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In Defence of English Cooking
Not only was George Orwell one of the greatest writers and most important political thinkers of the twentieth century, he is also the author of the bestselling Penguin title of all time: Animal Farm first published in Penguin in 1951. These heartfelt essays demonstrate Orwell's wide-ranging appeal, and range from political manifesto to affectionate consideration of what being English truly means.
56 pages, Paperback
First published May 6, 2005
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About the author
George Orwell
1,290Ìýbooks48.2kÌýfollowersEric Arthur Blair was an English novelist, poet, essayist, journalist and critic who wrote under the pen name of George Orwell. His work is characterised by lucid prose, social criticism, opposition to all totalitarianism (both authoritarian communism and fascism), and support of democratic socialism.
Orwell is best known for his allegorical novella Animal Farm (1945) and the dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), although his works also encompass literary criticism, poetry, fiction and polemical journalism. His non-fiction works, including The Road to Wigan Pier (1937), documenting his experience of working-class life in the industrial north of England, and Homage to Catalonia (1938), an account of his experiences soldiering for the Republican faction of the Spanish Civil War (1936�1939), are as critically respected as his essays on politics, literature, language and culture.
Orwell's work remains influential in popular culture and in political culture, and the adjective "Orwellian"—describing totalitarian and authoritarian social practices—is part of the English language, like many of his neologisms, such as "Big Brother", "Thought Police", "Room 101", "Newspeak", "memory hole", "doublethink", and "thoughtcrime". In 2008, The Times named Orwell the second-greatest British writer since 1945.
Orwell is best known for his allegorical novella Animal Farm (1945) and the dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), although his works also encompass literary criticism, poetry, fiction and polemical journalism. His non-fiction works, including The Road to Wigan Pier (1937), documenting his experience of working-class life in the industrial north of England, and Homage to Catalonia (1938), an account of his experiences soldiering for the Republican faction of the Spanish Civil War (1936�1939), are as critically respected as his essays on politics, literature, language and culture.
Orwell's work remains influential in popular culture and in political culture, and the adjective "Orwellian"—describing totalitarian and authoritarian social practices—is part of the English language, like many of his neologisms, such as "Big Brother", "Thought Police", "Room 101", "Newspeak", "memory hole", "doublethink", and "thoughtcrime". In 2008, The Times named Orwell the second-greatest British writer since 1945.
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February 17, 2025
In Defence of English Cooking by the English author George Orwell, was first published as a piece of journalism in the London newspaper, the “Evening Standard� on 15th December 1945. It also formed part of a collection of 8 essays in his 1947 collection “Some Thoughts on the Common Toad�, which is titled after its first essay.
At the end of 1945, England was about to celebrate its first Christmas since the end of the Second World War, which had ended in May. But the end of the war did not mean an end to rationing. Shortages persisted and it actually took until mid-1954 before rationing finally ended. However George Orwell was not to know that, almost nine years earlier. He decided that this was a good time to make a staunch defence of his nation’s dishes, and wanted to encourage everyone, and remind them about how unique, and great, British cooking could be. He was looking forward to resuming the variety of English cooking (and yes, it is very varied, as he describes!) Yet already both English people and the world did not think it was up to much. As he points out:
“It is commonly said, even by the English themselves, that English cooking is the worst in the world.�
The government of the time were keen to increase the number of foreign tourists visiting Britain, and George Orwell wryly points out England’s two worst faults from a foreigner’s point of view: “the gloom of our Sundays and the difficulty of buying a drink�.
He was hopeful that when rationing had completely stopped, England’s culinary reputation would improve. Sadly though, the reputation of English food has not changed much, so the essay is ironically prescient. Even now, very few English dishes can be found abroad. There might be an “English tea� available, with just one type of tea, and probably no sign of delicious cucumber sandwiches, on wafer-thin slices of bread and butter, nor of hot toasted sultana-laden tea cakes, split in two and dripping with butter and jam—and only a very limited selection of slices of cake and buns.
There is likely to be be a total incomprehension as to what a “cream tea� is, and whether the correct form is fruit or plain scones—and even more importantly in the West Country—whether to pile jam or clotted cream on first, according to whether it is a Cornish or Devon cream tea. Sometimes there is a complete travesty of a Bakewell pudding (or tart) with an absurd topping of royal icing and a half glacé cherry! (There is no such decorative coating on the authentic recipe, merely the soft topping made from beaten egg and sugar.)
Perhaps Yorkshire pudding is on the menu, as an “extra� or side dish to roast beef, rather than as a course in itself, served with gravy. Yet traditionally roast beef comes with horseradish sauce, roast pork with apple sauce, roast lamb with mint sauce, etc. There are many savoury sauces which are traditionally used in English cookery, such as bread sauce, or a simple white sauce to pour over greens, and also redcurrant jelly, and “various kinds of sweet pickle, which we seem to have in greater profusion than most countries�.
But other than Yorkshire pudding, (usually in small neat fairly tasteless mass-produced rounds), tourists in hotels, guest houses and restaurants here struggle to find a typically British dish, just as much as non-English folk abroad. A “Full English Breakfast� may be advertised, with ham (bacon) and eggs, sausage, baked beans, tomatoes and mushrooms, with toast, but it rarely includes fried bread, or black pudding, or Scottish haggis. What about English kippers for breakfast? Or Scottish kedgeree? Or Irish potato griddle cakes? Or Welsh cockles and laverbread?
It is not merely English cooking which seems to be ignored abroad, but the entire range from the British Isles. Hotels and guest houses here still only pay lip-service to an English menu, preferring the ease of preparing a “continental breakfast� of rolls or croissants with jam, and coffee. And what happened to the toast with Oxford marmalade—never jam—which in a traditional English breakfast is the staple after the cooked portion? There are a variety of jams and preserves, which are typically English, such as George Orwell’s recommended marrow jam and bramble jelly.
