this post was submitted on 09 Sep 2025
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To continue to take a shitposty matter much too seriously for a while:
I think that's basically just the jellied eels and stargazy pie, isn't it? You'd have to really go looking to find anyone making or eating those nowadays, and they were always regional dishes in the first place (London for the eels, Cornwall for the pie). You could toss haggis in there too, but it doesn't have the same striking appearance as the other two, it's usually just the ingredients that freak folk out. Haggis actually still is popular in Scotland, and I can attest that it's excellent
The joke I usually hear is that way too much of our food is bland over-boiled under-seasoned mush. You know, "Britain conquered the world for spices and then refused to use any of them". That one does have a basis in modern reality. The amount of vegetables I ate growing up which were just boiled until they're barely holding together and then at most threatened with the mention of salt... it'd drive a Frenchman to madness, I swear it
As Kornblumenratte mentions, WWII rationing really did do a number on us whether it was the root of the joke or not. I personally find that explanation plausible because it comes with an explanation for why the reputation spread far and wide (soldiers from overseas being stationed here). I've read arguments for British food being bad pre-WWII, including early industrialisation and a poor climate for growing a lot of tasty ingredients. I don't know enough to comment on how true each one is. Whatever the case is, my experience of it is just that our culture lacks the deep love of food that some of our neighbours on the continent seem to have. Any serious exploration of the topic is left up to those that take a personal interest.
Entirely anecdotally it does seem to me like while there is great food to be had here, including very traditional stuff, the general baseline of quality is a lot lower than somewhere like France or Italy. You can't just walk into a random cafe and assume it'll be great and you can't just expect a random person to have a any sort of passion for food. There are plenty of people and establishments that do have that skill and passion, but the culture rarely gets anyone off to a good start on that journey
France has some rationing too during WWII.
I may have the beginning of a lead, as I wondered where the French culinary culture came from. It seems to have become something different from our neighbors, around the rise of Louis XIV. See, at that time, meals you could serve to your guest was a real measure of your wealth. You would serve exotic spices, fresh fish, ingredients from far away.
As the international trade was getting more intense (yes, already at the time), having exotic spices and curry became accessible to more and more people, not just the top elite (fun to think that around Louis XIII, the pinacle of expensive French food was probably something full of spices similar to a curry) so the king invented a new league above these: "We are going to make tasty food like you have never tasted, only with local products. They all come from the royal gardens. My vegetables have bodyguards. Have yours?"
The nobility competed with each other by having the most elaborate meals, the best chefs. It was the time when bouquet garni, creme chantilly and many popular recipes were invented.
In modern terms, you would say that a lot of R&D was invested in that status item, that was "good food". After the Revolution, what did these cooks do? They opened restaurants.
The strong food culture, the idea of seeing good food as an important status item to check if you want to rise in the hierarchy, seems to come from that time.
I was extremely confused to be getting a reply to a comment this old, but it's an interesting reply so no complaints from me!
I do quite like that theory. It'd be interesting to compare the circumstances to other places that had revolutions at about the same time. The New World countries maybe aren't great comparisons since they didn't have the same centuries-old entrenched aristocracies, but there were a number of other revolutions in the same time period
Oh! I did not see the age! I forgot I sort my message by active discussions first!