Puddings

In other words, desserts.

The British have a sweet tooth and so do I -- sort of --, much to Fernando's consternation.

Here's a list of British desserts from Wikipedia.  I need to identify the ones I should definitely search out in London and be aware of in Yorkshire and the Lake District.

Eccles Cake

Eccles Cake
St. John, the head-to-toe dining of Fergus Henderson, offers Eccles Cake and Lancashire Cheese.  According to Wikipedia, Eccles cake is a small, round cake filled with currants and made from flaky pastry with butter, sometimes topped with demerara sugar, from the British town of Eccles.  An alternative name is "Squashed Fly Cake".  Now, is that pronounced eckels or eckless?  And for a bit of poptart humor: British fire brigades have reported fires started by Eccles cakes overcooked in microwave ovens. The sugar contained in the cakes is alleged to be flammable.  You can learn even more about how they are made at Heston vs St. John.

Gypsy Tart

Gypsy Tart
Paul Hollywood (of Great British BakeOff fame) has a recipe for Gypsy Tart on BBC Food.  Made of a filling of evaporated and condensed milk and dark brown sugar in a pastry crust,  it must be awfully sweet and it doesn't seem particularly exciting.  I can't imagine why St. John Smithfield has it on its dessert menu or why Paul Hollywood would bother with it.  Evidently it is a common dessert for school dinners and you can see how to make it on this video from the Kent County Council (it originated in Kent), by a school meals trainer.  And Pinterest has a collection of photos, including one topped by passion fruit from Bubble and Squeak.

Treacle Tart

Treacle Tart
The Wolseley serves a treacle tart at its Afternoon Tea and according to Yelp, it is the best in London.  This tart is as sweet as the gypsy tart, being made with breadcrumbs, golden syrup, and lemon to cut through the sweetness.  Mary Berry (of the Great British BakeOff) has a simple recipe for treacle tart on the BBC Food website.  According to The National Trust Book of Traditional Puddings, treacle (the syrup remaining after sugar refining, i.e. molasses) was used in the beginning and was gradually replaced by the lighter golden syrup.  Oh, and evidently Harry Potter loves treacle tart.  You can make it treacle pudding by leaving out the pie crust.  Lyle's is famous for its golden syrup and treacle and also offers a recipe for Lyle's Lovely Treacle Tart.

Sticky toffee pudding

Sticky Toffee Pudding
This appears on almost all London dessert menus. It is a cake made with dates, eggs, sugar, flour and treacle ("treecul"), topped with a toffee sauce (the Brits love their toffee!).  BBC Good Food has a recipe for the Ultimate Sticky Toffee Pudding if you want to try it before we go.  The toffee sauce can be homemade or you can pick up a can of Carnation caramel sauce.  Nigella Lawson has a recipe for it and even a YouTube video to help you.  Gordon Ramsay serves it at his restaurants and Mary Berry bakes it as well.  Pinterest will give you all sorts of versions.

Banoffee Pie

Banoffee Pie
Ban (from bananas) + offee (from toffee).
Wikipedia says it is an "English dessert pie made from bananas, cream and toffee (made from boiled condensed milk, or dulce de leche), combined either on a pastry base or one made from crumbled biscuits and butter."  Supposedly it was developed "in 1971 by amending an unreliable American recipe for "Blum’s Coffee Toffee Pie" with a soft toffee made by boiling an unopened can of condensed milk for several hours."  Blum's Coffee Toffee Pie?  Do you think Mother ever ate it in San Francisco?   Carnation will sell you a can of caramel, which apparently is almost the same as dulce de leche.

Bakewell Tart

Bakewell Pudding and Bakewell Tart
According to Wikipedia, "a Bakewell tart is an English confection consisting of a shortcrust pastry shell beneath layers of jam, frangipane, and a topping of flaked almonds," while a "Bakewell pudding is an English dessert consisting of a flaky pastry base with a layer of sieved jam and topped with a filling made of egg and almond paste."  They sound the same to me but the community of Bakewell Online says the Bakewell Tart "is not really at all like the Bakewell pudding either in flavour or texture."  I guess we will have to try each to find out.

Rhubarb Crumble

Fruit Crumbles
These are like our fruit crisps and are fruit topped with a streusel mixture of flour, butter and sugar.  According to Wikipedia, "Crumbles became popular in Britain during World War II, when the crumble topping was an economical alternative to pies due to shortages of pastry ingredients as the result of rationing. To further reduce the use of rationed flour, fat and sugar, breadcrumbs or oatmeal could be added to the crumble mix."  Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall of River Cottage fame, has an article on cobblers, crisps and crumbles with recipes.