George Orwell bemoans the demise of his favourites, such as potted shrimps, faggots, smoked eel, and although jellied eels can still be purchased in a traditional seaside town, they never again became very popular after the war. Ditto the innards of animals such as chicklets, sweetbreads, and so on, which were a staple of poorer people, although tripe and onions or liver and kidneys are still purchased. In East London you can still get “pie and liquor� (meat pie and a very green sauce based on parsley). Bangers (sausages) and mash (mashed potatoes) is quite a well known dish, and “Fish and Chip� shops have perhaps travelled across the world a little more. There is mutton stew, (now invariably called “lamb stew�, however old the poor creature was when slaughtered), steak and kidney suet pudding, cottage pie, and shepherd’s pie, hotpot, beef stew and dumplings, and all sorts of other dishes which had originally been created to eke out very little meat. When George Orwell was writing, there was generally little luxury food on offer, for at least the next decade, and a good meal depended almost entirely on the household income. Potted meat, or fish paste, was a likely sandwich filling—but all these are rarely seen now, outside the family home.
In hard-up households the call “What’s for tea?� (often the final meal of the day, around 5pm) would be answered by “bread and jam�—and not always as a joke. On the other hand the variety of types of English bread is very wide. Within white bread alone, there are bread-cakes, baps, bloomers and bridge rolls, cottage loaves and crusty bread, before moving on to wholemeal, wholewheat, bran or different grains such as ryebread. My father was in Belgium and Holland at this time, and he reported that there was nothing on the continent similar to English bread, except “black bread�: a particularly dense type of rye bread, so my mother used to send some soft white English bread over there, to the family’s delight.
A light lunch in a restaurant or hotel here now is rarely English sandwiches, or a Cornish pasty, or Welsh rarebit, but more likely to be baguettes, or panini, tacos, or tortilla wraps, and so on. Even our traditional English flan is now given the ubiquitous French term of “q³Ü¾±³¦³ó±ðâ€�. In England we have 5 types of pastry. There is shortcrust pastry, flaky pastry, rough puff pastry, suet crust pastry and puff pastry, (and 7 if you include French choux pastry, and Greek filo pastry). Yet outside the UK it seems to all be “pie doughâ€� (shortcrust pastry). Additionally, England’s huge range of biscuits: “innumerable kindsâ€� George Orwell says “are generally admitted to be better and crisper in Englandâ€�. American cookies are perhaps similar, but far more limited and a little doughy. Shortbread, especially Scottish butter shortbread is a melt-in-the mouth treat. Crumpets, muffins and pikelets seem to have no equivalents.
The amount and variety of English puddings is huge! George Orwell picks out Christmas pudding, treacle tart and apple dumplings, but a few additions might be ginger duff, figgy pudding, steamed treacle suet pudding, jam roly-poly, spotted dick, sticky toffee pudding, and interchangeable soft fruit puddings in abundance such as plum cobbler, blackberry and apple crumble, rhubarb fruit fool, gooseberry pie, bread-and-butter pudding, as well as lighter desserts such as Queen of puddings, Eton mess, English trifle, knickerbocker glory, junket, lemon syllabub � and that’s not to mention the milk puddings such as rice, tapioca or sago pudding, (known as frogspawn to schoolkids!) which although not English in origin, have been a staple for centuries.
There are dozens of traditional English puddings I have not named, but puddings as desserts, or even the mere concept of a dessert sometimes, is not by any means standard outside the British Isles.
I remember when I was just 14, going to Holland to visit relatives. My “aunt� came in from the kitchen wreathed in smiles. She was very excited, and proudly dished up what she called an “English pudding�. I glanced at my father, completely baffled and could tell by his warning expression that I’d have to ask him later �
What she had placed before us was custard. Just that! Where was the pudding? Where was the suet sponge, dripping with treacle or the ginger duff, lemon sponge or jam sponge—or the blackberry and apple pie, rhubarb crumble or plum cobbler? There was nothing under the custard, so where was the actual pudding?
The English are very proud of their cakes, too. Fruitcake of various sorts, from date and walnut to iced wedding cake and Christmas cake, simnel cake, Dundee cake, lemon Madeira cake, Angel cake (not Angel food cake, but a pink and yellow layered sponge), saffron buns, currant buns, macaroons, kunzle cakes, eccles cakes, mince pies, cream or custard slices, flapjacks and oatcakes, ginger parkin, coffee and walnut cake, almond buns, and Queen Victoria’s favourites, Battenberg cake and Victoria sponge.
Doughnuts, surprisingly, are neither Dutch nor American in origin, but predate the first American ones in 1847 by some years. English “Dow nutsâ€� have been traced back to Baroness Elizabeth Dimsdale who made them in Cowbridge House in Hertford, following a local cook’s recipe which she published in her own cookery book in 1800. But just as these have become known as “d´Ç‵µ³Ü³Ù²õâ€�, fairy cakes and butterfly buns have been virtually squashed by the larger American “c³Ü±è³¦²¹°ì±ð²õâ€�, and most traditional English cakes are side-lined in favour of universally available treats such as chocolate cake, or French “g²¹³Ù±ð²¹³Ü³æâ€�.
French cheese is usually soft and runny, but English cheese is dense and solid: either easy to cut, like Cheddar or Red Leicester, or crumbly like Cheshire, or Blue Stilton: “the best cheese of its type in the world, with Wensleydale not far behind� says George Orwell.
