m picking the Smoky Chorizo Slices, they really fill you up, they’re tasty and make you feel like you’re on holiday”.

This all invoked a volcano of cynicism within me. Can we believe that these four people take a break from their busy lives to gather and taste a range of food and wines before finally selecting their favourites? Did they actually compose the sentences in the praise of each product? Or is it more likely that they just attached their names to this advert drafted by an advertising agency in exchange for a fee plus a smidgen of the publicity needed to maintain a celebrity career? If my cynical views are correct, then there is a further question: why should anyone be influenced by what three presenters and an actress recommend? None have, as far as I know, claimed any expertise in the appreciation of food and wine. But I suspect that the marketing men know what they are doing. People are most likely to be influenced by those they admire, and the greatest admiration is for people who appear on television.

Eating a steak in Glasgow in 1968.

In 1968, I became a student at the University of Strathclyde, studying for an MSc in Politics. I was attracted by the reputation of Professor Richard Rose, a young and enthusiastic head of department with a major public profile. I stayed for the first year in a ghastly postgraduate hall of residence in Rotten Row, very close to the University’s McCance Building - the location of the Department and also the University’s library. There was of course no Internet, which meant that students spent hours reading in the Library, often the back issues of the (then very few) academic journals. Towards the end of that academic year, I met an attractive library assistant who I later married (and eventually divorced).

My income came from a postgraduate studentship, which (just) covered my living costs and allowed me to eat out at a restaurant about once a month. But there was astonishingly little choice in Glasgow restaurants at that time: almost all were steakhouses owned by Reo Stakis, who had come to Scotland from Cyprus many years before. Stakis knew what sold and his restaurants were well-run and produced tasty and economical food, albeit from a restricted menu. There was a Stakis steakhouse just below the McCance Building on George Street, and this was my usual spot for dining out.

I remember this experience well. Like most British restaurants then and for many years after, the steakhouse was dimly-lit. There was an open kitchen and grill, which was used for cooking the steaks. There was a choice of sirloin, rump and rib-eye, in different weights. The restaurant also served gammon steaks and (I think) a fish dish. I would usually start with either a prawn cocktail or egg mayonnaise. The latter comprised two halves of a boiled egg, covered in mayonnaise with some paprika. Both the latter ingredients were at that time quite exotic. For the main course, I usually ate the cheapest rump steak, which would be accompanied by a single large cepe, a grilled tomato and some hand-cut chips. When this was finished, I would be offered a selection of puddings from a ‘sweet trolley’ which was wheeled round to the table. I usually chose either black forest gateau or trifle. After the meal, there was then a fashion for Irish Coffee (coffee with whiskey, with cream floating on top), but I preferred my coffee unadulterated.

I had thus eaten the characteristic 1960s British restaurant meal, now utterly out-of-fashion and even mocked by comedians. But the food tasted wonderful, and the restaurant gave me a warm feeling that I had enjoyed a special treat. Suppose I were to be transported back to 1968 to eat the same meal at the same restaurant - would I still find the food as tasty? In the years since then, my tastebuds have experienced many different types of food in several countries, but I think that a Reo Stakis steak and chips would still be satisfying. This is because steak and chips, egg mayonnaise and trifle can be some of the tastiest food on the planet. This of course involves the radical idea of judging food primarily by its taste rather than by fashion (ingredients which you have never heard of and which are unobtainable outside central London), by arty-farty arrangements of food on the plate (towers, drizzles, foam etc), or by the expensive ambience of the restaurant in which it is served.

Why has taste declined as the main criteria for judging food? The main reason is probably the importance of television and its many celebrity chefs. Television is a visual medium utterly unable to transmit taste or smell to its viewers. To keep the viewers’ attention, its celebrity chefs must generate a succession of innovative recipes, often filmed in exotic locations and using strange ingredients. People thus come to judge food by what it looks like and whether it succeeds in being strange and different.