British Cheese Plate
Fortunately if you don't like cloyingly sweet desserts, there is usually a cheese board selection in the puddings menu, like this one at the Drayton Arms Pub: British cheese plate - Taw Valley Cheddar and Garstang Blue with savoury biscuits, apple and fig chutney, celery and grapes.  The National Café at the National Gallery offers an artisan British cheese plate (Keens Cheddar, Barkham Blue, Tunworth and Berkswell) served with oatcakes and chutney.  The plate usually comes with crackers and chutney.

This 2016 article in the Guardian claims that now British cheesemakers are outperforming the French: "The experts’ guide to a great British cheeseboard".  It mentions several cheese stores in London: Paxton & Whitfield, Neal's Yard Dairy, and La Fromagerie.  So we'll have to explore them.

HF Holidays: Durham and Derwent Bank

Durham
Finally on Day 9 (really 8) of our Road Scholar program with HF Holidays, we head back west to the Lake District National Park, stopping in Durham to see its 11th century Cathedral, which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and to have lunch.  Durham Cathedral is on a peninsula formed by a loop in the River Wear and there is also Durham Castle, a Museum of Archaeology, and Durham University with a Botanic Garden.  Perhaps Fernando would like to stop by Durham University's School of Engineering and Computer Science, which looks like they got a divorce last year and now are separate departments with separate websites.  We'll see where we go on the program's "field trip".

For lunch we are on our own, so maybe could stop by Bell's for fish and chips, or Akarsu for Turkish food.  There are also some Thai, Lebanese, Chinese, Mexican and Italian restaurants to choose from and a variety of pubs serving pub fare and comfort food, which looks to be hamburgers and all-day breakfast.  Or we could walk over to the Durham Market Hall and see if they sell any food. We might just have to wander through the town or ask our guide for suggestions.

Then on we go to the famous Lake District and our country house near Keswick: Derwent Bank.

Derwent Water

Lake District National Park: Derwent Bank
This historic house is near the shore of Derwent Water, one of the lakes in this region and it offers the most holiday programs of the three houses in our program.  One can book a painting, photography, yoga, ukelele, bridge or cycling holiday here, in addition to walking.

Silver Travel Advisor: Derwent Bank, Cumbria - guided walking short break with HF Holidays
Most of the full reviews I've read have been for 3-day weekend holidays at the invitation of HF Holidays so they tend to be positive.  The author, Gillian Thornton, has a room on the top floor with a beautiful view of the lake, with a spacious bathroom, two USB ports and plenty of storage.  I only hope we are so lucky.

Derwent Bank room

Travel Lowdown: HF Holidays - Derwent Bank
This is the same author who did the review on the family holiday at Newfield Hall in Malham and again he does it with his family.  He too gets rooms with beautiful views but all of the rooms "contain everything required for a comfortable stay, including a range of toiletries, TV, hair dryer, towels and tea/coffee-making facilities." TV? I thought we were trying to get away from that!  Give me a view instead any day.  And again, there are no lifts in the house.

All country houses have drying rooms

Telegraph: That's the Way I Lake It
It's in this article on Derwent Bank that the author mentions you have to be careful ordering your sandwiches for the packed lunch.

Food at the hotel was outstanding and there was a generous spirit everywhere, with baskets of fruits and snacks lying around to help yourself for picnics, though you had to get the hang of ordering sandwiches. Sitting on a dry-stone wall, one of our group who had misunderstood the request form stoically munched into her Marmite, cream cheese and banana sandwich, pronouncing it "not so bad".

Full Cumbrian Breakfast

Marmite, cream cheese and banana sandwich?  That's worse than Madeleine Morris's peanut butter and onion sandwich.    In another article (the one below on HF), its author mentions "the fine selection of packed lunches, with poached salmon sandwiches and fine local cheese" so I think we will survive just fine.

Hopefully at Derwent Bank we can eat the Full Cumbrian breakfast: fried free-range eggs, local sausage, back bacon, black pudding, tomatoes and fresh mushrooms.  Fernando will be happy to eat everybody else's black pudding.

Oh!  and what does the HF stand for in HF Holidays?  Holiday Fellowship.  You can read more about the organization at 100 years of holiday fellowship.  In 1913 Thomas Arthur (TA) Leonard created the Holiday Fellowship (HF), a Society which sought to provide basic, accessible walking holidays in the UK and abroad. Although the accommodations have become more posh over the years, all the HF guides, or 'leaders' as they call them, are still volunteers who love walking and the outdoors.

H.F. Holidays: Newfield Hall and Larpool Hall

Our Road Scholar walking trip in September is done in conjunction with H.F. Holidays which offers walking/hiking programs around England and other countries.  The reviews I've read about them have been quite positive except for the romantic young couples who, after arriving, realize that they are amidst a bunch of older people, with whom they actually have to share a table at dinner.  Not at all what they had in mind for their honeymoon...  So here are a few reviews that I came across late last night.