“Then there are the various ways of cooking potatoes that are peculiar to our own country. Where else do you see potatoes roasted under the joint, which is far and away the best way of cooking them? Or the delicious potato cakes that you get in the north of England? And it is far better to cook new potatoes in the English way—that is, boiled with mint and then served with a little melted butter or margarine—than to fry them as is done in most countries.�
In restaurants now, it is extremely rare to be offered boiled potatoes. It is nearly always “french fries�, which to the English seem like thin chips. Chips, of course come with battered cod, haddock, etc. Also “green salad� has taken the place of boiled vegetables such as cabbage, carrots, parsnips, turnips, swede, broccoli; occasionally peas are on offer, but nothing else. This trait had already begun by 1945:
“It will be seen that we have no cause to be ashamed of our cookery, so far as originality goes or so far as the ingredients go. And yet � you practically don’t find good English cooking outside a private house. If you want, say, a good, rich slice of Yorkshire pudding you are more likely to get it in the poorest English home than in a restaurant, which is where the visitor necessarily eats most of his meals.�
I can attest to the truth of this. My grandmother’s Yorkshire pudding was second to none, and my mother made a phenomenal apple pie, although I was not too keen on my Auntie Flossie’s speciality rice pudding, which had to be virtually cut with a knife (sorry Auntie!). Grandma would sit in her chair by the oven range, with the basin on her lap, and a jug of milk-and-water next to her (a greater proportion of water made better puddings). She made a well in the flour mixture, and poured in the liquid bit by tiny bit. It took a very long time to gradually incorporate all the flour mixture, and when it was smooth, she would leave it to stand for another 2 hours.
Then she would heat a little fat in large round iron pans in the range next to a coal fire, until each was sizzling hot, and pour a little mixture into the middle swirling it round. She cooked large round Yorkshire puddings this way, turning them over half way through, and then cutting them into four quarters while they were still in the iron pan. Forget those puffy shop-bought objects, full of air and nonsense. These were the real deal. Grandma would pile them high on a plate, and keep them warm on a top shelf of the range, until she had made plenty for everybody.
We ate our flat Yorkshire puddings by themselves with gravy, before the stew and potatoes which followed. This was the traditional Yorkshire way. Better off families would have roast beef instead of stew, but a restaurant meal would not taste as good.
“The expensive restaurants and hotels almost all imitate French cookery and write their menus in French, while if you want a good cheap meal you gravitate naturally towards a Greek, Italian or Chinese restaurant.�
This is largely still true. A recent survey discovered that the favourite meal out for English folk on a Friday night was, of all things, curry! We have all sorts of ethnic cuisine; within walking distance from my home I can think of Thai, Chinese, Italian, Turkish and Indian restaurants. We do have a local “chippie� selling fish and chips to take away, and that has German sausages and kebabs I think, as well, but if I try to think of an English restaurant there isn’t one.
George Orwell’s final thought is:
“It is not a law of nature that every restaurant in England should be either foreign or bad, and the first step towards an improvement will be a less long-suffering attitude in the British public itself.�
I can see his point. Of course I welcome the diversity of available foods now, particularly since I have been a strict vegetarian for several decades. I particularly favour Italian dishes, or various regional Indian foods, (when spices were not my enemy). The lacto-vegetarian diet has an immense breadth which often surprises meat-eaters � but that is a subject for another day.
Also I am now wondering if the world-famous vegetarian George Bernard Shaw wrote an essay on Vegetarianism. I do remember reading his thoughts on all the different nut butters he was able to get during World War II, and feeling that he had a better deal than meat-eaters. But it did have its downside.
At the age of 94, George Bernard Shaw fell out of his own apple tree at his home “Shaw’s Corner� in Ayot St. Lawrence, Hertfordshire, and died. George Orwell had himself died less than a year earlier, but doubtless would have had something sardonically amusing to say about this freak accident.
At the end of 1945, England was about to celebrate its first Christmas since the end of the Second World War, which had ended in May. But the end of the war did not mean an end to rationing. Shortages persisted and it actually took until mid-1954 before rationing finally ended. However George Orwell was not to know that, almost nine years earlier. He decided that this was a good time to make a staunch defence of his nation’s dishes, and wanted to encourage everyone, and remind them about how unique, and great, British cooking could be. He was looking forward to resuming the variety of English cooking (and yes, it is very varied, as he describes!) Yet already both English people and the world did not think it was up to much. As he points out:
“It is commonly said, even by the English themselves, that English cooking is the worst in the world.�
The government of the time were keen to increase the number of foreign tourists visiting Britain, and George Orwell wryly points out England’s two worst faults from a foreigner’s point of view: “the gloom of our Sundays and the difficulty of buying a drink�.
He was hopeful that when rationing had completely stopped, England’s culinary reputation would improve. Sadly though, the reputation of English food has not changed much, so the essay is ironically prescient. Even now, very few English dishes can be found abroad. There might be an “English tea� available, with just one type of tea, and probably no sign of delicious cucumber sandwiches, on wafer-thin slices of bread and butter, nor of hot toasted sultana-laden tea cakes, split in two and dripping with butter and jam—and only a very limited selection of slices of cake and buns.
There is likely to be be a total incomprehension as to what a “cream tea� is, and whether the correct form is fruit or plain scones—and even more importantly in the West Country—whether to pile jam or clotted cream on first, according to whether it is a Cornish or Devon cream tea. Sometimes there is a complete travesty of a Bakewell pudding (or tart) with an absurd topping of royal icing and a half glacé cherry! (There is no such decorative coating on the authentic recipe, merely the soft topping made from beaten egg and sugar.)
Perhaps Yorkshire pudding is on the menu, as an “extra� or side dish to roast beef, rather than as a course in itself, served with gravy. Yet traditionally roast beef comes with horseradish sauce, roast pork with apple sauce, roast lamb with mint sauce, etc. There are many savoury sauces which are traditionally used in English cookery, such as bread sauce, or a simple white sauce to pour over greens, and also redcurrant jelly, and “various kinds of sweet pickle, which we seem to have in greater profusion than most countries�.