See also:Dining in yuppieland

What we ate and what we called it

In Jack Vance’s wonderful science fiction story The Killing Machine, his hero Kerth Gerson visits an area of a city inhabited by a people called the ‘Sandusk’, notorious for their cuisine:

The air of Ard Court smelled richly indeed, with a heavy sweet-sour organic reek that distended the nostrils. Gersen grimaced and went to the shop from which the odours seemed to emanate. Taking a deep breath and bowing his head, he entered. To right and left were wooden tubs, containing pastes, liquids, and submerged solids; overhead hung rows of withered blue-green objects the size of a man's fist. At the rear, behind a counter stacked with limp pink sausages stood a clown-faced youth of twenty, wearing a patterned black and brown smock, a black velvet headkerchief. He leaned upon the counter without spirit or vitality, and without expression watched Gersen sidle past the tubs.

"You're a Sandusker?" asked Gersen.

"What else?" This was spoken in a tone Gersen could not identify, a complex mood of many discords: sad pride, whimsical malice, insolent humility. The youth asked, "You wish to eat?"

Gersen shook his head. "I am not of your religion."

"Ha ho!" said the youth. "You know Sandusk then?"

"Only at second-hand."

The youth smiled. "You must not believe that old foolish story, that we Sanduskers are religious fanatics who eat vile food rather than flagellate ourselves. It is quite incorrect. Come now. Are you a fair man?"

Gersen considered. "Not unusually so."

The youth went to one of the tubs, dipped up a wad of glistening black-crusted maroon paste. "Taste! Judge for yourself! Use your mouth rather than your nose!"

Gersen gave a fatalistic shrug, tasted. The inside of his mouth seemed first to tingle, then expand. His tongue coiled back in his throat.

"Well?" asked the youth.

"If anything," said Gersen at last, "it tastes worse than it smells."

The youth sighed. "Such is the general consensus."
The general consensus is that English food was in the past not far removed from that of the Sanduskers, although things are thought to have improved in recent decades with food introduced by South Asians, Europeans and others. My memories of food from the 1950s are different - there was certainly a lack of variety, but the food (at least that cooked by my mother) was tasty and nourishing. When I was at primary school, each day began with porridge and milk. At lunchtime, I would walk home and have dinner, which usually comprised meat and two veg, followed by a pudding such as apple pie and custard. I would then walk back to school. After school, I would have tea, which might be poached eggs on toast. A bit later, my father would cycle home from work, and would sit in the kitchen having his dinner (the main course of which he flavoured heavily with brown sauce). We would all eat supper together. This was a snack just before bedtime, and always comprised toast and a cup of tea.

Sundays were different. We would start the day with a vast fried breakfast. This would be followed in mid-morning with coffee (the only coffee we had all week). This was made from instant coffee with milk. At about 1pm, we would have our dinner, which was usually roast meat with roast potatoes and sundry boiled vegetables in season. My father would have sausages instead because he disliked the appearance of meat. Pudding might be a sponge or apple pie with custard. In the evening, tea would be a salad. This was never chopped or dressed, although there might be a sweet salad cream available. Supper was as usual.

Despite considerable amounts of food, we did not become obese or otherwise unhealthy. This was probably because we walked everywhere, played in the street until it got dark, and watched very little television. The state rations of orange juice and cod liver oil probably also helped.

Since those days, I have led a less healthy lifestyle. I do, however, eat food from many different cuisines, much of it frozen, processed, or transported long distances. I have, like many English people, also become utterly confused about what to call the meals I eat. Words like ‘dinner’, ‘supper’, ‘tea’ (including its ‘high’ or ‘afternoon’ variants), ‘lunch’ and ‘luncheon’ seem to mean different things to different people.‘Dinner’ now seems to be any sizeable meal whenever it is eaten, although this rule does not apply to Sundays, when local pubs advertise a ‘Sunday lunch’ of roast beef and Yorkshire pudding. In despair, I now use the phrases ‘midday meal’ and ‘evening meal’ in conversations to enhance mutual understanding. Everybody seems to understand what a breakfast is, although what we eat at that meal varies greatly. Still, on Sundays I still eat a big fried breakfast with a roast dinner later. Some traditions never die.   

Vance J (1967) The Killing Machine. Glasgow: Grafton Books.

See also Dining in Yuppieland

Learning our incompetencies

All men at an early age believe they are talented at football. Some (like myself) realise their lack of talent in the first years of primary school. Others persist in years of hope until the final disappointing realisation that theirs will not after all be a life of Premiership fame, Ferraris, and beautiful but expensive girlfriends.