Yorkshire Dales National Park:  Newfield Hall
This is our first stop, about an hour and a half (65 miles) by car directly north of Manchester.  HF Holidays is supposed to pick us up at the Manchester Airport and transport us there, otherwise it would take us 3 to 4 hours by bus and train to get there.

Bald Hiker:  Newfield Hall The Walking Retreat of Malhamdale
This February15, 2018 post by Paul Steele describes his weekend walking holiday at Newfield Hall, invited by HF Holidays.  Newfield Hall an historic building that was acquired by HF Holidays in the 1930s and the Bald Hiker finds it very impressive.  It even has a heated swimming pool so take your bathing suit.  He says everyone one looks forward to the dinners and the breakfasts are ample: "Breakfast is a huge array of cooked and cold, from full English to Salmon and egg, porridge to cereals."  I wonder if it will displace Munich in Fernando's ranking of breakfasts.

After a couple of days in Malhamdale, we are transported to the Yorkshire Coast, stopping by the Royal Horticultural Society's Garden Harlow Carr in Harrowgate on the way.  Here are some of the must see garden highlights:  a hedgehog-friendly garden with a hedgehog highway, a streamside garden, and a kitchen garden.  The growing conditions they have to contend with are "cold, drying winter winds, deep frosts, a cooler, shorter growing season and lots of wet weather."  Sounds a bit like Pittsburgh.

Yorkshire, North York Moors National Park: Larpool Hall
Now we are up near the east coast of England, near the seaside town of Whitby, whose abbey inspired Bram Stoker's Dracula and where Captain James Cook learned how to sail.  Whitby looks like a very picturesque town so I hope we'll have a chance to explore it, especially the jet shops.  Most of the hikes seem to be along the Cleveland Way.  We are staying at Larpool Hall, an imposing Grade II listed Georgian mansion. The last dinner at Larpool Hall is a 5-course farm-to-table dinner so that is something to look forward to.  Here are a couple of articles about the area so that we know what to expect.

Whitby in the rain

The Quirky Traveler: An Ideal Walking Holiday on the Yorkshire Coast
Zöe Dawes lives in Cumbria and was invited to spend a 3 day holiday in the summer by HF Holidays at Larpool Hall.  She speaks of afternoon teas there and also mentions that the walking guides are all volunteers, so apparently HF Holidays is a nonprofit.  She also mentions the North Yorkshire Moors Railway with steam engines, which we (the Easy Walkers) will ride to the market town of Pickering.  Oh the grandkids would love a vacation here!  Zöe says that both the dinner and breakfast were excellent and that for the packed lunch, you order a sandwich with a choice of fillings the night before and then you get to add things to it in the morning from "a tempting selection of ‘ingredients’ which include fresh fruit, raw vegetables, cheese and crackers, dried fruit, hard-boiled eggs, cake, biscuits and loads more."  I've read more than once that you don't go hungry on HF Holidays.  And I also hear that you can have kippers or blood pudding for breakfast...

Travel Lowdown: HF Holiday's Larpool Hall, Whitby
This is a March 2016 review by a man who took his wife and two young boys to Larpool Hall for a holiday.  Previously he and his family had been to Derwent Bank, which is our last stop on our Road Scholar program.  They are vegetarians and found the staff at Larpool hall very accommodating to their dietary needs.

Most of the articles are by people who have been invited by HF Holidays so one needs to go to Trip Advisor to find the negative reviews, like a couple who were locked out because they came home after midnight (that won't happen to us) or who complained about the hot water not arriving fast enough in the shower (after all, it is an old house).  It also doesn't have a lift.  We only hope that the size of our room is adequate, that it has a view (cross your fingers) and that it is quiet.

Museum of London

The Museum of London is located a few blocks north of St. Paul's Cathedral so maybe we can do both the same day, although it would probably be better not to go on Sunday when St. Paul's has its free concert.  Like the British Museum, the Museum of London is free and open daily from 10 am to 6 pm, so we don't have to worry about it being closed on Mondays.  Naturally it has a store where one can buy nifty souvenirs like these suffragette buttons to the left.  I can even get London handkerchiefs!

The museum has a section on the prehistory of the Lower Thames Valley from around 450,000 BC until the creation of the Roman city of Londinium around AD 50.   They say that "London’s prehistoric landscape was similar to today's central African plains.  125,000 years ago hippos lived in Trafalgar Square!"  Rather hard to believe, isn't it?  We'll have to remember that when it is cold and rainy.