But other than Yorkshire pudding, (usually in small neat fairly tasteless mass-produced rounds), tourists in hotels, guest houses and restaurants here struggle to find a typically British dish, just as much as non-English folk abroad. A “Full English Breakfast� may be advertised, with ham (bacon) and eggs, sausage, baked beans, tomatoes and mushrooms, with toast, but it rarely includes fried bread, or black pudding, or Scottish haggis. What about English kippers for breakfast? Or Scottish kedgeree? Or Irish potato griddle cakes? Or Welsh cockles and laverbread?
It is not merely English cooking which seems to be ignored abroad, but the entire range from the British Isles. Hotels and guest houses here still only pay lip-service to an English menu, preferring the ease of preparing a “continental breakfast� of rolls or croissants with jam, and coffee. And what happened to the toast with Oxford marmalade—never jam—which in a traditional English breakfast is the staple after the cooked portion? There are a variety of jams and preserves, which are typically English, such as George Orwell’s recommended marrow jam and bramble jelly.
George Orwell bemoans the demise of his favourites, such as potted shrimps, faggots, smoked eel, and although jellied eels can still be purchased in a traditional seaside town, they never again became very popular after the war. Ditto the innards of animals such as chicklets, sweetbreads, and so on, which were a staple of poorer people, although tripe and onions or liver and kidneys are still purchased. In East London you can still get “pie and liquor� (meat pie and a very green sauce based on parsley). Bangers (sausages) and mash (mashed potatoes) is quite a well known dish, and “Fish and Chip� shops have perhaps travelled across the world a little more. There is mutton stew, (now invariably called “lamb stew�, however old the poor creature was when slaughtered), steak and kidney suet pudding, cottage pie, and shepherd’s pie, hotpot, beef stew and dumplings, and all sorts of other dishes which had originally been created to eke out very little meat. When George Orwell was writing, there was generally little luxury food on offer, for at least the next decade, and a good meal depended almost entirely on the household income. Potted meat, or fish paste, was a likely sandwich filling—but all these are rarely seen now, outside the family home.
In hard-up households the call “What’s for tea?� (often the final meal of the day, around 5pm) would be answered by “bread and jam�—and not always as a joke. On the other hand the variety of types of English bread is very wide. Within white bread alone, there are bread-cakes, baps, bloomers and bridge rolls, cottage loaves and crusty bread, before moving on to wholemeal, wholewheat, bran or different grains such as ryebread. My father was in Belgium and Holland at this time, and he reported that there was nothing on the continent similar to English bread, except “black bread�: a particularly dense type of rye bread, so my mother used to send some soft white English bread over there, to the family’s delight.
A light lunch in a restaurant or hotel here now is rarely English sandwiches, or a Cornish pasty, or Welsh rarebit, but more likely to be baguettes, or panini, tacos, or tortilla wraps, and so on. Even our traditional English flan is now given the ubiquitous French term of “q³Ü¾±³¦³ó±ðâ€�. In England we have 5 types of pastry. There is shortcrust pastry, flaky pastry, rough puff pastry, suet crust pastry and puff pastry, (and 7 if you include French choux pastry, and Greek filo pastry). Yet outside the UK it seems to all be “pie doughâ€� (shortcrust pastry). Additionally, England’s huge range of biscuits: “innumerable kindsâ€� George Orwell says “are generally admitted to be better and crisper in Englandâ€�. American cookies are perhaps similar, but far more limited and a little doughy. Shortbread, especially Scottish butter shortbread is a melt-in-the mouth treat. Crumpets, muffins and pikelets seem to have no equivalents.
The amount and variety of English puddings is huge! George Orwell picks out Christmas pudding, treacle tart and apple dumplings, but a few additions might be ginger duff, figgy pudding, steamed treacle suet pudding, jam roly-poly, spotted dick, sticky toffee pudding, and interchangeable soft fruit puddings in abundance such as plum cobbler, blackberry and apple crumble, rhubarb fruit fool, gooseberry pie, bread-and-butter pudding, as well as lighter desserts such as Queen of puddings, Eton mess, English trifle, knickerbocker glory, junket, lemon syllabub � and that’s not to mention the milk puddings such as rice, tapioca or sago pudding, (known as frogspawn to schoolkids!) which although not English in origin, have been a staple for centuries.
There are dozens of traditional English puddings I have not named, but puddings as desserts, or even the mere concept of a dessert sometimes, is not by any means standard outside the British Isles.
I remember when I was just 14, going to Holland to visit relatives. My “aunt� came in from the kitchen wreathed in smiles. She was very excited, and proudly dished up what she called an “English pudding�. I glanced at my father, completely baffled and could tell by his warning expression that I’d have to ask him later �
What she had placed before us was custard. Just that! Where was the pudding? Where was the suet sponge, dripping with treacle or the ginger duff, lemon sponge or jam sponge—or the blackberry and apple pie, rhubarb crumble or plum cobbler? There was nothing under the custard, so where was the actual pudding?
The English are very proud of their cakes, too. Fruitcake of various sorts, from date and walnut to iced wedding cake and Christmas cake, simnel cake, Dundee cake, lemon Madeira cake, Angel cake (not Angel food cake, but a pink and yellow layered sponge), saffron buns, currant buns, macaroons, kunzle cakes, eccles cakes, mince pies, cream or custard slices, flapjacks and oatcakes, ginger parkin, coffee and walnut cake, almond buns, and Queen Victoria’s favourites, Battenberg cake and Victoria sponge.