Learning our incompetences helps us avoid wasting time on activities where there are more talented rivals, and enables us to concentrate on what we can do effectively. However, there are some areas of life in which this learning usually fails to take place. Most people, against all the evidence, continue to believe they are ‘above average’ drivers and lovers. Many people also believe that, despite lack of training or any previous evidence of competence, that they can run a pub or a restaurant.

The results of this delusion can be found in every town. Here is an example. My wife is a member of a group of women (which she calls the ‘ladies’) who have worked together in the past, and celebrate each others’ birthdays by meeting for dinner. The restaurant is usually one chosen by the lady with the birthday. The most recent meal was at a new Indian restaurant in Worcestershire. The ladies met there at 8pm. The decor was pleasant, and there were poppadums and chutneys awaiting them at the table. But no waiter came to ask for their orders for drinks, and there was a long delay before any waiter came at all. When this did eventually happen, the ladies decided to skip a starter and ordered main courses. Nothing happened for a very long time. The group at the next table decided that they too had waited for far too long, and decided to leave. The waiter pursued them into the street and told them the food was ready. The food then came for the ladies. It was lukewarm, indicating that it had been cooked some time ago and then forgotten.

No waiter came to ask them if they wanted to order a dessert, so the ladies decided that they would move directly to coffee. A coffee pot arrived, but no cups. The ladies found some in the restaurant and served themselves. They then seized a waiter, who produced three bills. These included one for £27 worth of lager, which they certainly had not drunk. There followed a process of negotiation to reduce the bills. The toilets were in the basement, but when reaching them, the ladies found they were closed, and they were redirected to the disabled toilet at the top of the building (!) By the time they were due to leave it was 11-30pm, and the front door of the restaurant was locked.

The sad thing is that the ladies could have gone to the Spice Cuisine in St John’s in Worcester and paid rather less for an excellent meal, cooked rapidly and served efficiently. But then, the people who run and work in the Spice Cuisine have discovered an area of life in which they are supremely competent. The staff at the other restaurant could try being footballers.

Dining in Yuppieland

A map of Birmingham looks like a spider’s web. Like most inland cities in Europe, a series of concentric ring roads encircle the city, while main roads radiate from the centre, usually named after their destinations. If you head outwards from the city down the Stratford Road, you pass through the long straight streets of terrace houses of the late 19th and early 20th Century, into the semi-detached estates built a generation later. You then pass the sprawling ‘shed cities’ of supermarkets and the new ‘executive homes’ to emerge in the fields and villages that are the homes of the young upwardly-mobile professionals of Yuppieland. To an outsider, Yuppieland looks rural, but instead of farms there are golf courses, riding stables and craft centres. The cottages of the peasantry have become the mansions of the wealthy, while the village pubs have become expensive restaurants.

My experience is that dining in these converted pubs is dispiriting. Earlier this year, I went with my mother to Henley-in-Arden, a beautiful small town along the Stratford Road in the heart of Yuppieland. The restaurant included mediaeval features, superb decor and friendly staff. The food was a work of art presented on elegant plates and looked wonderful. It was expensive but poorly-cooked. It somehow managed to be both tasteful and tasteless. This has been my experience with several dining expeditions to this part of the world. People in Yuppieland are prepared to spend a lot on their meals, like them to be an impressive visual experience in a fawning environment, but can not discriminate between good food and bad.

Not all of England is like this. To encounter good food made from fresh local ingredients, it is better to move further from the big cities. In my own area of rural Worcestershire, there are two places I visit which always delight. The first is the Talbot at Knightwick. This is a small hotel with its own brewery and farm. The food is imaginative, is sourced from the Teme Valley and is full of taste. The main draught beers are called ‘This’ and ‘That’, and these are the best beers I have ever tasted anywhere. The plates and beer glasses are not the products of designer studios, but who cares. The second place to eat is the Venture In in Ombersley. This is a small restaurant (with Michelin rosettes) owned by its cook, who lives with his family above the shop. I have a family connection with the Venture In because my son Andrew worked there as a kitchen porter one evening a week before going to University. The atmosphere in the kitchen was far from the kind of shouting match shown on television pictures of restaurants. Instead, there was an effective and friendly team of people dedicated to cooking in the best way from the best ingredients. The result is food that is as close to heaven as can be attained on earth.