The Museum divides its early historical periods into Roman (AD 50-410) and Medieval (410-1558), which starts with the accession of Queen Elizabeth I.  I always thought the Norman Conquest was a dividing line but perhaps not.  Evidently King Henry the Eighth is considered medieval rather than divisive.  Elizabeth is followed by some turbulent times and London suffers from the Great Plague of 1665-1666 (in which 100,000 or 20% of the population died) and the Great Fire of 1666, which destroyed a quarter of Greater London and four fifths of the City.  We can learn more about these when we visit.

A few blocks to the northeast of the Museum is the Smithfield Market, the largest wholesale meat market in the UK but they recommend getting there before 7 am when all the stalls are open, since the market activity starts at 2 am...

Fernando might be interested in a nearby restaurant, St. John - Smithfield, which is the restaurant of Fergus Henderson, who specializes in offal and is the author of Nose to Tail Eating.  You can see lots more of his dishes on Instagram.

What to See in the British Museum

I'm not a great museum fan so I'm going to prepare for the London museums and know what I'm supposed to see in each one, even though wandering serendipitously is my preferred method of tourism.  Penny can help us out here.  I was going to post several museums here but the British Museum, its Blog and Tweets, got me sidetracked.

The British Museum

Is this what the British took from other countries during its imperial period?  TimeOut London has a 2015 article on The Seven Wonders of the British Museum which are a bit quirky.  The British Museum itself lists 9 items to see in One Hour, including the Rosetta Stone, the Assyrian Lion Hunt reliefs, and the Parthenon sculptures.  In a Three Hour visit, they list 25 items, including an Astrolabe, which might be of interest to Fernando, and The Flood Tablet, relating the Gilgamesh version of the flood.  You can read more about the ark before Noah in the BM Blog posting by Irving Finkel: "Was the ark round?  A Babylonian description discovered."  And you can read even more about the palm and pitch coracle in this Daily Mail article: "Is this the REAL Noah's Ark? Scaled-down replica based on 4000-year-old Babylonian tablet's instructions is rebuilt by hand."

Pazuzu

Irving Finkel has more interesting things to tell you about Mesopotamian demons, ghosts and sprites and how to deal with them in this YouTube video.  You can subscribe to the British Museum YouTube Channel and learn all sorts of things, not about London, of course, but it will get you into the BM spirit so that you can appreciate their collection better.  And you can also subscribe to the British Museum Twitter feed, if you happen to have an account and actually look at the thing.  Or sign up for the British Museum's email newsletter -- there's a signup box at the bottom of their pages.

You can learn more about the museum's collection by reading the Museum Stories in the British Museum Blog where objects are put into their historical context.  There's a recent blog on Suffrage Objects in the British Musuem, at the end of which the author says that the Museum of London is the place to go for the Women's Suffrage Movement.  And that's where we'll go next.  Oh.  Did I mention that the British Museum and the Museum of London are free?  Maybe Penny will get her wish and our lives will be spent in London museums...  and churches for free lunchtime concerts...

Free Lunchtime Concerts

Those who have traveled to London with me know I am a big fan of London's free lunchtime concerts!  Many are performed by student musicians, but others have professionals and you just might hear the next star performer.
Now you don't have to go to all of these, but browse the venues to choose.

St. Martin in the Field, Trafalgar Square, is a church you will want to see anyway so why not take in a free concert on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays from 1-2 pm.

And did you know that Cathy's and Penny's great grandmother, Sarah Knight, was christened there 20 Oct. 1852?  There is also a crypt with a cafe, not that that has anything to do with our great grandmother who died in Spokane, Washington.

The Southbank Centre offers lot and lots of music.  We'll check out the full schedule as time goes on.  But for now, know that free Friday Lunch concerts at 1 pm are held in the Central Bar in Royal Festival Hall, and that there are other types of music plus classical. Click here for Southbank's What's On Calendar.

The London Symphony Orchestra (LSO) also offers a free Friday Lunchtime Concert (12:30-1:15 pm) in Jerwood Hall, St. Luke's, 161 Old Street, London.  This is their education venue as their main performances are at the Barbicon in a huge performing arts center, the largest of its kind in Europe, and I get disoriented every time I go.

St. James, Piccadilly, a church designed by Christopher Wren, offers free 50 minute concerts at 1:10 pm on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

St. Olave's lunchtime recitals on Weds. and Thurs. at 1 pm.  As you can see, lots of the old City church's offer free music.  We can check for schedules as we get closer to our trip.

The Royal Opera also offers free lunch concerts, but I'm not the biggest opera buff so I'll skip that for now. 