Doughnuts, surprisingly, are neither Dutch nor American in origin, but predate the first American ones in 1847 by some years. English “Dow nutsâ€� have been traced back to Baroness Elizabeth Dimsdale who made them in Cowbridge House in Hertford, following a local cook’s recipe which she published in her own cookery book in 1800. But just as these have become known as “d´Ç‵µ³Ü³Ù²õâ€�, fairy cakes and butterfly buns have been virtually squashed by the larger American “c³Ü±è³¦²¹°ì±ð²õâ€�, and most traditional English cakes are side-lined in favour of universally available treats such as chocolate cake, or French “g²¹³Ù±ð²¹³Ü³æâ€�.
French cheese is usually soft and runny, but English cheese is dense and solid: either easy to cut, like Cheddar or Red Leicester, or crumbly like Cheshire, or Blue Stilton: “the best cheese of its type in the world, with Wensleydale not far behind� says George Orwell.
“Then there are the various ways of cooking potatoes that are peculiar to our own country. Where else do you see potatoes roasted under the joint, which is far and away the best way of cooking them? Or the delicious potato cakes that you get in the north of England? And it is far better to cook new potatoes in the English way—that is, boiled with mint and then served with a little melted butter or margarine—than to fry them as is done in most countries.�
In restaurants now, it is extremely rare to be offered boiled potatoes. It is nearly always “french fries�, which to the English seem like thin chips. Chips, of course come with battered cod, haddock, etc. Also “green salad� has taken the place of boiled vegetables such as cabbage, carrots, parsnips, turnips, swede, broccoli; occasionally peas are on offer, but nothing else. This trait had already begun by 1945:
“It will be seen that we have no cause to be ashamed of our cookery, so far as originality goes or so far as the ingredients go. And yet � you practically don’t find good English cooking outside a private house. If you want, say, a good, rich slice of Yorkshire pudding you are more likely to get it in the poorest English home than in a restaurant, which is where the visitor necessarily eats most of his meals.�
I can attest to the truth of this. My grandmother’s Yorkshire pudding was second to none, and my mother made a phenomenal apple pie, although I was not too keen on my Auntie Flossie’s speciality rice pudding, which had to be virtually cut with a knife (sorry Auntie!). Grandma would sit in her chair by the oven range, with the basin on her lap, and a jug of milk-and-water next to her (a greater proportion of water made better puddings). She made a well in the flour mixture, and poured in the liquid bit by tiny bit. It took a very long time to gradually incorporate all the flour mixture, and when it was smooth, she would leave it to stand for another 2 hours.
Then she would heat a little fat in large round iron pans in the range next to a coal fire, until each was sizzling hot, and pour a little mixture into the middle swirling it round. She cooked large round Yorkshire puddings this way, turning them over half way through, and then cutting them into four quarters while they were still in the iron pan. Forget those puffy shop-bought objects, full of air and nonsense. These were the real deal. Grandma would pile them high on a plate, and keep them warm on a top shelf of the range, until she had made plenty for everybody.
We ate our flat Yorkshire puddings by themselves with gravy, before the stew and potatoes which followed. This was the traditional Yorkshire way. Better off families would have roast beef instead of stew, but a restaurant meal would not taste as good.
“The expensive restaurants and hotels almost all imitate French cookery and write their menus in French, while if you want a good cheap meal you gravitate naturally towards a Greek, Italian or Chinese restaurant.�
This is largely still true. A recent survey discovered that the favourite meal out for English folk on a Friday night was, of all things, curry! We have all sorts of ethnic cuisine; within walking distance from my home I can think of Thai, Chinese, Italian, Turkish and Indian restaurants. We do have a local “chippie� selling fish and chips to take away, and that has German sausages and kebabs I think, as well, but if I try to think of an English restaurant there isn’t one.
George Orwell’s final thought is:
“It is not a law of nature that every restaurant in England should be either foreign or bad, and the first step towards an improvement will be a less long-suffering attitude in the British public itself.�
I can see his point. Of course I welcome the diversity of available foods now, particularly since I have been a strict vegetarian for several decades. I particularly favour Italian dishes, or various regional Indian foods, (when spices were not my enemy). The lacto-vegetarian diet has an immense breadth which often surprises meat-eaters � but that is a subject for another day.
Also I am now wondering if the world-famous vegetarian George Bernard Shaw wrote an essay on Vegetarianism. I do remember reading his thoughts on all the different nut butters he was able to get during World War II, and feeling that he had a better deal than meat-eaters. But it did have its downside.
At the age of 94, George Bernard Shaw fell out of his own apple tree at his home “Shaw’s Corner� in Ayot St. Lawrence, Hertfordshire, and died. George Orwell had himself died less than a year earlier, but doubtless would have had something sardonically amusing to say about this freak accident.
February 1, 2022
Orwell discusses English cooking in the context of attracting foreign tourists to the country. He gives many examples of his favorite English specialties--baked goods, puddings, potatoes, various sauces, jams, and cheeses.
However, he admits there is a problem for visitors:
"You practically don't find good English cooking outside a private house. If you want, say, a good, rich slice of Yorkshire pudding you are more likely to get it in the poorest English home than in a restaurant, which is where the visitor necessarily eats most of his meals."
Other problems mentioned were the Sunday hours of establishments, and liquor licensing laws. Some food rationing laws were also in effect in 1945 when Orwell wrote this essay. Orwell did seem to get great enjoyment from a good English meal of his favorite foods.
I've never visited England so I can't comment on the quality of the food there. But I've noticed there is only one English restaurant located 15 miles away from my American home that advertises lovely English teas with little sandwiches and baked goods. But there are multitudes of restaurants featuring other ethnic cooking in the area. This is in an area that was originally settled by the English. I'm not sure if it's the food, or a public relations problem, but nobody says they're going to pick up some English food on their way home.
However, he admits there is a problem for visitors:
"You practically don't find good English cooking outside a private house. If you want, say, a good, rich slice of Yorkshire pudding you are more likely to get it in the poorest English home than in a restaurant, which is where the visitor necessarily eats most of his meals."
