Sweet and Sour

[callmemadam]

It’s just as well that Nigel Slater is never likely to be standing behind me in the checkout queue at the Co-op; I’m the woman who annoys him, the one ferreting around in her purse for the right change. A lot of things annoy our Nigel, from Guardian readers to carpet slippers and other signs of age. The point of Eating for England, though, is memory. It reminds us exactly how to unwrap a Dairylea cheese triangle, a Kit Kat or a Tunnocks Teacake and how to fold up the empty foil case from a custard tart (yes! I do that!). Slater’s food icons are roast beef, a full English and, of course, toast but he also celebrates what most food writers would see as an appalling weakness for ready made, processed foods; this is refreshingly honest of him. The book is irritable, repetitive, episodic, not as good as Toast but ultimately very endearing.

Comments

[dorianegray.livejournal.com]

I glanced through that in Waterstone's recently, but ultimately decided it was a book to borrow, not buy.

[callmemadam.livejournal.com]

Yes, I think so and I borrowed this copy.

[sloopjonb.livejournal.com]

I confess to a weakness for green Pot Noodles as accompaniment to a pork chop.

[callmemadam.livejournal.com]

Confess away; Liberty Hall here. I have never eaten a Pot Noodle myself but can millions be wrong? (Yes, obv.)

[sloopjonb.livejournal.com]

THey're not as horrible as you might think (well, some of the flavours aren't). I had a pork chop once, and had nothing to go with it bar a green Pot Noodle. So I had that. They went surprisingly well together.

Roast beef for tea tonight!

[sloopjonb.livejournal.com]

Actually it turned out to be roast lamb. So the Yorkshire pud is held over until tomorrow, to go with the beef-n-horseradish sausages.

It's fun in our kitchen!

[callmemadam.livejournal.com]

Nigel Slater would be proud of you.

[rosathome.livejournal.com]

I say you should have Yorkshire pudding whatever the meat.