And Royal Albert Hall also offers free Friday lunch concerts, but it looks like you'll have to buy lunch at Verdi Italian Restaurant.  It's a crazy building...maybe we should take a tour - that'll cost 12 pounds.  The Proms are held at the Royal Albert each year.

And here's one that is not at lunch.  St. Paul's Cathedral offers free and unticketed concerts on Sundays from 4:45 to 5:15 pm.


 On Sunday, 16 Sept. there is an organ and piano duo scheduled.  There will be no problem getting seats in that huge space, and you know you wanted to see it anyway.  No?  But don't expect me to climb the dome...You can if you want to.

We Missed British Pie Week!

Oh no, you say.  Am I back on meat pies again? 

But British Pie Week was last week (March 5-9) and the British eat a tremendous number of pies.  According to Awareness Days UK, the most popular pie recipe searches on the Internet were for
1: Cottage Pie
2: Fish Pie
3: Shepherd’s Pie
4: Chicken and Leek Pie
5: Chicken and Mushroom Pie
6: Steak and Ale Pie
7: Meat and Potato Pie
8: Pork Pie
9: Steak and Kidney Pie
10: Corned Beef Pie
"Cottage Pie" is Shepherd's Pie except they put strong cheddar cheese in the mashed potato topping.

Pieminster

According to Hospitality and Catering News, the nation's favorite this year at the British Pie Awards was the Highland Top Rump & Dark Ale Pie.  The Independent has a list of the seven best places to eat meat pies and none of them have parsley liquor.  Pieminster apparently serves its pies with gravy and you can see that their presentation is a bit more sophisticated than that of the pie and mash shops but you pay a bit more as well. For 9.50£ you can get "any classic pie, mash, minty mushy peas, cheddar and crispy shallots."  At Goddards, pie and mash with peas is 5.10£

The Telegraph reports on the decreasing number of the traditional working class pie and mash shops but at the same time gives recipes for 7 other pies, only two of which have meat (chicken and bacon) and none have parsley liquor made with eel broth.  I don't think it's making a comeback.

The New Improved British Food?

They say British food has gotten better but does that mean dumping the traditional dishes like fish and chips, pie and mash, bubble and squeak, toads in a hole?  Or can they be made lighter and more exquisite, more Frenchified?  I'm hoping that the list at Visit Britain can help.  It is there that they say that a Brit's favorite comfort food is a good pie and they recommend the Ginger Pig, but it looks more like a butcher shop than a restaurant, so that doesn't help us at all.  For the Sunday Roast Visit Britain recommend Hixter but the menu says "Brunch" not "Sunday Roast" and "All our beef is aged in a Himalayan salt chamber and comes from Shorthorn, Hereford and Aberdeen Angus breeds."  Himalayan Salt Chamber?  Don't the Brits have their own salt?

Full Borough Breakfast

For the full English breakfast Visit Britain recommends Roast in the Borough Market, but that comes at a price:  16.50£ instead of the 5.50£ at the Chelsea Bun.  I'll save Roast for Sunday Dinner since the full breakfast doesn't look that different from the Chelsea Bun.   That's about it from Visit Britain but they do mention that one must have afternoon tea and they have only one to recommend, The Thames Foyer at the Savoy.  I like to have a choice so Olive Magazine has a list of Afternoon Tea Spots in London, but they also give recipes in case you want to bake your own scones.  Maybe we can pick up some scones and clotted cream and tea and make our own Afternoon Tea.

Beef & Yorkshire Pudding

Visit Britain does recommend Rules Restaurant for Olde-Worlde British Dining and their menu is quite interesting, although beyond our means.  They have grouse (watch for lead shot), rabbit, venison, steak and kidney pie, steak and kidney pudding, shepherd's pie, leg of lamb, pork cheeks, duck breast, dover sole, beef.  The photo at the left is roast beef and Yorkshire pudding for two but the pudding looks a bit dark to me.  And then for dessert: spotted dick, sticky toffee pudding, rhubarb and raspberry fool.  The desserts I could go for but everything still looks a bit dark and heavy, like persimmon pudding and the interior of their restaurant.  Time to find a place that is nice and airy, with dining al fresco, and still has locally sourced British products.  Are we across the Channel yet?...

For lighter food we might have to go to a cutting-edge restaurant like Restaurant Gordon Ramsey, which is actually in Chelsea down by the Physic Garden, but the only price that is listed is 120£ for 3 courses.  Gulp.  Oh wait!  It's only 70£ for the 3 course lunch menu (and I was worried about a prix fixe price of 45£...).  You have to admit that the dishes look absolutely lovely and fresh.  Especially the desserts.  We'll have to find a cheaper venue.