Other problems mentioned were the Sunday hours of establishments, and liquor licensing laws. Some food rationing laws were also in effect in 1945 when Orwell wrote this essay. Orwell did seem to get great enjoyment from a good English meal of his favorite foods.
I've never visited England so I can't comment on the quality of the food there. But I've noticed there is only one English restaurant located 15 miles away from my American home that advertises lovely English teas with little sandwiches and baked goods. But there are multitudes of restaurants featuring other ethnic cooking in the area. This is in an area that was originally settled by the English. I'm not sure if it's the food, or a public relations problem, but nobody says they're going to pick up some English food on their way home.
February 3, 2022
A short essay on English cooking, pretty forgettable really. None of the foods that he lists made me think, yum, should cook that soon. But clearly Orwell likes his traditional foods, Yorkshire pudding etc.
April 1, 2019
This is a small collection of Orwell's essays, of which the last, the shortest, and the least significant gave title to the whole pamphlet. Deceiving, you might say, but I think it's a justified deception. Many people will be tempted to see what that old fellow Orwell had to say about cooking, but not as many would be willing to engage with his essays about nationalism, because cooking interests practically everyone and politics is often found boring. But Orwell's essays about nationalism are really worth reading, for he doesn't do traditional political commenting. His inquisitive and ever-questioning mind looked at nationalism as a mode of thinking that everyone, at some point or other, is affected by. He encourages his reader to look into oneself and dig out all the sins of tribal thinking that virtually every one of us is guilty of. The light-hearted title may then trick unaware people to do some serious thinking, and there's hardly a better purpose for deception than that.
December 20, 2012
When you find yourself nodding in agreement at Orwell's defence of English cooking, you know you've been completely seduced. I would like to read his defence of English *weather* if such a text exists. In any case, the essays before this last one are no less works of art: the persona Orwell constructs in his political writings always seems to speak with the voice of absolute common sense and right-thinking, despite him being a card-carrying communist. Orwell's acute sense of the potential perversions of the left allow his analyses of English culture at the time to transcend polemics and emotionalism. The more I read him the more I admire his thoughts and the spirit which animates them.
October 21, 2021
'It will be seen that we have no cause to be ashamed of our cookery, so far as originality goes or so far as the ingredients go. And yet it must be admitted that there is a serious snag from the foreign visitor’s point of view. This is, that you practically don’t find good English cooking outside a private house. If you want, say, a good, rich slice of Yorkshire pudding you are more likely to get it in the poorest English home than in a restaurant, which is where the visitor necessarily eats most of his meals. It is a fact that restaurants which are distinctively English and which also sell good food are very hard to find. Pubs, as a rule, sell no food at all, other than potato crisps and tasteless sandwiches. The expensive restaurants and hotels almost all imitate French cookery and write their menus in French, while if you want a good cheap meal you gravitate naturally towards a Greek, Italian or Chinese restaurant. We are not likely to succeed in attracting tourists while England is thought of as a country of bad food and unintelligible by-laws.'
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July 17, 2019Well I feel a little bit dumb.
This was a collection of essay. Firstly talking about nationalism, and getting into the topics of totalitarianism and fascism (which I struggled to get through as it was the longest, and I had trouble understanding what on earth he was talking about).
The next one spoke about liberty, particularly as it pertains to literature and freedom of speech, and the freedom to argue on political issues (which I understood more of what he was talking about).
And then the last one was his defence of English cooking, in which Orwell says that most people think good English cooking is just an imitation of French cooking and he does nothing to actually rebut this claim except to list dishes that the English have created. Listing food does not mean those foods are good or better than French cooking, it merely means that the English have created something. Obviously this last essay is very based on personal opinion, but I would have liked to see at least some real attempt to dissect the topic (maybe because it was the only one I fully comprehended).
This was a collection of essay. Firstly talking about nationalism, and getting into the topics of totalitarianism and fascism (which I struggled to get through as it was the longest, and I had trouble understanding what on earth he was talking about).
The next one spoke about liberty, particularly as it pertains to literature and freedom of speech, and the freedom to argue on political issues (which I understood more of what he was talking about).
And then the last one was his defence of English cooking, in which Orwell says that most people think good English cooking is just an imitation of French cooking and he does nothing to actually rebut this claim except to list dishes that the English have created. Listing food does not mean those foods are good or better than French cooking, it merely means that the English have created something. Obviously this last essay is very based on personal opinion, but I would have liked to see at least some real attempt to dissect the topic (maybe because it was the only one I fully comprehended).
July 9, 2023
A short piece on how English cooking is unique and should be celebrated not only in the privacy of your home but in restaurants where tourists go
I thought it might be longer and show more examples
I thought it might be longer and show more examples
July 23, 2020
A small collection of essays that are as relevant now as the 1940s. With a very clever style of writing and some gems of insults. Thought-provoking and yet somehow saddening that we still find ourselves in the same battles as Orwell did.
September 5, 2021
not even orwell can make english cooking sound desirable
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December 7, 20210 stars. Failed to prove that English cooking is actually good.
Want to read
September 16, 2007English breakfast, ugh. What defense could there be?
December 6, 2022
It is very interesting how George Orwell comments on British cooking. The only good British cooking is done in homes, cheap restaurants have bad food while expensive restaurants have French, or other foreign foods. Middle class and working people have to learn to cook, if they don't they will have to put up with not good food or spend much money to eat foreign food. This is not good and British folks should learn to prepare and shop for foods they like and not depend on fast foods. Learn how to cook and don't depend on what mother and grandmother cooked.
Too much sugar and fats are not good, heavy food also not good, hot drinks, tea is popular, there are many different kinds of teas. Hot drinks in cold, wet weather is excellent. Different kinds of spices are excellent to make foods more tasty. Sugar not. British folks do like too much sweet in their food. Not good, plus fattening.
