Cuisines
British recipes
Roasts, puddings, and unfairly maligned baking.
British cooking spent most of the twentieth century being apologised for and has spent the last thirty years being reassessed, largely by people rediscovering what it actually is: roasting, baking, preserving, and a genuinely serious tradition of puddings. It is a cuisine of the oven and of the long, slow, wet cook rather than of the fast pan. It is also, more than most, a cuisine of the constituent ingredient — a British recipe often reads as thin on the page because the quality of the meat, the flour or the butter is carrying it. The recipes here include the Sunday things, the baking that made the reputation, and the borrowed dishes that have been here long enough to be naturalised, which is a large part of what British food now means.
26 recipes
Vanilla Custard
A pouring custard of egg yolks, milk and cream thickened over low heat until it coats the back of a spoon.
Swiss Roll
A fatless whisked sponge baked in ten minutes and rolled while it is still hot, which is the only way it curls without cracking.
Sticky Toffee Pudding
A dark date sponge skewered and soaked with hot toffee sauce the moment it leaves the oven, then served with the rest of the sauce.
Split Pea and Ham Hock Soup
Yellow split peas simmered with a smoked ham hock until they collapse into the broth, thickening the soup with nothing but themselves.
Spiced Fruit Tea Loaf
Dried fruit soaked overnight in strong tea, then stirred into a batter with no fat in it at all and baked slowly into a dark loaf.
Roast Chicken with Lemon and Thyme
A whole chicken salted and left uncovered in the fridge before roasting hot then moderate, so the skin crisps and the breast stays juicy.
Lemon Drizzle Loaf Cake
A creamed-method lemon loaf finished with a granular sugar and juice drizzle poured on hot, which sets into a crunchy crust.
Creamy Oat Porridge
Rolled oats cooked in milk and water and stirred throughout, which draws out the starch that separates creamy from watery.
Chicken Thigh and Potato Traybake
Bone-in thighs roasted on top of potatoes and lemon in one tin, so the skin crisps above the juices rather than poaching in them.
Braised Red Cabbage
Shredded red cabbage cooked slowly with apple, vinegar and spice, the acid going in early so the colour stays bright.
Baked Rice Pudding
Pudding rice baked in whole milk for two hours without stirring, until the grains collapse to cream under a browned nutmeg skin.
Smoked Haddock Kedgeree
Smoked haddock poached in milk, the rice then cooked in that same liquid, folded together with boiled eggs and curry spices.
Smoked Haddock Chowder
Undyed smoked haddock poached in milk, with that milk becoming the soup and floury potato doing the thickening in place of flour.
Sausage and Bacon Breakfast Bap
Sausages cooked slowly from a cold pan, bacon crisped in their fat, and the roll toasted on its cut face so it holds together.
Roast Leg of Lamb with Garlic and Rosemary
A bone-in leg studded with garlic and rosemary, roasted hot then moderate and pulled off the heat pink, with gravy made in the tin.
Mushrooms on Toast
Mushrooms seared hard in a wide pan until they brown, then finished with garlic butter and piled onto thick toast.
Everyday White Tin Loaf
A straight-dough sandwich loaf made with commercial yeast and no starter, baked in a tin so it slices square for toast.
Espresso Martini
Vodka, coffee liqueur and a fresh shot of espresso shaken hard enough to build a proper crema on top.
Dry Martini
Gin and dry vermouth stirred down cold and served straight up, with a lemon twist or an olive and nothing else in the way.
Crushed Roast Potatoes
Floury potatoes parboiled, crushed flat and roasted in hot fat, so the broken surfaces crisp into edges a whole roast potato never gets.
Crumpets
A wet yeasted batter cooked in rings on a low griddle, with bicarbonate stirred in at the end so the holes open right through.
Crisp Roast Potatoes
Floury potatoes parboiled with bicarbonate of soda, roughed up in the pan, then roasted in fat that is already smoking hot.
Classic Scones
Plain scones brought together in under a minute and cut straight down with a floured cutter, so they rise tall and split cleanly.
Buttery Mashed Potato
Potatoes steam-dried in the pan and pushed through a ricer, then beaten with butter before the hot milk goes in.
Beef and Ale Stew with Herb Dumplings
Chuck steak simmered in dark ale until it gives, with suet dumplings steamed on the surface of the pot for the last half hour.
Apple and Blackberry Crumble
Tart Bramley apples and blackberries under a rubbed-in oat crumble, mixed by hand in one bowl with no mixer needed.