Which brings us to Medlar, also in Chelsea with 1 Michelin Star but offering a 3-course dinner menu for 49£ and a 3-course lunch or Sunday dinner menu for 35£, plus a 12.5% discretionary gratuity.  Two years ago SheerLuxe had a helpful article: "How To Eat At The Best Restaurants For Less", that said you could get 20% off your Monday night dinner there.   I wonder if that discount is still operational.

And, in case you don't know, the medlar is a fruit that has to be "bletted" before it is eaten, kind of like a Hachiya persimmon.  Even the English don't eat medlars anymore and Shakespeare called them "open-arse" according to The Independent: "Medlars: the 'open-arse' fruit that could be making a comeback". 

Now I'm going back to that SheerLuxe article to see if I can ferret out some more light airy cuisine.

What to Eat in London, Episode 2

Mushy Peas
I can see adding mint to English peas but why mash them into a mush?  Is it so that you can smoosh them onto the back of your fork and eat them more easily?  Mother always told us about the time in 1956 when they went to England and she saw this man eating peas off his knife.  I can see mixing up peas with your mashed potatoes so they don't run all over your plate, like we do with corn at Thanksgiving, but not mashing them.  Wikipedia, however, tells me that mushy peas are made with Marrowfat peas which are mature peas that are left to dry in the field, and not with frozen green peas.  So it's kind of like refried beans I suppose.  Here's a recipe if we want to try it ourselves, otherwise we can order them with our fish and chips or meat pies.

Meat Pies
Goddards at Greenwich has a bit more on the history of Pies and Mash.  Originally in the 1700s the pies were filled with eels but when eels became too expensive, they filled them with meat.  If we take a trip down to Greenwich (preferably by boat), maybe we can stop at Goddards for lunch, as pies and mash are very reasonably priced.  And we can have a fruit pie or crumble for dessert.  Unless we want a sticky toffee pudding...

Sticky Toffee Pudding

Puddings
We always had persimmon pudding for Thanksgiving and Christmas at home in California -- do you think it was the influence of our British ancestors?  But we didn't have "sticky toffee pudding" which appears on an awful lot of menus in London.  There's a website called Great British Puddings,  and although their English isn't the best, they do have a great variety of sweet and savory pudding recipes, and even some videos. 

Often "puddings" is another term for "desserts".  You can make your own sticky toffee pudding with this recipe from the BBC -- containing dates in a sponge cake with a caramel sauce, which you can make yourself or buy it canned from Carnation.  And then there is always Spotted Dick.  Years ago I picked up a little book called The National Trust Book of Traditional Puddings at a book sale and the author says that King George I was a lover of puddings and known as "Pudding George", probably being the Georgie Porgie of pudding and pie.  Some of the dishes in the book have charming names like 'Pears in Nightshirts', 'Moonshine', 'Poor Knights of Windsor'.  And then there are flummeries and fools, cobs and clangers, crumbles and humbles, snows and syllabubs.  Is it Leena that likes her desserts?

Moving on to more substantial food, The Telegraph has an article on the 15 most British foods ever and one of them is:

The Full English Breakfast or the Full Monty
We don't need to go to a fancy restaurant for this, the neighborhood Chelsea Bun should do just fine.  Serious Eats has a guide to let you know what is in it or you can check out this recipe from the BBC containing sausage, bacon, black pudding, mushrooms, tomato, eggs and bread (fried).  They forgot the Heinz baked beans.  I think it would be easier to eat out with this one than to prepare it in the apartment and I don't think we could eat it every day, although TimeOut London has a list of the best full English breakfasts in the city if we want to try.

What to Eat in London

...  besides Seville Orange Marmalade.

When one goes to a foreign country one has to eat like a native and not be tempted to order hamburgers, loaded nachos, sweet potato fries, pizza, cupcakes, and, God Forbid, macaroni and cheese.  (This might mean I'll have to drink gin and Scotch instead of rum and coke...). Since the English are so much like us (meat and potatoes) one has to be very discerning whilst reading the menu.  Fortunately a lot of the menus are online so I can prepare in advance.

Sunday Dinner
Penny says we have to go out for Sunday Dinner -- which doesn't mean that horrible institution called "Brunch" -- if I want breakfast I'll go out for a proper English breakfast during the week.  Unlike Americans, the British eat lamb and so Lamb Rump is a common main dish on Sunday Dinner menus, alongside Roast Beef with Yorkshire Pudding.  The Hollywood Arms near the apartment offers roast beef, chicken, pork belly, or lamb, all served with goose fat.  The nearby Pig's Ear serves roast beef, chicken or pork, all with Yorkshire pudding.  The Medlar, with a Michelin star, is a bit more inventive and serves Rump of Belted Galloway, turbot, quail, cod, lamb rump, pork loin, chicken or gnocchi in a 35£ 3-course menu (is $48.50 beyond our means?).