I don't like oatmeal or any other type of hot cereal. I was brought up on these cereals, but can't eat them. I have cold cereal, but add fresh fruit to them, good and healthy. No sugar. When I was in Scotland I did eat British breakfasts. Some good, some not. Heavy breakfast, no. I do not use milk in tea, I prefer honey in hot tea, none in iced tea. I usually don't eat a heavy breakfast, maybe once or twice a week.
Wow, heavy food for lunch. A school lunch on cold days in the states popular with kids, tomato soup, Campbell soup and grilled cheese sandwiches. Some of the British food sounds good, other not, too heavy. Apples sauce is good with pork. I agree. My father liked horseradish with meat and I do also. Pickles not so much. Mutton is not popular in the sates, but I do like mutton pies which I can't find. Beef pies yes, mutton no.
Yes, fried fish popular in the states with chips which is also popular in Britain. I had some good soup, potato and leaks in Scotland, tomato soup which tasted like canned soup. Mince pies are not popular in the States, people don't seem to care for them.
I am acquainted with some British food. I liked reading the recipes.
The apples sound great and healthy.
Good article, fun to read, what people eat, when, where, what time.
Nothing beats good roast beef, then sliced thin, pink on the inside, not overcooked.
Do British people still eat like this. This essay was written back in the 1940s.
Different types of jellies are popular in the states, my mother liked orange marmalade.
High tea is not called that in Scotland. In Scotland I went to an afternoon tea in Edinburgh. On cruses high tea is served with many sweet pastries, cakes cookies. Things are a bit different. Not everyone eats the same. Baked potatoes are also popular in the states. Also new potatoes with butter. I need to try mint to the cooking water.
Fish and chips are also popular in the Unites States as in Britain. In Scotland we were served chips with fried fish, also mashed green peas.
My parents did not eat salads, didn't seem to care for them. My mother, who was from Scotland used to cook, them cream carrots. not very good.
Some of these cakes sound so rich and fattening. So many Americans are overweight. Yes scones are popular in Scotland. We went to Scone Palace.
Whiskey yes, Scottish whiskey.
I enjoyed reading this essay. It is interesting where, why, how people eat. Also how much they want to spend. I learned much from this article.
So eat what you like and enjoy.
Too much sugar and fats are not good, heavy food also not good, hot drinks, tea is popular, there are many different kinds of teas. Hot drinks in cold, wet weather is excellent. Different kinds of spices are excellent to make foods more tasty. Sugar not. British folks do like too much sweet in their food. Not good, plus fattening.
I don't like oatmeal or any other type of hot cereal. I was brought up on these cereals, but can't eat them. I have cold cereal, but add fresh fruit to them, good and healthy. No sugar. When I was in Scotland I did eat British breakfasts. Some good, some not. Heavy breakfast, no. I do not use milk in tea, I prefer honey in hot tea, none in iced tea. I usually don't eat a heavy breakfast, maybe once or twice a week.
Wow, heavy food for lunch. A school lunch on cold days in the states popular with kids, tomato soup, Campbell soup and grilled cheese sandwiches. Some of the British food sounds good, other not, too heavy. Apples sauce is good with pork. I agree. My father liked horseradish with meat and I do also. Pickles not so much. Mutton is not popular in the sates, but I do like mutton pies which I can't find. Beef pies yes, mutton no.
Yes, fried fish popular in the states with chips which is also popular in Britain. I had some good soup, potato and leaks in Scotland, tomato soup which tasted like canned soup. Mince pies are not popular in the States, people don't seem to care for them.
I am acquainted with some British food. I liked reading the recipes.
The apples sound great and healthy.
Good article, fun to read, what people eat, when, where, what time.
Nothing beats good roast beef, then sliced thin, pink on the inside, not overcooked.
Do British people still eat like this. This essay was written back in the 1940s.
Different types of jellies are popular in the states, my mother liked orange marmalade.
High tea is not called that in Scotland. In Scotland I went to an afternoon tea in Edinburgh. On cruses high tea is served with many sweet pastries, cakes cookies. Things are a bit different. Not everyone eats the same. Baked potatoes are also popular in the states. Also new potatoes with butter. I need to try mint to the cooking water.
Fish and chips are also popular in the Unites States as in Britain. In Scotland we were served chips with fried fish, also mashed green peas.
My parents did not eat salads, didn't seem to care for them. My mother, who was from Scotland used to cook, them cream carrots. not very good.
Some of these cakes sound so rich and fattening. So many Americans are overweight. Yes scones are popular in Scotland. We went to Scone Palace.
Whiskey yes, Scottish whiskey.
I enjoyed reading this essay. It is interesting where, why, how people eat. Also how much they want to spend. I learned much from this article.
So eat what you like and enjoy.
May 20, 2023
This is a review of the specific titular essay by Orwell, in which, within the space of only a few pages, the English author and commentator manages to mount a very valid defence of English food against the common perception that it hardly fares up to the standard of French and other Continental cooking. Now, this perception, for some strange reason, has lasted - and rather unfairly because I believe that English cooking is indeed sorely underrated - give me a plate of fish and chips or bangers and mash over even pizza or spaghetti and I will always find the former more fulfilling. And true to my expectation, Orwell was able to argue quite convincingly that there's a lot more to English and British cooking than meets the eye.
I happen to live in India, one of the bastions of the Empire, and happily for this Anglophile reader, our erstwhile rulers have indeed left something of an indelible influence on our own cuisine itself. Every hill station here (hill stations being established by the British in the first place) has its resident bakery - still serving almost English tasting tarts, cakes and muffins - and there is plenty of fruit jam and even orange marmalade in circulation here, even becoming a part of the breakfast in some cities. Making conserves with sugared fruits has become something of a hobby for some housewives who live here in some of the cities, cakes and biscuits have become local delicacies too. And so, as Orwell rattles off a wonderful list of everything that makes English and British cooking special, from the cakes to the marmalade, from the potatoes to the puddings, right down to the loaves of bread, that have become the default bread here too, one is indeed charmed and impressed and compelled to reexamine one's thoughts and views on British food. There's certainly a lot more to it than just fish and chips and haddock, certainly.
