Immigrants and Their Gifts to the British Stomach

[bigc]

Ethiopian restaurant called Menelik near where i live Caledonian Road N1.....Not sure what they serve......? i could guess and say a red cross parcel, but would get slated so i wont............just what is ethiopian food ?

I didn't come across that one on Cally Road. There were a few there, ADDIS and Marathon spring to mind.

Uncle Eric burgers were my favourite in that area..

 

[Marty McFly]

It has come to my attention that the Cornerstone pub near the bottom of Elm Grove does a rasty tasty Jamaican roast of a sunday.

The Jamaica Inn on Portland Road does a LUSH Jerk Chicken Roast. Yum!!

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

The inventor of the kebab died about a month ago (true story, not a joke):

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/4295701/The-man-who-invented-the-doner-kebab-has-died.html

Wonder if he carried a Doner Card?

 

[coventrygull]

There is nothing more British than fish and chips – eaten with salt and vinegar, fish and chips is one of our Great British institutions.




Humble Beginnings

But where did this famous culinary delight originate? The simple answer is that no one really knows. We do know that fish and chips were developed separately. The French invented chips or “chipped pommes de terre a la mode” (from the humble potato commonly believed to have been brought to Europe by Sir Walter Raleigh in the 17 th century), and in 1839 Charles Dickens referred to a “fried fish warehouse” in Oliver Twist.

The great British fish and chip trade grew out of these existing small businesses which sold fish and chips separately in the streets and alleys of London and some of Britain’s industrial towns in the 1850’s.

I thought fish and chips had a jewish origin?

 

[Hennes]

I thought fish and chips had a jewish origin?

Fish and chips - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ja, Sammy Isaacs war en mensch.

 

[northstandnorth]

if it was not for those pesky foreign johnny's we would still be drinking warm muck made out of honey.
for it was the continentals who introduced HOPS as an ingredient in BEER, deryk carver wasn't only lauded in brighton(and commemorated by the pub carrying his name)for his opposition to the papacy but for the introduction of Hops to Brighton brewing.

Hops - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[coventrygull]

if it was not for those pesky foreign johnny's we would still be drinking warm muck made out of honey.
for it was the continentals who introduced HOPS as an ingredient in BEER, deryk carver wasn't only lauded in brighton(and commemorated by the pub carrying his name)for his opposition to the papacy but for the introduction of Hops to Brighton brewing.

Hops - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Dutch are very good at selling us weed.

Good article. I love beer

 

[brakespear]

The Bahar in Worthing....finest doner and blue cheese sauce in the land

 

[northstandnorth]

The Bahar in Worthing....finest doner and blue cheese sauce in the land

f*** the food.let us end this thread with the greatest gift immigration has given us.

BEER

 

[GT49er]

The variety of food that has been brought to this contry is astonishing and wonderful - and welcome (although to be honest I've never had anything I'd consider eating again at an African restaurant).
But in some cases, I wonder if the price we're paying for this wonderful diversity of food isn't a price too high..........................

 

[fatbadger]

Useless but true - there were curry houses in Britain before there were fish & chip shops!

The first Indian takeaway shop was opened in London in 1810, by a chap whose name I forget who later moved to Brighton where he made his fortune running a bath-house. The first chippies didn't arrive until the 1860s (the first is generally believed to have been a market stall in Oldham, although Preston claims to have had a market stall selling fish and chips earlier). Somewhere in Lancashire, anyway. The idea is that the chip (very popular in Scotland) and fried fish (very popular in southern England) met in Lancashire as they each spread throughout Britain.

Anyway, to answer the original question - living in central Scotland I particularly appreciate the Italian cafes and ice cream shops. They also do the best chip shops up here - and yes, I know Scottish chip shops, with a few glorious exceptions, are pretty poor compared to England's, albeit generally better than the shite you have to put up with on the south coast (Lincolnshire has the best chippies in Britain!). For true fusion food, you can't get better than macaroni cheese and chips (the best I've found being Fionda's in Hamilton) or, to take it to the extreme, the fantastic Italian chippy in the Orangefield area of Greenock, if only for their 'chips arrabiatta'. Yum.

 

[Gwylan]

Useless but true - there were curry houses in Britain before there were fish & chip shops!

The first Indian takeaway shop was opened in London in 1810, by a chap whose name I forget who later moved to Brighton where he made his fortune running a bath-house. The first chippies didn't arrive until the 1860s (the first is generally believed to have been a market stall in Oldham, although Preston claims to have had a market stall selling fish and chips earlier). Somewhere in Lancashire, anyway. The idea is that the chip (very popular in Scotland) and fried fish (very popular in southern England) met in Lancashire as they each spread throughout Britain.

Sake Dean Mahomed is the bloke in question. One of Brighton's buses is named after him.

And as others have pointed out, fish and chips isn't exactly British either. Fried fish came to these parts courtesy of Jewish immigrants and the origins of chips are bit shrouded in mystery but one theory, as was pointed out above, is that they were introduced by French/Belgians - although I've also heard a theory that they were invented by Irish immigrants. What isn't in question is that the potato is not native to these shores but was introduced in the 17th century - so even the raw material is foreign.

That Wiki article mentioned above highlights Sam Isaacs, the London and Brighton fish-and-chips man. One of my father's sayings, when we wanted something extra for dinner, was "what do you think this is, Sam Isaacs?" I wonder if that was a common Brighton phrase from the 30 and 40s.