Then there is Roast, a restaurant in the Borough Market, that offers Salt Marsh lamb, a lamb that grazes on the salt marshes.  You are supposed to serve salt marsh lamb with samphire, a sea vegetable that grows in salt marshes and looks somewhat like asparagus. Now they are growing it in greenhouses to supply the new demand for it in supermarkets.  How is it going to obtain its salty flavor?  The greenhouse variety is in season from May to October so we might be able to find it.  The real stuff from the salt marshes has a short 2-3 week season from late June to early July, after which it becomes too stringy.  And yes, you should serve it with fish too but I'd rather have chips...

Fish and Chips
Oh yes, we have to have fish and chips, only not too often or I'll get sick.  Time Out London has a list of 14 of the Best Chippies, one of which is Golden Union whose fish is from sustainable British waters, whose frying oil is changed 8 times a week, and whose potatoes are from the Fenlands of East Anglia, peeled and cut by themselves and only fried once (no Frenchified double frying here!).  Their menu offers cod, haddock, plaice, rock salmon, pollock and coley.  So plaice is a flounder or sole, rock salmon is a type of shark, and coley is related to cod.  Lots of the trendier fish and chips restaurants use matzoh meal or panko instead of the traditional batter and fry their chips twice so we will have to be on our guard in order to get the traditional fish and chips.  Oh, and another thing they serve in Fish and Chips shops (and something for Fernando to try along with jellied eels) is saveloy, a bright red, highly seasoned pork sausage that used to be made from pig brains.  They're supposed to be like the Maine red hots or red snappers.

Pie and Mash (and liquor)
Pie and mash (meat pie and mashed potatoes) is a traditional London working-class food and is often accompanied by jellied eels and a parsley liquor.  Business Insider ate some Pie, Mash and Jellied Eels at F. Cooke's in the East End but I can't say that I'm anxious to try it, although I do like meat pies and mashed potatoes.  Battersea Pie Station in Covent Garden even offers steak and kidney pie, that Daddy liked so much and that Mother made once in a blue moon.  And, as always, TimeOut London has a list of 14 traditional Pie and Mash shops, which are cheap as can be (around 3 £) but scroll down to #1 F. Cooke ("one of the very few to still sprinkle the shop floor with sawdust; traditionally used to prevent the floors becoming slippery from discarded eel bones").

More to come!

Where Can I Get Marmalade?

Frank Cooper's marmalade to be exact.  Fortnum and Mason has quite a number of marmalades to choose from but Frank Cooper isn't among them.  Will might like F&M's Lucifer Marmalade with ginger and chilli.  Many of the marmalades are no longer made with Seville oranges but with sweet oranges, just like in the United States.  In 2013, the Evening Standard had a list of 5 of the best marmalades and Frank Cooper's was among them so it still exists, we just can't find it in Pittsburgh.  Checking with the Evening Standard's source, Tesco, they indeed do have it and it's a lot cheaper than the marmalades at Fortnum and Mason (2.20£ as opposed to 4.95£ to 9.95£) so maybe I can get it at any local supermarket or check at the Tesco Superstore across the Thames.

Tesco even carries its own "Finest Dark Coarse Cut Rich Seville Orange Marmalade".  How many jars should I bring back?  A case like Daddy did from Victoria?  But I'd have to haul it up to the Lake District with me...  While we are in London we can do taste tests of the various kinds.  Tesco offers about 24 kinds online and there's a Tesco Express a block from the apartment but who knows how many each store carries.  There's also a Sainsbury's Local diagonally across from the apartment and a larger Sainsbury's about a kilometer down Fulham Road and, like Tesco, Sainsbury's carries Frank Cooper's marmalade online.  Although maybe they should call it Sarah Jane Cooper's marmalade since it uses her 1874 recipe.

Or maybe I should just haul back a can of Robertson's Ma Made Thin Cut Seville Oranges and make my own marmalade, like I did one year when I found it at Williams Sonoma.  Oh, never mind.  I see I can get Ma Made on Amazon with free shipping for $13.71...  For that matter, I can also get Frank Cooper's marmalade on Amazon for about $10 a jar with free shipping.

But what fun is that????

London Markets

Spitalfields Market

I find myself starting posts and then I move on to something else without finishing them.   I was looking at Visit London's Top 12 Markets so that if we are in a specific neighborhood we can stop by and see what they have.  I just have to remember that many of them are only alive on weekends.

The Eyewitness Travel Guide on London says:  "Even if you're not looking for cut-price cabbages or a silk sari, it's worth paying a visit to one of London's crowded, colorful markets."