What's missing in this elegantly written essay is a sense of conclusion. Orwell does not really probe deeply into what has caused this misconception in the minds of the people about English cooking. He merely suggests that there are not enough purely English restaurants and eateries available to the tourists - a very valid point, indeed - but one expected him to go a little further in coming up with some more solutions as to how it can be done. That said, I suspect this is only a minor niggle - Orwell does mention that there is a rationing in force at the time of writing this and hopes that the end of the same will ensure a more lasting legacy for British food, something which did happen to an extent. Dishes like spotted dick, Yorkshire pudding, sticky toffee pudding and even something as humble as baked beans on toast have really survived and become household names in their own right. And there are a whole spree of recipes to make them right and even tweak the ingredients. Most encouraging, indeed but Orwell, with all his skill for foresight, could surely have foreseen that too.
Still, on the whole, a fine little essay and a specimen of the general truth that Orwell's non-fiction was far more enlightening than his fiction.
I happen to live in India, one of the bastions of the Empire, and happily for this Anglophile reader, our erstwhile rulers have indeed left something of an indelible influence on our own cuisine itself. Every hill station here (hill stations being established by the British in the first place) has its resident bakery - still serving almost English tasting tarts, cakes and muffins - and there is plenty of fruit jam and even orange marmalade in circulation here, even becoming a part of the breakfast in some cities. Making conserves with sugared fruits has become something of a hobby for some housewives who live here in some of the cities, cakes and biscuits have become local delicacies too. And so, as Orwell rattles off a wonderful list of everything that makes English and British cooking special, from the cakes to the marmalade, from the potatoes to the puddings, right down to the loaves of bread, that have become the default bread here too, one is indeed charmed and impressed and compelled to reexamine one's thoughts and views on British food. There's certainly a lot more to it than just fish and chips and haddock, certainly.
What's missing in this elegantly written essay is a sense of conclusion. Orwell does not really probe deeply into what has caused this misconception in the minds of the people about English cooking. He merely suggests that there are not enough purely English restaurants and eateries available to the tourists - a very valid point, indeed - but one expected him to go a little further in coming up with some more solutions as to how it can be done. That said, I suspect this is only a minor niggle - Orwell does mention that there is a rationing in force at the time of writing this and hopes that the end of the same will ensure a more lasting legacy for British food, something which did happen to an extent. Dishes like spotted dick, Yorkshire pudding, sticky toffee pudding and even something as humble as baked beans on toast have really survived and become household names in their own right. And there are a whole spree of recipes to make them right and even tweak the ingredients. Most encouraging, indeed but Orwell, with all his skill for foresight, could surely have foreseen that too.
Still, on the whole, a fine little essay and a specimen of the general truth that Orwell's non-fiction was far more enlightening than his fiction.
July 30, 2021
I will start of by saying if you have never read Orwell before do not start with this. Start with 1984. But if you like his work read his essays. They are a very a good commentary on the politics of the time. I also think that it is interesting to compare what he writes about in his books to what the world is like today.
I would just quickly like to sum up the last chapter (in defence of English Cooking) in a word with incorrect grammar at the end, ‘interesting?�
Not the best book and not the worst.
I would just quickly like to sum up the last chapter (in defence of English Cooking) in a word with incorrect grammar at the end, ‘interesting?�
Not the best book and not the worst.
June 17, 2020
Finally, I have found some one of importance who defended English cooking!
One of my favourite dinners is a good Sunday dinner; yorkshire pudding, roast potatoes and veg, brussel sprouts...
Not to mention all of the fantastic puddings; picking blackberries as a kid to bake in an apple and blackberry pie.
One of my favourite dinners is a good Sunday dinner; yorkshire pudding, roast potatoes and veg, brussel sprouts...
Not to mention all of the fantastic puddings; picking blackberries as a kid to bake in an apple and blackberry pie.
November 2, 2017
My only gripe is that the title is totally irrelevant to the bulk of the book. In the first few essays (which are about nationalism and the war), Orwell feels like a demanding personal trainer who puts us through the usual mental exercises.
December 21, 2022
A valiant effort, but I remain unconvinced. Probably the only valid point the multiculturalists have (in the case of England and English-descended nations only) is that globalisation has improved both the variety and the quality of the food.
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January 2, 2024Reread this little booklet in 2023. My first read was likely in 2012 or 13. Precise date is lost. The namesake essay at the end of the collection does reduce a Chinese traveller's dread of English food a little. Just a little. A good laugh, though.
May 17, 2017
As relevant today as the day it was written.
August 28, 2019
Orwell is a better writer than what is exemplified in this collection of WWII era essays.
January 11, 2021
A small collection of Orwell's essays. My favourites are notes on nationalism and the prevention of literature but all of them were excellent. Makes me want to pick up a book of his full essays.
July 25, 2023
Painfully Brittish and noticeably written in the 40's
January 21, 2024
Orwell looking at English food on the World Stage. This is completely outdated now from when the book was written, but, understandable observations for the time period.
March 14, 2024
In what world are haggis and tattie scones english
May 30, 2024
An instant George classic, Notes on Nationalism is prime Orwell. This is why we love him 💪
June 8, 2024
i did enjoy the titular passage the most, and would love to cook Orwell a yorkshire pudding.
October 2, 2024
There’s no defending that stuff
December 16, 2024
I aspire to know a place's cuisine as well as Orwell knows English cooking.
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