Spitalfields.  What a name!  Spitalfields was an immigrant community in East London that you can read more about in BBC Travel, host to first the Huguenots, then the Irish during the Potato Famine, then Eastern European Jews and finally Bangladeshis.  There is an old Victorian covered market hall here: Old Spitalfields Market which is open daily.  Brick Lane Market is another market in the Old Truman Brewery in the same vicinity (the East End) but it is only open on Saturday and Sunday.

Portobello Road Market

Portobello Road Market is north of Chelsea and is mainly known for its antique market on Saturday, although they have fruits and vegetables and other things as well.  They say the antiques market is centered around the Notting Hill underground station.  There is also a Notting Hill Farmers Market on Saturday, opening at 9 am.  I don't suppose we could rush out and shop before we go see the sights?  The London Farmers' Markets website has a list of such produce markets.  I'm going to have to buy a foldable grocery cart.

First Saturday in London:  Walk up to Earls Court Station (16 minutes) and then take the tube up to Notting Hill Station (5 minutes) and walk up Portobello Road to Ackham Village Market.  The stretch along Portobello Road is about a mile.  A lot of the reviews on TripAdvisor found it too touristy and overpriced although others liked it so this excursion is tentative.  TripAdvisor has a ranking for Flea and Street Markets that puts Portobello Road at #41 in Shopping (with 3,608 reviews) and Borough Market at #1 (with 10,123 reviews).  Maybe I'd prefer Borough market anyway because it is a food market rather than a flea market, and from the looks of the Portobello Road Market it would take hours to get through the crowds.

Borough Market

Borough Market
This one is located south of the Thames near London Bridge and might be too upscale for me from the looks of things, sort of like the San Francisco ferry building market.  According to the Rough Guide "Prices are high and Saturdays can be a crush; arrive early." The full market is operational from Wednesday to Saturday but it is a long way from Chelsea.  The closest tube station to the market is London Bridge but we'd have to walk up to Earls Court to take it.  At the Transport for London Plan a Journey website, they recommend taking the #14 or #414 bus to South Kensington Station and then taking two lines to the London Bridge Station for a total travel time of 50 minutes.  Or we could walk there, seeing the sites along the route, arriving in about 2 hours...

One Thing Leads to Another...

I was reading this Washington Post article on the best places in London for afternoon tea, remembering how intrigued I was by the idea in Victoria (especially with crumpets), which led me to another article, about London's underground history.

I guess it's time for me to start submerging myself in British history and quirkiness for our trip next September, or was it October?  I don't suppose they have a Britainology TV program...

Penny, what did we do with the book "The Year 1000"?  Or did I already read it?  I'll even have to read Mother's volume on British Food or check out these dishes.  Fish and chips, Yorkshire pudding, full breakfast, cullen skink and pasties I can handle but steak and kidney pie, blackpudding and jellied eels I'll leave for Daddy and Fernando!  Laverbread (Welshman's caviar) will be for Jen.  This Christmas we could have Yorkshire Pudding along with the standing rib roast that Juan is so crazy about (I don't mind it myself, especially with horseradish sauce).  Now mind you, these are "British", not "English" foods, so they include Scotch Eggs, which Mother even had at the Palms in Ventura, and Haggis, which only Fernando was brave enough to try in Scotland.  Ah, to live so vicariously through one's husband!

Heck.  I'll even eat Fish and Chips with Mushy Peas, "recipe courtesy of Young Sun Huh".  Who would have thought?  And do you remember how Daddy always liked "Piccalilli"?  I'm sorry this descended into food again but I think that is the most exciting part of my life

Columbus

As in Ohio, not Christopher.
I'm just pulling together some links that I can get to later.

And why is Columbus called the Arch City?  Shouldn't that be St. Louis?

First, the local newspaper:  The Columbus Dispatch.  Lots of sports coverage but what teams do they have besides Ohio State?
And then the monthly magazine: Columbus Monthly.
Columbus Underground is a "hyper-local, community-driven" online media site.

Then some Asian markets and restaurants:
Here's a Dispatch article on Fortune Chinese Restaurant, in the north suburbs:

"it has one of the most extensive dim sum menus in town. The restaurant is said to make all 48 selections from scratch, including the roasted pork dumplings, steamed rice roll with shrimp and the mushroom chicken bun...Certainly there are plenty of exotic choices, such as braised chicken feet, minced pork with preserved egg congee (a type of porridge) and taro rice cake."

Tensuke Japanese Market -- they also have a bakery and a restaurant in the same shopping center, Kenny Shopping Centre, north of the city.

An American's Guide  to Korean in Columbus, a list on Yelp covering six places in Upper Arlington.  She says the "International Corridor" is Bethel Road, north of the city.

More to come, I hope.